How the Oakland Athletics Broke My Heart
It started when I was 5, somewhere in the mid-80s. My mother was probably 26-ish. That’s when she took me to my first baseball game. It was the Baltimore Orioles vs. the Oakland Athletics. I remember this because she caught hell, and so did I from her, for insisting on an Orioles hat because of the cartoon bird on the front. We were in her company at the time’s skybox, which in the 80’s at Oakland Alameda County Coliseum, meant something. Long before the tone-deaf apology letter from owner John Fisher letting A’s fans know he did everything he could to keep the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, long before the penny-pinching that drove an esteemed franchise into the ground, long before…well I could go on forever.
It was in the 70’s way before I was alive that my mother babysat for one Jim “Catfish” Hunter while he pitched in the World Series. It was those teams of the 70s that Billy Beane referenced the other day on the KNBR morning show with Murph and Markus as “the Ramones to San Francisco’s Bee Gees” as just being gritty vs. cute. The “Swingin A’s” as they were known. The only team outside of the Bronx Bombers to win 3 consecutive championships.
In my generation, it was Dave Stewart, an Oakland native dominating. It was the Bash Brothers and Eck. It was Ricky Henderson holding up third base in front of Lou Brock and all of Alameda County and the world stating he was the greatest. It was sweeping the Giants in the earthquake series, “Battle of the Bay” in 89. It was my favorite Walt Weiss. I had to love these guys because if I didn’t, mom would never take me to the Stick.
That’s why today is tough. Not only for The Town and the true Oakland Athletics fans like my mother. Losing their souls, childhoods, and memories, getting ripped away to a AAA stadium in Sacramento. So today I’m taking my mom back to a place where my love of baseball started. The tickets on Gametime at time of posting weren’t cheap but I shelled out 300 bucks for two in section 150 of the bleachers. It was worth every moment. Every penny. I could hear Dave Stewart telling me to do a nice thing every day. Even if it doesn’t get noticed.
I walked by where me and my friends sat In the black hole. My season tickets in section 310 overlooking the same spot for the Raiders. I walked and I walked knowing this was it. The fans were rowdy and in good spirits considering the looming defeat that was ahead even in an A’s victory.
This was the last time and chance I had to say goodbye to a place that shaped my life. I never wanted to be an A’s fan but they were a part of me. They were a part of East Bay culture. And now they are dead.
Howdy! My name is Katy Atchison and I'm an Associate Editor for Broke-Ass Stuart.
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