The Athletics received instruction from Major League Baseball on Tuesday to pursue possible relocation sites outside of Oakland following the organization’s struggles to move forward on the waterfront ballpark site.
While A’s president Dave Kaval told NBC Sports California it’s “Howard [Terminal] or bust” for the team to remain in Oakland, the players caught wind of the reports as well, but it appeared they have been used to these talks for some time now.
“We’ve been hearing this drumbeat for many, many years and I think all the players basically try to push it to the side and take care of our business,” starter Chris Bassitt said following the A's 3-2 win over the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. “We’ve got Dave Kaval, we got these guys worrying about it so. We’ve got so much crap to worry about throughout the day, we can’t worry about a ballpark.”
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Bassitt, a Toledo, Ohio native, has seen this before.
“It sucks from a fan’s standpoint,” Bassitt said. “I grew up a Browns fan. When the Browns left for Baltimore, I know that absolutely destroyed the fanbase, just destroyed fans so I feel really, really bad for the actual fanbase, but as it comes to the clubhouse, there’s nothing we can do. There really isn’t So we try not to think about it, try not to talk about it, it’s just -- we got business to take care of and that’s what we do.”
First baseman Matt Olson, who has been with the A's organization for nearly 10 years, was asked about the future of the team -- one that has a reputation of not holding onto players.
“Personally, I’ve been with the A’s since 2012, I got drafted by them,” Olson said. “I want to be an Oakland A.”
Oakland Athletics
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Olson also talked about the ballpark reports.
“As far as the ballpark and things like that, it’s a little out of control,” Olson said. “We kind of just got to go with the flow with that. As far as the organization and the people that we have here, we all want to be here. Like I said, it’s the team I got drafted by personally and I want to be here for a long time. That other stuff is, unfortunately, it’s out of our control, we just got to wait and see what happens.”