The A’s break ground on planned $1.75B Vegas stadium

The MLB’s Oakland Sacramento Athletics this week broke ground on a new 33,000-seat, $1.75 billion stadium in Las Vegas, in a ceremony featuring club, city, and league officials.

The event, more than four years in the making (somewhat surprising given Las Vegas’ marriage laws), follows a saga that included securing MLB approval to move from Oakland to Vegas, a tearful departure from Oakland for a stint in Sacramento, and an initially unveiled stadium designed used to secure Nevada state funds that was later walked back and replaced with the current plan.

But…The project, which has a target completion date of Opening Day 2028, isn’t quite a done deal. A’s owner John Fisher, heir to the Gap fortune, still needs to scrounge up additional funding (apparently he hasn’t checked the banana stand…or in his case, the Banana Republic stand).

• Experts also say the early-2028 completion date may be aggressive, given the often-optimistic nature of construction timelines, as anyone who’s ever done a kitchen remodel can back up.

It’s not just the A’s: At least 39 major sports venues are currently being built or renovated across North America. An academic paper published in 2023 argues pro sports is in the midst of its “fourth wave” of stadium construction, as teams look to upgrade or replace aging venues built in the 1990s, the busiest stretch of pro sports stadium construction on record.

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