Inside The As

Las Vegas Fans Sound Off on A's New Ballpark Renderings

Jason Burke|
Dec 22, 2024; Las Vegas, Nevada, USA; The Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign on the Las Vegas strip.. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
Dec 22, 2024; Las Vegas, Nevada, USA; The Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign on the Las Vegas strip.. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

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Oakland Athletics

The Athletics had their ballpark development agreement approved on Wednesday by the Clark County commissioners, as the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported earlier this week. They still need to set the guaranteed maximum price for the ballpark, which was last tallied at at least $2 billion, and an update on that front is expected during the Las Vegas Stadium Authority meeting in November.

To celebrate this new achievement, the A's had another rendering drop, and let's just say the fans found it lackluster. First, here is Mick Akers of the Review-Journal with the initial new drop.

First off, it's a little concerning for the A's that the main reporter for the newspaper of record dropped a new rendering of the ballpark and it tallied all of 65 likes on social media. It produced 64 comments and 53 re-posts/quotes. That's a ratio, folks. This is the type of post that should be getting thousands of likes, but people just aren't excited about the A's in Vegas.

"The Athletics are not doing a good job of getting us excited about the $2B ballpark with these lame renderings" is what Las Vegas Locally had to say. That post received 421 likes last we saw.

A number of fans pointed out that a white roof is an awful idea, given that the baseball is also white. Too many fly balls will be lost this way. Other fans pointed out that the dugouts were non-existent. While these are just renderings and meant to give an idea of the look and feel of the ballpark, having some of the key details locked in would be terrific.

It would be quite the jump for the A's to have to go from clubhouses that aren't attached to the dugouts in West Sacramento, to no dugouts at all.

Schools Over Stadiums, which is the group that has been fighting the public funding that's going to the A's, sure didn't miss a chance to poke fun themselves.

"Even in the renderings for the publicly funded stadium, the A's are wearing visitor uniforms."

If you zoom in real closely, it would appear as though the New York Yankees have Gerrit Cole on the bump in home pinstripes in this rendering, while the A's are in gray pants. Again, it's just a rendering, but it's that lack of attention to detail, like "is the home team dressed in white?" that is generally missing from the A's plans.

"Even worse for generating excitement: realizing the As will be playing in it" seems to be the general sentiment of the local fans.

"This looks like something from the freaking Sims." Whoa! The Sims are catching strays now?

"Do you know how I know this is fake? All the fans here are wearing A's gear. We all know that if, and that's a BIG IF, if this stadium were to be built, 95% of those fans would be wearing the visitors' jerseys." The Las Vegas Raiders have had trouble filling up their stadium with home fans, especially in big rivalry games.

It's tough to imagine a ton of green and gold in the stands when the Yankees of Dodgers come to visit. It's also hard to imagine that those tickets would be cheap.

Dean is not a fan of this rendering, saying, "this is bad. Very bad." He's also the demographic that the A's would have to worry about catering to as a Golden Knights/Dodgers fan.

Even the Review-Journal's own columnist had to jump in on the action, saying, "Optimistic as all the fans are wearing A's gear." That's coming from the 2013 NPA Journalist of the Year and a UNLV Hall of Famer.

There were plenty of other comments, including a number from fans in Oakland and the Bay Area, but we wanted to keep this more local to Vegas. There were also Vegas fans that had NSFW replies, and we wanted to keep things clean. The big takeaway here is that the attention that the team is receiving (which is limited given the circumstances) is also negative.

The most baffling part of this rendering coming out is that this was sent out in a fan survey in which they were asking prospective season ticket holders questions to gauge interest and potential pricing options. If the team felt that this rendering, which apparently nobody likes, was the best representation they had, then that could be worrisome to the very people they're trying to woo.

The A's are at a point in this process where they keep wondering why people are doubting that the ballpark is happening, given that they had a ceremonial groundbreaking on the site in a tent, but at the same time, instead of not releasing new renderings, they pushed this out there to create more buzz for the ballpark. They ended up creating the wrong kind of buzz.

A brand new uninspired rendering at this stage is something that you push out when you're up against a wall and need to entice people, not when everything is going well. If things are going as expected, then take some time with the rendering. This isn't rocket science, but the A's sure make it seem like it is sometimes.

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Jason Burke
JASON BURKE

Jason has been covering the A’s at various sites for over a decade, and was the original host of the Locked on A’s podcast. He also covers the Stanford Cardinal as they attempt to rebuild numerous programs to prominence.

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