Cricket might be played at the Oakland Coliseum (Photo by Lachlan Cunningham/MLB Photos via Getty … [+]
The iconic Coliseum, with its stunning views of the Oakland hills a personal favorite for many seated in the terraces, is where the Athletics called home for 57 years.
It hosted almost 5000 baseball games. Those not au fait with America’s pastime sport might recognize the stadium from the hit 2011 film Moneyball starring Brad Pitt.
NFL team Oakland Raiders also played there for many years, but those two beloved franchises have been lured to the bright lights of Las Vegas leaving the Coliseum vacant.
Located near Interstate 880, the Coliseum has long been touted as a possible venue for the fledgling Major League Cricket. But it might soon become a reality with San Francisco Unicorns hoping the venue can be reshaped to the field dimensions of cricket, which differ markedly to baseball.
“We’re very lucky that it’s (the Coliseum) now available. We’ve never really been able to utilize it until this point in time,” Unicorns chief executive David White told KTVU. “I guess the ultimate deciding factor for us will be the cost. Then, we’re off to the races, as they say.”
The Coliseum was home to the Athletics for many years (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
Dallas, with its former baseball stadium in Grand Prairie becoming the hub of cricket in the U.S, has hosted the bulk of MLC over its first couple of seasons. But franchises such as the Unicorns are hoping to have their own home grounds by next year.
“I know cricket fans. I know their passion for the sport,” said White, who has informally presented the proposal to the Alameda County Coliseum Authority. “And I know that the 35-minute drive from Fremont to Oakland is not going to be something that’s going to stop them.”
As I’ve reported recently, officials from the Bay Area and Seattle want to be in the mix to host cricket matches at the Los Angeles Olympics.
Cricket will end a 128-year Olympic drought but venues have yet to be determined, with the men’s and women’s competitions possibly extending beyond Los Angeles.
As reported recently by Sportico, the LA 2028 local committee chair Casey Wasserman revealed at the Texas Business of Sports Summit in Austin that the cricket competition was likely to be played on the east coast although he did not name specific cities.
But options could be limited due to the logistical challenges of finding suitable cricket infrastructure marked by oval shaped grounds and a pitch in the middle. New York is the obvious destination having staged eight T20 World Cup matches in June at its $30 million modular stadium in Long Island.
The T20 World Cup was played in New York (Photo by Howard Schnapp/Newsday RM via Getty Images)
The cricket ground was torn down immediately after the tournament, but billionaire Mukesh Ambani, the owner of MI New York, reportedly has plans to build a world-class facility in the famous city.
But there are still a lot of unknowns and if the Coliseum can be repurposed into a cricket venue then it could lead to the Bay Area being thrust right back in the Olympic hosting mix.
“That is our hope and ambition, so that we can get it done in time for the LA Olympics,” Unicorns co-owner Anand Rajaraman told me last month when asked about having a venue ready well before Los Angeles 2028.
“That’s an internal deadline that we’re working towards. And clearly a lot depends on getting the support of the local government…wherever that is…to get things done in time, to get the permit approvals done.”
Home of so many memorable moments, the Oakland Coliseum might soon add cricket to its sporting lore.
