The Las Vegas Strip took centerstage Monday morning when the baseball world held a groundbreaking ceremony on the home stadium of the Las Vegas Athletics.
The event brought out Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred, Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo, and other dignitaries to add to the city’s latest push to dub itself the Sports and Entertainment Capital of the World and bring even more tourists to the city as part of diversification efforts.
Speakers referenced casino developer Bally’s and land owner GLPI for making the 35-acre site available for the A’s stadium, slated to open in 2028. Bally’s Chairman Soo Kim was traveling and wasn’t in attendance.
“The opportunity to welcome Major League Baseball and the A’s to our city will go down in history and be part of our skyline for decades and decades,” said Steve Hill, CEO of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. The LVCVA helped broker the deal that brought the A’s to Las Vegas, with funding by the state legislature and Clark County.
Hill said Las Vegas knows how to come together and make projects happen by removing obstacles for entrepreneurs. He emphasized that fans of other MLB teams will want to come to Las Vegas to see their team play in what he said will be an iconic ballpark built at the intersection of Tropicana Avenue and the Las Vegas Stdrip.
“We’re on a site that has meant so much to Las Vegas,” Hill said. “This has been a place that welcomed dreamers, and entrepreneurs and made people stars. We’re going to do that again on this site. This iconic location is going to be an epic ballpark and no better place in the United States to watch Major League Baseball.”
A’s owner John Fisher said he couldn’t wait for the stadium to open and pointed out it’s part of a much larger project. “It’s going to have a tremendous Bally’s resort on it.” Fisher thanked Bally’s and GLPI executives for “making this happen.”
Manfred told the audience that Las Vegas has proven to be a great host to professional franchises. He said MLB is excited to bring baseball as another entertainment option to southern Nevada.
“Today is the beginning of a new chapter in the A’s great history,” Manfred said. “The team is going to build Las Vegas an unbelievable, awesome and iconic ballpark.”
The project faced opponents of the legislature providing $380 million in funding for the $1.75 billion project. Advocates countered that the stadium will pay for itself by generating hotel and sales taxes and other revenue from tourists it brings to Las Vegas. Some 30% of fans attending the games are expected to be visitors, an estimated 400,000 extra a year.
Gov. Lombardo cited some “sleepless nights” over the votes to make the project a reality. It finally came together in a special legislative session he called in June 2023.
“This is the culmination of hard work, blood, sweat and tears, and vision for us to have success in the state of Nevada,” Lombardo said. “When asked by the media today what this means to me, you might think it’s sports, sports, and sports. It isn’t. To me, it’s an economic driver. It’s jobs and the ability to be the true Entertainment Capital of the World and drive everything home in what we envisioned.”
U.S. Rep. Dina Titus, whose congressional district includes the A’s stadium and Strip, pointed out that baseball will now join an immediate area that has Allegiant Stadium hosting the Raiders, T-Mobile Arena hosting the Golden Knights, and Mandalay Bay hosting the Aces. F1 also holds an annual race on the Strip.
“The icing on the cake is going to be the A’s,” Titus said. “It’s going to be great for the economy. Not only will you see baseball games during the season, it will be hosting other kinds of events in the park that will go on throughout the year.”
The National Finals Rodeo, currently held on the nearby campus of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, has been speculated as possibly moving their early-December event to the new 30,000-seat stadium.
Nevada Assemblymember Steve Yeager, who helped usher through the deal with Lombardo, said no one can deny the impact of sports facilities coming to Nevada. The $2 billion-plus Allegiant Stadium was funded in part by an increase in the hotel tax.
“It also adds a home team for locals, a favorite fascination for visitors to see their team play, and a facility that can serve for meetings, events, and concerts,” Yeager said. “We truly are the Sports and Entertainment Capital of the World. This stadium will be another validation of that.”
A’s fans in the Oakland area continue to demand Fisher sell the team to owners who will keep it in that city and build a new stadium. Fans and some in the media have questioned whether Fisher has the finances to fund the stadium and even said they doubted it would ever get built.
A’s television announcer Dallas Braden, a former pitcher for the team who grew up in northern California and emceed the groundbreaking ceremony, concluded the program by having the speakers don A’s hardhats and pick up shovels whose handles were shaped like baseball bats. The group stood around a replica infield with dirt, which they scooped up on cue and turned it over for the assembled crowd and media. Immediately behind them was a window showing construction equipment and an enlarged sign of the future home plate.
“We all thought about when this moment becomes reality,” Braden said with construction equipment in the background of the air-conditioned temporary structure where the ceremonies were held. “It’s real when you have shovels in the dirt.”
