[vertig0/Marine Layer's has followed the A's ballpark situation for the last 6 years, in great detail. If you want the latest on the stadium situation in all aspects, his site is the best, and this interview is especially awesome - Zonis]

Last week I did a two-hour interview with Lew Wolff, similar to the interviews Blez has conducted in the past. Since my blog is all about the team's continuing quest for a ballpark, the interview focuses mostly on stadium issues, baseball's internal politics, the process, and economics. The transcript of the interview has been split up into five parts, with the first part posted on Monday. The final part is now up. If you're interested in the subject matter, check it out.

• Part 1 – History of working in Oakland, 980 Park site, Process
• Part 2 – Oakland now and what it takes, Earthquakes, contraction
• Part 3 – Territorial rights, Giants’ motives, Dodgers/Mets, Coliseum
• Part 4 – Tarps, discounts, player development, CBA, payroll, T-rights again
• Part 5 – Redevelopment, Target Field, Cisco Field, Keith Wolff, museum and history

When possible, editor's notes have been added. 

If you want a recap, Field of Schemes has a good one.

I received a note this morning from Jim Pappas, KTRB's VP and GM. The station has FCC and FAA approval to construct a new transmitter in Sonoma County. The 50,000-watt facility would seriously augment coverage in the North Bay and Sacramento. By now you've seen the existing coverage map:

The new Sonoma Daytime transmitter map (exclusive of existing transmitter) looks like this:

Much better, right? It is a Daytime transmitter, and Nighttime operation is in the works as well, though it would come later (application with the FCC already on file). For those who believe in miracles, don't expect the transmitter to be ready in time for Opening Day. It's not like building a skyscraper in terms of complexity, but it's still quite tall and requires proper preparation and testing. Maybe before the end of the season. The deal between the A's and KTRB is only for one season, but this gives you an indication of where both parties would like the relationship to go. Both want to be serious Bay Area radio players, and they want to do it together.

This is where you come in. Construction of the transmitter is wholly dependent on approval by Sonoma County's Board of Zoning Adjustments. KTRB is ready to build pending approval. The transmitter has not yet come up for review by the BZA. When it does, KTRB will draft a letter to request fan support. I'll post it here. The board usually meets twice a month, and like the EIR process in Fremont, it is open to public comment. You can go to the meeting at 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa, CA, 95403, or send written comments to that address.

I'll update this post when a hearing date is finalized.

I covered last night's ballpark workshop. I didn't catch anything new, but KTVU reporter Lloyd LaCuesta did. I took a screengrab.

This is considered a green light to talk with San Jose, a city that has to overcome territorial rights restrictions (Santa Clara County is Giants territory). Despite this, they have four things in their favor: a ballpark site, an adjacent site to develop, future BART and Caltrain/High Speed Rail nearby, and an already completed environmental impact report. I have received a few messages indicating that territorial rights will be discussed this week at the Winter meetings. Those talks may be limited to television rights as related to the launch of the MLB Network. They may be expanded to include Santa Clara County.

I will be at the Fremont City Council session tomorrow evening and will report here and at the ballpark blog.

Incumbent Fremont mayor Bob Wasserman won re-election last night, defeating councilman Steve Cho and former mayor Gus Morrison, whose attempt to turn the race into a referendum on Cisco Field fell short.

Excerpting myself from the ballpark blog:

Incredibly, the results paint a rather favorable picture for the A's and their hopes to get the baseball village built. Several potential obstacles in Fremont have been removed. Incumbent mayor Wasserman, who has been the staunchest public proponent of the project, will stick around to see it through the EIR process at the very least. Wieckowski, also a supporter, will be there as well. They'll be joined by Chan, who is also a project supporter. Neither of the project's biggest critics, former mayor Gus Morrison and Sierra Club chapter leader Vinnie Bacon, placed higher than third in their races.

Is it smooth sailing from here on out? Not quite. Wasserman may have violated election laws in recuiting students from local high schools to campaign on his behalf. The fallout from that is unknown. The EIR still has to pass muster. The council has lobbied hard for concessions and so far the city and the A's have been able to find common ground. There remain issues to work out with private parties such as nearby businesses and landowners, but those are very doable. The upshot from tonight is that there won't be obstructionists making the decisions. That's not to say that the council are yes-men - far from it, in fact. Instead, the governing body should be of an open-minded view to make a deal that works for Fremont's residents, not one that derails it in service of a narrow agenda.

These results effectively act as the nail-in-the-coffin for any future formal referendum on the ballpark project. Now it's onto the environmental impact report, which I suspect will be released sometime in the next couple of months.

With all of the complaints regarding the poor timeslot for the A's-Twins ALDS, I come bearing bad news: It's probably going to continue.

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Looks like Lew isn't waiting until Opening Day to move forward. Out of today's Tribune comes the following quote from Lew Wolff:

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A seven-alarm blaze is burning at the old HomeBase site just south of the Coliseum. All of the local news outlets are covering it, the news stations should all have video.

I took pictures of the site a few months ago and compiled them into an overview (PDF) for the ballpark blog.

The fire was threatening the EDD building next door. It probably doesn't threaten the arena or stadium, but there are some structures on the perimeter like a cell tower and the football seats that may be in jeopardy.

One of the items on tonight's agenda is the consideration of a preliminary feasibility study on a Fremont-area ballpark. I'll be at the meeting. Note the last sentence in the description below:

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I brought some coworkers to today's game for a little decompression time, which was well worth it despite the A's poor performance. One coworker who had never been to an A's game before asked me if I had season tickets, to which I replied, "Look around. Why would I need to buy season tickets?" That's a sad, unfortunate reality. Even those of us who go enough times to merit a partial plan (20-40 games) don't feel the need to invest in one as long as we can always get good seats when walking up or even just a few days before a game.

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I can't even remember the last time the A's actually won one of the these tiebreaker coin flips.

ESPN article

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I'm clipping this from the ballpark blog because, well, I wrote it so I'm not going to call myself out for copyright violations.

BTW, Blez, have you ever been asked for a business card when getting a media credential? I felt a little sheepish about that. I have business cards from my day job, but those won't exactly work. I did beat work several years ago, and I have to admit the blogosphere has changed things immeasurably.

Enjoy.
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29-7.
That is the A's record this season when the gametime temperature is 74 degrees or higher. Yes, it is a complete coincidence, but it is extremely curious, considering the fact that the A's have made a name for themselves as a second-half team, or more correctly, a summer months team (June-July-August).

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Now that Lew has given some details on his ballpark, here's your chance to chime in. What would you like to see in the new ballpark?

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I've gone to 4 games this week. Since I knew that tonight's game would have 40,000+ in the stands, I understood that there would be more casual fans. More basic questions about what's happening in the game that shouldn't annoy me but do. But the most cringeworthy, inevitable phenomenon when that big of a crowd comes is The Wave. Sure, the families have fun watching it. I don't even resent the fact that it's a Euro-soccer thing - if Crazy George started it here, then it's an Oakland thing too.

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A's rumors spark a political dust-up

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The long version of this update is available at my ballpark blog, http://newballpark.blogspot.com

There's also news on a new State Senate Bill for stadium construction, and my take on an Oakland Tribune Op-Ed article.

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Tonight the A's promising OF prospect Travis Buck is playing 3B for the Sun Devils. Apparently head coach Pat Murphy wanted to have more power throughout the lineup, so Buck's at the hot corner.

In the bottom of the 4th, Buck had quite an adventure with a foul pop-up, which he misjudged in the twilight. The ball land at least 10 feet away from him near the third base coaching box. He redeemed himself immediately thereafter by catching another foul pop-up in almost the same spot for the third out. ASU coaches and players were laughing, and Buck added to it but letting out a hoot and a fist pump on the way into the dugout.

Buck also had the only hit for ASU through the first four innings. It happened to be a 2-run homer to right to give the Sun Devils a 2-1 lead.

I checked outside to see if anything froze over. Negative on that, so I guess "The Leader" must be shortstaffed tonight. Urban's good. He's covering the A's including his opinion on Chavez, World Cup baseball, the Whizzinator, even managed to butcher Giants reliever Tyler Walker's name (mistook it for disgraced cyclist Tyler Hamilton). Turnabout is fair play I guess.

Best quote from Urban?

"If I'm Scott Rolen, I don't wanna be whippin' out the Vlad Guerrero model."

Sadly, it's all-too-brief a taste of something resembling A's radio.

I don't really care for the promotional giveaways, so I often come to games just before first pitch just to avoid the riff-raff. The usual handful of people walking the wrong way on the BART bridge with said giveaways is always disturbing, but at least it wasn't as bad as some bobblehead days.

I got a seat in View section 311, but snuck down to 104 in the 3rd inning. I made one major observation:

The crowd was tremendous.

It looked like a crowd of around 20,000, and after Dotel finished Harris off, it still looked like 20,000. No mass exodus, even though the team went down 3 runs twice. No boos and catcalls, even though the defense clearly deserved it (except for Kotsay). Lots of standing and cheering during 2-strike counts. The place was thick with nervous energy - first to see if the streak would be broken, next to see if they could come back a second time. There was a little comedy relief when balls kept escaping the bullpen and the Byrnes-Jr-esque ballboy ran to the outfield wall to retrieve them. Speaking of which, what is going on with Brandon Buckley?

I definitely can't expect this type of crowd to fill a new, more expensive ballpark, but last night, they represented themselves well. I've come to expect good, albeit small crowds at the Coliseum, but last night's was much better than most, and they had no reason to be. Props all around to those who were there.

I also posted this on my ballpark blog, http://newballpark.blogspot.com.

Interested in getting the A's more coverage? Then get Wolff to buy KTCT.

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I hate to keep piling on the "Fire Hank" bandwagon, but frankly Greenwald is obviously going through the motions. I'd much rather see Tim Roye or Glen Kuiper in the booth. At least they appear to be interested.

So far I've caught two mistakes by Hank, who I know is has been much better than he has been with the A's:

Nick Swisher = Steve Swisher
Danny Haren = Dan Harden

I've created a blog to keep track of news and discuss financing of a new A's ballpark:

http://newballpark.blogspot.com/

It currently has a mockup of what a 40,000-seat ballpark would look like on the Coliseum South/Hegenberger property. It'll eventually have different designs and a wish list. Let me know what you think.