Latest Updates on the A’s Las Vegas Ballpark: Financing, Timeline, and What’s Next

Some updates following the latest LVSA meeting

Gold shovel with Athletics on it in the dirt as the team's ceremonial groundbreaking in Las Vegas | Athletics

Thursday marked the final meeting between the A's and the Las Vegas Stadium Authority of 2025, and the big takeaway from the AP report is that the club is saying they're still on track to open up the $2 billion ballpark in 2028. The year-end goals are being met, primarily with them "having cranes in place and putting in the first buttress and concrete column."

But we've all seen the updates on the ballpark's construction over the past few months. Those are easy to find, given that the A's themselves will post those on social media, showing the progress being made at the ballpark site in Las Vegas.

But one question that hasn't been answered—how A's owner John Fisher is paying for this ballpark—has eluded an explanation. According to the AP, A's vice chairman Sandy Dean said that despite the increases in price from an estimated $1.5 billion to $1.75 billion, and now $2 billion, he doesn't expect the cost to increase much more.

Detractors of the project will find it interesting that Dean did not have an update on new investors in the project, though the franchise has been looking for Las Vegas investors, which is why they hired Galatioto Sports Partners back in April of 2024. 20 months later they haven't had any luck getting them their goal of $500 million.

A little over a year later, Fisher decided to try and sell the San Jose Earthquakes, who have been valued at around $600 million by Sportico. Dean has said that none of the money from that potential sale will go towards the funding of the ballpark project in Las Vegas, but that would appear to be tough to believe given how the two values line up so neatly.

Thus far, there has been no announcement of a buyer for the Earthquakes, meaning that potential piece of the funding hasn't come through yet either.

For those heavily invested in the Las Vegas park's success, Dean also dropped this quote in the AP.

"I think the most important thing is that starting in December of 2024, we were able to describe the financing for the stadium as being complete,” Dean said. “We have the ability to bring in some investors. We thought, in particular, if we have Las Vegas investors, that will be a positive.”

The question here remains whether or not the A's are to be believed on how secure the funding is. There are plenty of longtime A's fans that are sticking with the "I'll believe it when I see it" approach to this project after years of dealing with the team under Fisher's ownership. Newer fans are more ready to accept what ownership says at face value.

Steve Hill of the LVSA also mentioned that the expectation is for the A's to request their $380 million in public assistance, granted by SB1 in 2023, sometime next year. The Las Vegas Review-Journal also noted that the projected is being worked on without a guaranteed maximum price contract with stadium contractor Mortenson-McCarthy, which is a big step that has yet to come.