Music blared from the speakers as a DJ spun popular sounds. A line about 30 deep stood waiting to order beer from taps attached to an old Greyhound bus. A din of noise rumbled like cars on a freeway amid the music and lines.
If you didn’t know any better, you’d have thought it was just any early evening at any popular drinking establishment.
It wasn’t.
“I just really felt the need to be here and be around others who are feeling the same emotions,” Clovis resident Jess Brooks, 42, said Thursday amid the crowd at The Terminal at Line 51 on Castro Street in Oakland, where members of a popular Oakland A’s fan group gathered for what they dubbed “The Wake.” The group, named the Last Dive Bar out of affection for the A’s Oakland home, in the words of Bryan Johansen “celebrates the Coliseum and its rich history.”
The group brought fans together Thursday following the team’s final game at the Oakland Coliseum. For the record, it will go down as a win: 3-2 over the Texas Rangers. That kind of lifted the mood.
Kind of.
“More than anything, I just feel really sad,” said Louis Quindlen. “I attended my first game in 1981 and have been coming ever since. Season-ticket holder for a lot of years. You’d like to think the owner would have a change of heart. But it’s hard to have a change of heart when you don’t have a heart.”
The stories about A’s owner John Fisher and his plans to build a new ballpark in Las Vegas with a detour in Sacramento until it happens have been plentiful. The damage to a community left behind has yet to be.
“A lot of people are feeling a lot of pain,” Johansen said, adding that he wanted to help people with grief that he said at times can be overwhelming.
“So this is like you just watched your mother die,” Johansen said. “Not only that, your father murdered her. Not only that, you had to go to 81 open-casket funerals, while your father justified and seemed proud of his actions. Not only that, 29 other family members (MLB owners) watched all of it and said, ‘This is fine.’ So that’s what it is. I didn’t want people to have to go home after the last game and have to sit with this by themselves.”
Oaland A’s fan Kyle Brown, center, shares a moment with his daughter Marureen, left, during a gathering remembering the A’s tenure at the Oakland Coliseum at Line 51 Brewing in Oakland, CA on Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. The A’s will play future games in Sacramento before their move to a permanent home in Las Vegas. (Don Feria for Bay Area News Group)
So they sat and stood with it among a group of like-minded people. A plastic tombstone reading “RIP Oakland A’s Fandom. April 17, 1968 – Sept. 26, 2024” sat on a small stage where people laid green and gold flower petals. Also on the stage were two giant Styrofoam forearms, commemorating the Bash Brothers era, a more glorious time in the team’s Oakland history.
Someone impersonating A’s president Dave Kaval, an object of fan angst, made a speech that elicited a rousing round of boos.
A green sign on the wall illuminated the underlying message, saying simply: “SELL!”
Even former employees and their sons were there. Longtime A’s equipment manager Steve Vucinich was among the patrons, which numbered barely a dozen when the final out was made but was overflowing with at least 300 two hours later. Trent Henderson, son of longtime A’s centerfielder Dave Henderson, also was there.
“It did not need to happen,” Vucinich said. “It did not need to happen. Did anybody tell Fisher about any of this or did he read about how fans are reacting? How can you see all of this sadness and be OK with it?”
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“I’m heartbroken like you all are,” Henderson said. “All in the name of greed, too. It’s terrible.”
One fan carried around a sign that said, “Oakland Forever.” Another wore a shirt that said “Sell John Fisher.”
“I can say this,” Johansen said. “If John Fisher thinks we’re going away, he’s crazy. One thing he’s proven he can do exceptionally well is not get a stadium built. So we are gonna keep the spotlight on him, expose what’s going on, and keep our hopes that maybe down the road we’ll be celebrating their return.”
Last Dive Bar Founder Bryan Johansen thanks A’s fans for their support at Line 51 Brewing in Oakland, CA on Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. After almost 60 years at the Oakland Coliseum, the A’s will play future games in Sacramento before their move to a permanent home in Las Vegas. (Don Feria for Bay Area News Group)