OAKLAND — A warm applause greeted Jason Giambi as Tony La Russa introduced him as the Oakland A’s latest Hall of Fame inductee. It was a bit surprising given the way Giambi left a 102-win Oakland team for the New York Yankees and a lucrative contract 12 years ago.
Giambi fleeing town was a slap in fans’ faces, so his comments in March that the team’s potential relocation to Las Vegas would “be amazing” served as a gut punch. Giambi doubled down on his pro-Vegas thoughts in the minutes before the A’s Hall of Fame ceremony on Sunday afternoon prior to the final Bay Bridge Series game against the San Francisco Giants.
“If you’re a fan, you’re going to follow your team no matter what,” Giambi said. “That’s the part that’s exciting, the buzz in Vegas. There’s a lot of great players that have come out of there. (Bryce) Harper, (Joey) Gallo, Kris Bryant. It’s not just California that has great baseball, a lot of great baseball is coming out of Vegas.
I hope all the people that are serious A’s fans will come out. I know they’ll miss their team, but I hope they’ll all stay A’s fans because they’re a special group.”
Giambi, who lives in Las Vegas, won an MVP as part of some of the most electric A’s teams baseball has seen in the franchise’s 55 years in Oakland. An emotional Giambi reminisced about the days that earned him this Hall of Fame honor; playing with the “Big Three” of Tim Hudson, Barry Zito and Mark Mulder; learning from fellow slugger Mark McGwire, touching the same grass as his idols Terry Steinbach and Dennis Eckersley.
Nothing compared to the two years he was A’s teammates with his brother, the late Jeremy Giambi, who died of suicide in 2022.
“Those were my favorite two years of my career,” Giambi said at the podium after accepting his Hall of Fame green jacket.
The organization’s threats to move to Las Vegas felt all the more flippant in light of their Hall of Fame ceremony celebrating the A’s rich history in Oakland. Generations of Major League Baseball’s biggest superstars spanning from the 1970s three-peat teams to the late 1980s and 90s super-teams and early 2000s trailblazers sat elbow-to-elbow.
Giambi, Carney Lansford, Gene Tenace, the late Bob Johnson and the “voice of god” PA Roy Steele were the newest inductees with current Hall of Famers Tony La Russa, Rickey Henderson, Eckersley, Dave Stewart and Rollie Fingers at the ballpark to celebrate with them.
Tenace used his acceptance speech as a tribute to his teammates who died recently: Vida Blue, Sal Bando and Ray Fosse.
In his introduction, Stewart made a point to call Lansford the true captain of their World Series-running teams of the late 1980s and 90s. Lansford, a San Jose native, kept thoughts of the team’s potential relocation to himself.
Other Bay Area native Hall-of-Famers were more outspoken.
Henderson, an Oakland native who spent 14 of his 25-year MLB career with the A’s, pointed a finger at the city for letting the A’s slip away. Notably, Henderson is a special advisor to president Dave Kaval, who is leading the A’s relocation movement.
“It’s saddening, not angering,” Henderson said. “I’m an Oakland A’s guy. I am Oakland. I work for the organization. I’m not just angry with the organization, I’m angry with the city. They can’t get anything together. We lost a lot of professional teams here. It can’t just be the team, it has to be something with the city.”
Asked about A’s fans protesting the relocation — a movement that started with a “reverse boycott” in June and turned into a fan-led demonstration in ballparks across the country — Henderson said fans’ anger needs to be directed at the city of Oakland, too.
“The team means a great deal. The protesting against the organization, I’m not too fond of all that because I aw other teams that left and we can’t keep them. It’s not that the fans won’t come out and support them, I know they are the type of city that will support the team. But who is trying to get it done? I always say if the city wants a team here, they’ll make it happen.
The city ain’t putting that much effort into keeping the team. They want the team, they say they do. Somebody has to stand up and make it happen. You can’t make it happen you can’t blame the organization. They have things to accomplish too. As a fan, I’m pissed off. As a player here, I’m angry because I know that the city is not sitting at the table to make a decision. It’s a sad time, and I hope it don’t even happen.”
Fingers, another special advisor to Kaval, expressed his sympathy for the As fans who may see their beloved team uprooted.
“I’m sure the fans are upset, because if you’re an Oakland A’s fan, you’ve been coming here for 50 years,” he said. “Now all of a sudden, you’re not gonna have a team here. I’m sure they’re going to be upset, and I’m sure they’re going to voice their opinions.”
Staff writer Joseph Dycus contributed.