Tank's 30 Ball Park Tour: Oakland Coliseum

Barstool Sports

9/25/2024

Frank The Tank

Transcript

00:00Welcome to the Oakland Alameda County Coliseum.

00:20You can almost hear John Vicenda say that every time.

00:23And well, we was once home to Raiders.

00:27Raiders left, and then they went to Los Angeles.

00:33When they came back, they built this monstrosity.

00:37You're walking in here, it kind of feels like you're walking into a tomb.

00:41It looks like a tomb, and it is.

00:44As the A's have been playing a season-long wake in their final season in Oakland.

00:50Let's check out the Oakland Coliseum, which was built in the 60s for the Raiders.

00:55The A's moved in in 1968, and are moving out.

01:00Let's check it out.

01:04There's nothing.

01:06There's nothing outside this ballpark.

01:07This isn't a ballpark, it's just life after people.

01:10You can take the Barden, and you see just how bad and how damaged the city of Oakland

01:17is from just how poor it is.

01:20They can't afford to build a new stadium.

01:22They can't afford to keep the A's.

01:25Just as much as this stadium has rotted, the city has rotted.

01:31There seems to be a couple people trying to have a good time out here, doing maybe a little

01:37bit of tailgating over here.

01:39But there's nothing for fans outside the gates.

01:41When you walk in from the Bart, it feels like you're walking through a prison with the way

01:45the fences are set up.

01:47In terms of ballpark outside atmosphere, is there a way to give them an F-?

01:53I was in the Coliseum late one night, when my eyes beheld an awesome sight, and A's homerun

02:01had begun to rise, when suddenly, to my surprise, he did the bastard.

02:07It caught on in a flash.

02:09He did the bastard.

02:11He did the monster bash.

02:13The A's have put up a nice little mural under history in Oakland.

02:20And you know, one thing that I haven't seen?

02:24They've won four World Series in Oakland.

02:27There are four World Series trophies.

02:29Where are they?

02:34Those should be on display for the fans to see, not hidden in a team corporate office.

02:40So in terms of honoring your history, the A's get an F!

02:51Wow!

02:54Wow!

02:57Wow!

03:00And do the bash!

03:03It's always important to fans.

03:06In hopeless situations, a team getting ready to leave, and they're out here banging drums,

03:11making noise.

03:12When the A's are making playoff runs, this section was the rowdiest section in baseball.

03:19And now...

03:33Sidelines to the stadium are weird.

03:38I mean, we got the football pleasure.

03:40The foul territory here is the biggest in baseball.

03:46That's going away.

03:49The cozy feel you have in a baseball game doesn't exist here.

03:52That's why for sidelines, the A's get a D.

04:04You know, the athletics have had kind of a vagabond existence.

04:10As they played their final games in Oakland, this is not the first time they've moved.

04:14This team was founded in Philadelphia in 1901, and were a powerhouse.

04:20They went to the 1905 World Series, won it in 1910, 1911, 1913.

04:26But after losing the 1914 World Series, rumors of players throwing the World Series

04:31led Connie Mack, the owner-manager, to sell off all the players.

04:36And the A's instantly became one of the worst teams in baseball history.

04:40I think one year they went, like, dirty in 117.

04:44Worst winning percentage before the White Sox this year.

04:48But in the late 20s, they got good again.

04:50They had Jimmy Foxx, they had Lefty Grove.

04:53They went to the World Series and won it in 29, won it again in 30.

04:57But in 31, they lost to the Cardinals.

05:00And after that World Series, due to the Great Depression and the stock market crash,

05:06which was very hard on Connie Mack,

05:09they had to sell off the players again.

05:11And their next 20 years, they were pretty bad.

05:16Connie Mack was manager of the A's and owned them until 1950.

05:20And then he finally stepped down as manager,

05:22winning and losing as manager in baseball history.

05:25In 1950, the Phillies made a surprise trip to the World Series

05:29and stole the heart of Philadelphia away from the Athletics,

05:33who were the more successful team.

05:35So in 1954, the Athletics moved to Kansas City.

05:40A guy named Arnold Johnson, who was a part owner of the Yankees,

05:44brought the Athletics to Kansas City, which had been the Yankees' farm scene.

05:48And over the next seven years, the A's kind of were a farm team of the Yankees.

05:53For example, in 1961, when the Yankees won the World Series,

05:56there were 10 former Athletics on the Yankees.

05:59If the Yankees needed a player, they just called the A's,

06:02any player they want, for nothing.

06:04It was a collusion that was just horrible that this actually happened.

06:10I mean, the A's history of bad owners is just incredible.

06:14You guys in the bullpen are listening.

06:16All right, well, I got to try a hot dog at every stadium.

06:21And of course, you know, they say that the food service here

06:26is like failing health grades, that it's not clean.

06:30Like the whole stadium is just falling apart.

06:34The whole stadium is falling apart.

06:37But we'll do a hot dog review.

06:43Hot dog to bun ratio, no bueno, not good.

06:47Coloring, not good.

06:50Feels like it sat in a drawer for like 20 minutes or at least three hours probably.

06:56It's cold. It's terrible.

07:05It's chewy. It's the chewiest hot dog I've ever seen.

07:08There's no, it's not, snap, forget snap.

07:11It's like chewing gum. It's not going down. It's not swallowing.

07:16This legitimately is like the worst hot dog I've ever had.

07:23In 1961, after Arnold Johnson died,

07:27Charlie Finley brought the team and said that that's going to change right now.

07:31He changed their colors to green and yellow because he was Irishman, very proud Irishman.

07:36But he didn't like being in Kansas City.

07:38First he tried to move it to Dallas.

07:40Then eventually after Kansas City got the expansion team set up,

07:45he moved the team to Oakland.

07:47And they became successful within a few years.

07:50They had a dynasty. They won five straight division championships,

07:54won three straight World Series.

07:56They won the World Series in 72, 73, and 74.

07:59But Charlie Finley wasn't very rich independently,

08:03and he knew that free agency would not, he would not be able to keep up with them.

08:06So he eventually had to trade off everyone, and he sold the team.

08:10And then in the 80s they got good with the Brash Brothers and Tony LaRusso,

08:14and his team was, his team was competitive.

08:16They built Mount Davis, and the cracks began to fall.

08:20They got new owners that couldn't afford to sign anybody, so they did Moneyball.

08:25And Moneyball worked for a while until other teams learned about Moneyball

08:28and started doing it themselves.

08:30But the A's for the most part had a grittiness, a competitiveness,

08:35that lasted until 2020 when John Fisher basically,

08:39knowing that if they were bad he could move them,

08:42so he basically did Major League.

08:44And now that's where we are now with John Fisher,

08:46and they're going to play a couple years in Sacramento.

08:50Vegas is kind of a sketchy situation, but Major League Baseball wants the A's in Vegas,

08:55so they're going to Vegas.

08:56The A's have an interesting history of bad owners and up and down history,

09:01and it's crazy.

09:14You know what you see over there?

09:17You notice that you don't see any advertising on top of the scoreboard?

09:21They lost their sponsor deal with the stadium over the whole move.

09:28So they just pulled that name off the tag, and they haven't put anything back.

09:33It's a symbol of just the decay of the stadium.

09:40Hey, how's it going?

09:42How's it going?

09:44Here we go.

09:45Here's Stomper.

09:46Now, you know, the elephant was originally derogatory for the A's.

09:50In 1905, John McGraw called the Philadelphia Athletics white elephants,

09:55and then they said the A's had defiantly made the elephant their logo.

10:00And now when they were in Kansas City they used the mule,

10:03And now when they were in Kansas City they used the mule,

10:05but in 1988 they brought the elephant back and Stomper was born.

10:27They do have a little bit of an open concourse.

10:29That's kind of a surprise, but it still feels dated.

10:35It feels dated.

10:37It is dated.

10:39So in terms of concourses, I'm going to give the Oakland Coliseum a D+,

10:47with the infrastructural problems of the stadium.

10:51The toilets have been known to overflow into the visiting and home clubhouses.

10:57They had a nest of possums last year up in the visitor's broadcast booth.

11:02And as I mentioned, the Board of Health gives the food rating at the stadium an F,

11:09and basically they sent out a warning to their fans,

11:13eat at your own risk.

11:15These are the food lines,

11:17because there are no open concessions elsewhere in the ballpark but the first level.

11:23So basically we give food options here an F.

11:29These guys, these workers, these concession workers,

11:32unless they work for the Giants also,

11:34and some people do double duty,

11:38they're not going to have a job.

11:40That's another person hurt by this whole mess.

11:43You know, when a team moves, it's sad for everyone.

11:48It's sad for everyone.

11:50And that's just the feeling I get here.

11:53I feel the sadness. I feel the longing.

11:56I feel like this is...

12:02The stadium is talking to me.

12:04And the Oakland Coliseum is saying to me,

12:07I feel empty.

12:10They don't have urinals here.

12:12They have troughs.

12:14That's how outdated this ballpark is.

12:17They have troughs.

12:20In terms of bathroom cleanliness,

12:23this stadium gets an F.

12:25Well, if the stadium's immaculate or a mess,

12:29it's good to have these dude wipes, personal grooming wipes,

12:34on your body, on your person.

12:37So after those ballpark nozzles go right through you,

12:41you can be clean and fresh,

12:44even in the worst bathrooms in baseball.

12:51This isn't good. This isn't good.

12:53The way this has been handled has been atrocious by everyone.

12:59John Fisher, the city of Oakland, and the commissioner

13:03are all bad guys here.

13:05There are no good guys. There are no heroes.

13:09This is a Major League ballpark.

13:11Just say to yourself,

13:13this is a Major League ballpark.

13:16This is disrepair.

13:20Basically, you have everyone saying fuck you to each other,

13:25no one's helping each other,

13:27and Major League Baseball's driving the bus to Vegas.

13:39Five, four, three, two, one.

13:44Go, Oakland!

13:47Go, Oakland!

13:50One, two, three, six.

13:53Go, Oakland!

13:58In the 70s, there was a homemaker

14:01who got a job in the Oakland A's office.

14:03She was good at making cookies.

14:06The owner of the A's, Finley, liked the cookies so much

14:09he said you should start making them and selling them.

14:13Finley helped her start her business.

14:19Her name was Mrs. Fields.

14:25Here's another story.

14:27In the late 70s,

14:30there were kids that would come around the stadium,

14:32sometimes sneak in the stadium,

14:34and there was this young boy

14:36who would always ride his bike around the stadium.

14:41Finley saw him coming to every game

14:44and sneaking in and said,

14:46I'll let you be a bat boy

14:48so you don't have to sneak in anymore.

14:50Someone remarked to him that he looked like Henry Aaron.

14:55All the players in the A's

14:57would call this bat boy Little Hammer.

15:00He even had his personalized jersey,

15:03Little Hammer.

15:04A decade later,

15:06he became one of the top-ranked ballers of all time,

15:09MC Hammer.

15:14Here's another story.

15:15During the pandemic,

15:18when they had all the cardboard cutouts out,

15:20they had a special one of a former peanut vendor

15:23who was a 17-year-old kid

15:25working his way through high school,

15:26though he became an actor.

15:29Tom Hanks.

15:33And those are the things that are going to be lost

15:36when this stadium goes away.

15:48All right.

15:50What happened here is a tragedy.

15:53This stadium was allowed to rot.

15:56The whole situation here was allowed to rot.

15:59This was once a great fan base.

16:01This was once a great-looking stadium.

16:07It's an F.

16:08But not just the stadium failed.

16:10Everyone failed.

16:12The fans of Oakland.

16:20Spiderwebs, spiderwebs.

16:23In Oakland we have spiderwebs.

16:26Ballpark not maintained.

16:28That is why they're going away.

16:31Look out.

16:32They got some spiderwebs.

16:34Take me out to the ballpark.

16:38Take me to each one.

16:42I'm hitting the road and I'm reviewing everything.

16:46Inside, outside, even the game.

16:50Of course, there will be a raw dog.

16:54Plus the ballpark specialty.

16:57As I review each ballpark in the MLB.

Tank's 30 Ball Park Tour: Oakland Coliseum

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