A’s fans lingered long after the third out of their 3-2 win over the Texas Rangers, soaking up every last minute inside the massive concrete Oakland Coliseum one final time. Now the club, one of Major League Baseball’s most storied franchises – founded in Philadelphia before a stint in Kansas City – is set to abandon the city of Oakland and its colorful fanbase after 56 seasons. The Athletics aren’t departing for greener pastures, but potentially – and we still don’t really know for sure – for a desert locale that didn’t ask for them. Oakland-born Dave Stewart, an All-Star hurler on the city’s last World Series champion in 1989, posed the question of the day on the A’s pre-game broadcast.
“What happened?” Stewart said. “There’s no real explanation for it. And any explanation that you give, it doesn’t cover the impact, and it doesn’t cover all the details of what really took place, for the Oakland A’s to be leaving this city, playing [in at] minor league baseball [stadium] in Sacramento for three years, and then eventually ending up in Las Vegas.”
