The slow painful death of the Oakland Coliseum

Discussing the Oakland Coliseum and it's history

[GoOp]

It’s shocking that the stadium wasn’t bad at all before they added the massive center field upper deck

[edalder]

My father lived a ten minute drive from The Oakland Coliseum. I visited every summer and got to see Canseco, McGwire, Stewart, Eck, Hendu, Welch, Ricky and many more.

I sat in the original bleachers and they were great!

Mount Davis was an awful downgrade. But the Coliseum had lack of upkeep that allowed the facilities to fall part.

Words can't describe my sadness.

[NN-bvlq]

I’m no architect but the natural scenery or skyline is better than looking at a bunch of drunks

[jonstefanik]

I remember seeing Mount Davis being constructed and thinking, "I don't like the look of this."

[abakella]

In hindsight, they should have added Mount Davis on the other side of the stadium. That way, instead of blocking the scenic view of the Oakland Hills, it would've given more fans that experience

[danterojas]

I vividly remember always sitting in the old wooden bleachers before mount Davis. I love the Coliseum warts and all! Lots of great memories there! Lots of great history!

[kimlanglewis]

The Coliseum was a great place to go to, especially if anyone remembers Malibu just in the south parking lot area. Being a kid it was fun in the 80's and early 90's: Go to an A's game on a Saturday or Sunday Afternoon. Then head on over to watch Mullin, Weber hoop it up at the Oakland Arena, and then walk on over adjacent to the parking lot, ah yes, that big castle entry inside, arcade games galore, and beyond that, go kart racing and batting cages. Those were the times!

[chalesgolding]

It absolutely looks like a “coliseum”. I love this stadium and would tear down mt Davis and reincorporate it’s original look ….

[Erlov]

New seats, new paint, new signs, replacing old/dirty misc. things, a giant screen up on Mt Davis and we’d have been good man.

[CheeseMasterSports]

The Coliseum was an absolute cathedral in its day, likely the most beautiful of all the multipurpose stadiums.

[robertryan]

Imagine if all of the following multipurpose stadiums still existed thst were torn down between the 90s and the 2000s were still being used, but stopped receiving regular maintenance. That’s pretty much the Oakland coliseum.

[williambutler]

Funny how a seat next to the dugout in Fenway is like a seven lane interstate highway thru a big city. A seat next to the dugout in Oakland is like a dirt road in Wyoming. A foul ball near an Oakland dugout is 30 rows back in Fenway.

[Owensully]

The first picture looked beautiful! I see many similarities to Dodger Stadium like you said. Gotta feel bad for A’s fans. Vegas is going from no teams to almost every sport in a matter of years

[jcasetnl]

Part of the problem is that by the end of the 90s, the coliseum was already seriously showing it's age. It was a blue-collar facility, but that was okay because Oakland was still fairly blue-collar. After the tech bubble and all the silicon valley money that poured into the bay area, the population and fans changed. They no longer were okay with a rough but scrappy ballpark. They wanted it to be clean and family friendly. SF saw this coming and it's why they abandoned Candlestick, which if you're old enough, you know was also a blue collar park. At the Coliseum in the early 2000s, fights, drunkenness', people puffing blunts, etc were huge problems (my father worked there at the time). They fired their inept security and started using OPD. It became pretty safe again, but the problem of it looking like a dumpster was never addressed and the family dollar started leaving for SF. Even my dad, who worked there both in the early '80s and 2000s, won't go there because it's just such a dump. I don't even mean the infrastructure, either, it's just grimy and nasty. They just got lazy and half-assed about cleaning the place. The last time I was there was around 2019 and it was shocking how rundown and dirty it was. Still, the As managed some decent and even amazing seasons, so the fans put up with it.

As soon as the A's stopped winning, and winning big, the fans left in droves. This is like if you're dating a hot chick and you put up with her terrible personality, always being late, always complaining, expensive tastes, but hey, she's hot. Then one day she tells you she only wants to have sex once a month. There's nothing to fall back on. You were putting up with the negatives for that one big positive. The A's one big positive was winning. Soon as that stopped, the fans started wondering why they were paying $20 for a beer to sit in a filthy, stinking ball park in the worst part of town.

Even today, they're still charging $50 for halfway decent seats and I wonder who would ever pay that much for such a terrible experience and losing team. But the ballpark is, if anything, just a reflection of Oakland city leadership's ineptness and wanting their palms to be greased before any decision. This is why all this "there's still a chance" talk will never amount to anything unless LV reverses and the A's have no other choices.

"What the f*** happened to you Oakland? Your ass used to be beautiful."

[beancount]

My dad had Raider season tickets even before the Coliseum. The good part was that our seats were on the 50 yard line. The bad part was that the seats were the wooden benches in center field. The seats were cramped and uncomfortable. It was cool that we got to walk near the sideline getting to and from the bleachers.

[abbyantweil]

The slow painful death of watching this video.

[Damuthafuccka]

Without MT Davis, I think the A's would've stayed

[thewolfpacktoyreview]

2:04 Mark Davis? What was he like 17 at the time of the upgrades?

[bizzles]

Couple things to add. Nice video though. First of all, when the Raiders came back the Coliseum it didn't have luxury boxes. That was a big reason Al NOT Mark wanted a new stadium in LA. Luxury boxes or "suites" were making a lot of revenue and he didn't have any. That was one of the reasons Mt Davis was added as well as additional seating. So if you remove that now, you remove the suites also. Davis never specifically asked or demanded any of the renovations in the 90s. He made it known what he wanted and the politicians in Oakland-Alameda did the rest and as I understand, taxpayers were so furious at the horrendous deal they approved, all those people were fired or left their jobs shortly after. I believe it cost $500 million for the renovations, that was something else you missed. That couldve funded a brand new stadium in 1995. INCREDIBLY stupid decision compounded by the fact they got maybe 10 years of solid use out of it, if that. Also in 1995 when the Raiders first came, they had an odd field configuration that was really bad and never used again after Mt Davis was completed, didn't mention that either. During that 1995 season they also had an issue against the Colts where there were no speakers for the game somehow... All kinds of wonky stuff to unpack.

[chunga]

What kills me is they still do the same tired, boring stuff between innings, like dot racing, find the ball under the batting helmet, and their version of the Brewers’ hot dog/sausage run, with caricatures of Fingers, Henderson, and somebody else in a race around the stadium.