When Plan A doesn’t work, it’s time to switch over to Plan B. Which is exactly what a group of local Oakland sports fans have done in their bid to keep baseball alive in the Bay Area.
A consortium of roughly a dozen Oakland-area fans have come together to start an independent Pioneer-League baseball team which will be known as the Oakland Ballers. Or the Oakland B’s for short.
After the Athletics proposed move to Las Vegas was unanimously approved by MLB owners a few weeks prior, Paul Freedman and Bryan Carmel announced plans to spearhead the minor league baseball initiative.
While it would be easy to assume that the project, spearheaded by a group of high school friends, is a quaint attempt to keep the A’s legacy alive, it became evident early on that it was receiving support from some serious baseball staffers from around the state.
Former Seattle Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu has reportedly been hired as the executive VP of baseball operations, while former St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Micah Franklin will assume the role of team manager. Both have ties to the San Francisco baseball scene and have a vested interest in seeing baseball continue to thrive on the west coast.
In an interview with ESPN, co-founder Bryan Carmel said “We just felt like our hearts had been ripped from our chests, like all East Bay sports fans…Oakland is a city that has seen the Raiders leave town, the Warriors move across town. There was a lot of chatter that maybe Oakland isn’t a pro sports town. We reject that completely.”
The team plans to play out of Laney College stadium, a local Oakland junior college, and hopes to begin operations as soon as 2024. Already, the group has raised $2M in capital to help renovate and expand seating at the stadium, and improve locker room amenities. It’s believed that there are currently more than 50 investors who have committed money to the project thus far.
“We’re not here to replace what we lost,” Freedman said. “We mourn what was lost. What we’re here to do is say there’s a tradition in Oakland. We get to continue that. We believe when Oaklanders come together, nothing can stop us.”
The Pioneer Baseball League features 10 teams from Idaho, Colorado, Montana, and Utah. The B’s franchise will represent the league’s first team situated on the west coast, something that PBL president Mike Shapiro was ecstatic about.
“I am so excited to usher in the next chapter of the Pioneer League’s future with our expansion to Oakland, California,” Shapiro said in a prepared statement. “Launching our first club in Oakland underscores the PBL’s spirit of innovation and commitment to providing the very best
fan and player development experiences. The richly diverse Oakland community, with its historic baseball heritage, is a perfect first step for the PBL’s expansion beyond its foundational roots in the Mountain West states.”
While Athletics fans will be sad to see their beloved franchise pack up shop for the desert, they can at least take solace in the fact that professional baseball won’t be leaving the Bay Area altogether. Tickets for the expansion team’s inaugural season are expected to go on sale in the coming months.
-Kyle Skinner
Twitter: @JKyleSkinner
Photo: Quintin Soloviev. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.