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Shop at Jay’s Market at 190 East Flamingo Road at the Koval Lane intersection east of the Strip.
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By Alan Snel, LVSportsBiz.com Publisher-Writer
WEST SACRAMENTO, California — It’s about 8 AM Sunday and a young woman is walking an angular brown dog that’s adroit at jumping on the top of oversized decorative baseballs along Sutter Health Park.
Before the A’s open their new palatial domed stadium on the Strip, they need to play three seasons at this Triple-A minor league baseball venue that’s capable of holding a tad more than 14,000 fans just over the Tower Bridge across from the California capital.
You’d think it would be all quiet on an early Sunday morning here.
But no.
There’s a 5K running race downtown and the little kids are already zipping along the pavement near the ballpark that also houses the Sacramento River Cats, the San Francisco Giants AAA affiliate that actually was in Summerlin playing the Las Vegas Aviators Sunday. A DJ under a white 10-by-10-foot tent was blaring loud music as the runners made their way down the road.
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It is what it is.
Sutter Health Park is a minor league ballpark with a big paved parking lot on one side.
The A’s and Rivers Cats/Sutter Health Park/NBA Kings owner Vivek Ranadive split the costs to upgrade the scoreboard, grass, premium seating, digital displays and WiFi technology at the venue.
But the fact it’s still a minor league ballpark. And it’s safe to subjectively say that the Aviators’ Las Vegas Ballpark, which cost $150 million (thanks to an $80 million naming rights deal by the LVCVA), is a lot nicer than Sutter Health Park.
While I bicycled around the streets in the “Bridge District” where Sutter Health Park is located, the A’s were playing in Denver against the Colorado Rockies in the final game of a three-game series. The A’s had won the first two games Friday and Saturday.
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The A’s played their first game at Sutter Health Park six days ago.
It did not go well for the Athletics. The Cubs blew out the A’s, 18-3.
The A’s said the game was a sellout of 12,119, with the second game drawing 10,009 and the final Cubs-A’s game attracting 9,342.
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It’s hard to find more different settings for the A’s in 2025-2027 in West Sacramento and in 2028 on the Strip.
Downtown Sacramento and the Capital area have light rail and lots of bicycle lanes, while the Strip has hardly any public transportation (a bus along Las Vegas Boulevard).
The Tower Bridge is a nice connector from Sacramento to West Sacramento and the temporary A’s home. Expect lots of tourists in Las Vegas to either walk, take shuttles or pay for Ubers to reach the $1.75 billion baseball playground on the Strip.
The A’s have decorated the Sutter Health Park entrances with their colors and photos of their players.
But it is what it is.
It’s still a minor league ballpark and the A’s plan to play here for three seasons before christening a new ballpark on the Strip that will have 30,000 fixed seats and room for 3,000 more for a capacity of 33,000.
The A’s say they want to have a groundbreaking in either April, May or June — Q2 2025. We are in that time window.
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The neighborhood around Sutter Health Park looks like a mixed bag.
There’s a new residential multi-unit structure that’s a neighbor, but then there’s a small sea of asphalt for a stadium parking lot and even some industrial-style development on another side of the ballpark.
Across the bridge there’s high-powered state government, lodging and restaurant development and perhaps those folks will take a ride or walk across the bridge to the A’s game. Maybe a little like people from the Strip taking the Hacienda Avenue bridge spanning Interstate 15 to reach the Raiders’ Allegiant Stadium.
The attendance at the Coliseum was meager with owner John Fisher not bankrolling much of a roster and the lame duck A’s bound for Las Vegas. The A’s drew an average of 11,386 per game in 2024, up from 10,276 in 2023, which was more than the 9,849 in 2022.
With the Padres in for three games Monday to Wednesday before the New York Mets come to town Friday to Sunday, there should be some robust crowds at Sutter Health Park this week .
LVSportsBiz.com will be there this week.
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