sf giants standings entered the conversation again on Tuesday as former A’s owner Lew Wolff used a new memoir to argue that the franchise’s exit from Oakland was driven by the San Francisco Giants, not just by the A’s own decisions. In Moments, Wolff says the A’s left the Bay Area “100 percent due to the nasty, shameful, and continuing opposition of the Giants, ” a claim tied to the long fight over territorial rights and a move to San Jose. Wolff’s comments sharpen an already bitter story as the A’s continue their stopover in Sacramento and prepare for a future move to Las Vegas.
Wolff points to territorial rights and a blocked path
Wolff, now 90, writes that the Giants refused to give up territorial rights to Santa Clara County, which includes San Jose, a market the A’s wanted during their search for a new stadium home. The former co-owner said the Giants’ position made negotiations with Oakland far more difficult and left the A’s with too little leverage to keep the club in the Bay Area.
He said, “John Fisher gets blamed for things he doesn’t deserve to be blamed for, ” adding that “the Giants’ position really, really messed us up in trying to even negotiate with Oakland. ” In the book, Wolff describes the team’s failed search for a stadium site as a central part of the franchise’s collapse in Oakland.
Immediate reaction from fans and the ownership split
The remarks landed in a market where many fans already place the blame on current owner John Fisher, who bought out Wolff in 2016 and later pulled the team out of Oakland after the 2024 season. Jorge Leon, a longtime A’s season-ticket holder in Oakland and president of the Oakland 68’s, said, “I don’t think there’s anything that they can say. If they really cared and they really wanted to get something done here, they could assemble an ownership group, local, that can either bring the A’s back or create an expansion franchise. ”
The Giants declined to comment on the book’s claims. Wolff, meanwhile, said he wanted to “set that record clear” after years of debate over how the move unfolded.
What the book adds to a long Oakland fight
The memoir gives a first-person account from a key team official during the period when the A’s were searching for a new home from 2005 to 2015. It also underscores the split inside the fan base: some still focus on ownership, while Wolff argues the Giants’ territorial stance shaped the outcome in a major way. For readers tracking sf giants standings, the larger issue is not just where the Giants sit in the race, but how their long shadow still reaches into one of baseball’s most painful relocation stories.
For now, the A’s remain in Sacramento for at least one more season before their planned move to Las Vegas, and Wolff’s book ensures the argument over responsibility will not fade soon. The story around sf giants standings may keep moving on the field, but the dispute over Oakland’s loss is still being fought in public, one quote at a time.
