DETROIT — Major League Baseball is coming to Sacramento. Ryan Noda wants some assurances that the Oakland Athletics’ temporary home will be up to major-league standards.
The A’s players learned on Thursday that this will be their final season in Oakland. They’ll be playing at West Sacramento’s Sutter Health Park for at least the next three seasons while a new ballpark is built in Las Vegas.
Noda, the A’s first baseman, played some games at the Triple-A Sacramento River Cats’ ballpark as a minor leaguer and knows upgrades will be necessary.
“Concerns? The field, the locker rooms, the dugouts, the surface — making sure all the safety protocols and everything is up to par,” he said on Friday prior to the A’s game against the Tigers. “That field needs a lot of work, a lot of money put into it in order for it to be a big league place. As long as we’re willing to spend the money where it needs to be spent for us to spend three to four, maybe five, years there. That’s one of the big things they need to do.”
River Cats owner Vivek Ranadivé, who also owns the NBA’s Sacramento Kings, and Oakland A’s owner John Fisher jointly announced the move on Thursday. The River Cats, who are affiliated with the San Francisco Giants, will also continue to play at the Triple-A facility.
There isn’t much that can be done regarding the seating capacity. Ranadivé said that the venue currently seats 16,000 when counting the stands, the lawn behind center field and standing room only. Kaval said the A’s will pay for upgrades around the stadium as part of their agreement to play there.
It’s not unprecedented for a major league team to play at a Triple-A ballpark. The Toronto Blue Jays temporarily moved to Buffalo in 2020 and 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Noda hopes the A’s and River Cats transform Sutter Health Park like the upgrades made to Buffalo’s Sahlen Field.
“New walls, new dugouts, new locker rooms — everything they needed to become a big-league stadium,” he said. “As long as we can do something like that, then it’ll be all right. But it’s definitely going to be different than playing in a stadium that holds 40,000 people.”
A’s manager Mark Kotsay is confident that upgrades will be made. Kotsay hasn’t seen the Triple-A park since 2007, when he played for the A’s and went to Sacramento as a part of a rehab stint after undergoing back surgery. The Triple-A team was affiliated with Oakland at that time.
“I have no idea what the facility looks like,” he said. “I know it will be of Major League Baseball quality. It has to be of Major League Baseball quality. I know the Players Association will make sure that takes place, as they did in Buffalo. But those things are in the future. I’m focused on this team, focused on winning as many games as possible and focused on these younger players — a core that continues to build for the future.”
While the move will lead to logistic issues, outfielder Seth Brown said it’s nice to have some clarity regarding the A’s future. Fisher sought out a temporary fix when he was unable to come to an agreement with Oakland city officials regarding an extension of the lease at Oakland Coliseum, which runs out at the end of this season.
“At least as a player, you know where you’re headed,” Brown said. “There’s obviously a lot of moving parts, a lot of stuff we’re not privy to, so it’s just been kind of a waiting game on our end: Where are we going to go? Where are we going to be? So I think just having that knowledge — at least we know where we’re going to be playing next year.”
In the meantime, the A’s will have to deal with the uneasiness of playing in front of fans who know they’ll be leaving their city for good.
“We’re sad for the fans, the diehard fans, who always come to our games, always support us, always support the boys wearing the jersey,” Noda said. “At the end of the day, we have no control over where we go, where we play. We’re just here to play baseball and represent whatever’s on the front.”