Just five years after the Vegas Golden Knights became the first major professional sports team in Las Vegas, the city now boasts three big dogs.
The Oakland Raiders of the NFL, of course, moved to Vegas back in 2020 to join the Golden Knights and now the MLB’s Oakland Athletics have reached an agreement to build a new stadium in Vegas. Man… you’ve gotta feel for Oakland sports fans.
More details from ESPN:
The Oakland Athletics have signed a binding agreement to purchase land near the Las Vegas Strip, where they intend to construct a major league ballpark, team president Dave Kaval said Wednesday night.
The agreement is for a 49-acre site owned by Red Rock Resorts, the parent company of Station Casinos.
Kaval told the Las Vegas Review-Journal a $1.5 billion, 35,000-seat stadium with a partially retractable roof would be built on the site, adding that other developments, including restaurants and an amphitheater, are being discussed.
The A’s will work with Nevada and Clark County on a public-private partnership to fund the stadium. Kaval said the A’s hope to break ground by next year and would hope to be moved into their new home by 2027.
– ESPN
This has to be the first time in major professional sports that a city has taken two teams from another city. Again, you’ve got to feel for Oakland sports fans.
What concerns me the most though is that the Golden Knights, in my mind, will now be firmly in third place within the market. Part of the initial appeal of having the Golden Knights in Vegas was the novelty of it all as the city’s only pro team. Now, they’ll have to compete with America’s past-time (baseball) and well… America’s true past-time (football). I don’t like hockey’s odds in competing against those two sports, but then again anything can happen in Vegas.
Really, it’ll come down to the competitiveness of each team and who can put on the best show. We’ve already seen that the Golden Knights can ice a great team and that their in-game theatrics are second to none. This should serve them well in a competitive market.