Oakland Athletics at RingCentral Coliseum
RingCentral Coliseum has been home to the A's since 1968. It was the last stadium in America shared by pro football and pro baseball teams, a distinction that ended when the Oakland Raiders moved to Las Vegas after the 2019 season. While the Coliseum may not possess the aesthetic charms of other stadiums, a game there offers all the pleasures of a day at the ballpark. It's conveniently located near public transit, and on days when the team opens its upper-deck level, fans can stretch out and enjoy the views of the Oakland hills. A new "Treehouse" complex in left field features indoor and outdoor bars, a patio deck and a lounge.
Oakland Athletics History
Has there been a more colorful team in baseball? For a time, at least, this was true in the most literal sense. In 1963, Charlie Finley, the eccentric owner of the then–Kansas City Athletics, got the league's permission to switch the team's colors from the standard red-and-blue combo to a technicolor green-and-gold. Other teams then adopted snazzier uniforms, in what A's fans would point to as a longstanding league pattern: The maverick A's try something new, and the rest of the league follows suit.
The A's fingerprints are all over the current era of baseball, though they haven't won a World Series since the George H.W. Bush years. In 2003, Michael Lewis' bestselling book Moneyball chronicled the team's rational approach to winning on a shoestring budget under general manager Billy Beane. It helped bring about the statistics revolution across the league, changing everything from how players are evaluated to how defenses align themselves. Since 2000, despite chronically low payrolls, Oakland has won seven AL West titles and secured four Wild Card berths.
The Athletics were founded in Philadelphia in 1901, one of the American League's eight charter franchises. The team's owner and manager for its first half century in existence was the legendary Connie Mack, MLB's all-time winningest skipper. The story goes that after the New York Giants trounced the A's in the 1905 World Series, Giants manager John McGraw said that Mack had "a big white elephant on his hands." In response, Mack adopted the white elephant as the team's logo, which is still in use today.
The A's won five World Series under Mack. They've won nine in all, including back-to-back titles under Finley in the '70s shortly after moving from Kansas City to Oakland. In 1989, the A's met the San Francisco Giants in a World Series that is best remembered for having been interrupted by the Loma Prieta earthquake. It was a loaded Athletics team that swept that series, featuring the Bash Brothers of Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco, closer Dennis Eckersley, outfielder Rickey Henderson and manager Tony La Russa.
