{"id":215236,"date":"2026-03-11T18:41:18","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T18:41:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/215236\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T18:41:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T18:41:18","slug":"sacramentos-bold-pitch-to-land-an-mlb-expansion-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/215236\/","title":{"rendered":"Sacramento\u2019s bold pitch to land an MLB expansion team"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"West<\/p>\n

West Sacramento Mayor Martha Guerrero and Sacramento Mayor Kevin McCarty prepare to throw the first pitch during a MLB game at Sutter Health Park between the Athletics and the Baltimore Orioles on Friday, June 6, 2025. The two are leading a group to win a bid for a MLB team.<\/p>\n

HECTOR AMEZCUA<\/p>\n

hamezcua@sacbee.com<\/p>\n

In an interview with The Bee, Sacramento Mayor Kevin McCarty<\/a> made the most definitive comments yet about the local effort to bring a Major League Baseball expansion team to the capital region.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is very real,\u201d McCarty said Tuesday. \u201cI think MLB is going to give a hard, hard look at Sacramento with only one team in Northern California.\u201d<\/p>\n

McCarty was referring to the Athletics, who will play in West Sacramento this year and next before relocating to Las Vegas in 2028, leaving only the San Francisco Giants in Northern California. MLB may expand from 30 to 32 teams in 2029 and Sacramento could end up competing against Salt Lake City and Portland to be the home of a new team in the Western United States.<\/p>\n

McCarty said he and other Sacramento leaders will hold a press conference sometime in May to formally announce Sacramento\u2019s MLB bid, but before then he shed some light on what is coming.<\/p>\n

After months of hinting about it,<\/a> the mayor revealed where a new MLB stadium would be built.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would be in West Sacramento,\u201d McCarty said. \u201cThat\u2019s one thing I\u2019m 100% locked in on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Financing a stadium that could cost an excess of $1 billion would be easier in West Sacramento, McCarty said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Sacramento we get 22 cents on the dollar in property taxes,\u201d McCarty said. \u201cIn West Sacramento, they get 48 cents on the dollar. So what does that mean? We just did a (special taxing district)<\/a> in Sacramento to provide a couple of hundred million dollars… for a soccer stadium in the rail yards. If you did the same thing over in West Sac, you get twice the money.\u201d<\/p>\n

West Sacramento is already set up to make this deal happen, McCarty said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn West Sacramento, they have an existing ballpark (special taxing district) that will be very comparable to the other states (to create) a public-private partnership,\u201d the mayor said. Aside from a stadium site, McCarty said the question he is always asked is: who would own the team?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re talking to locals who want to be part of the ownership. It\u2019s the proverbial whale \u2014 that\u2019s the big, big thing. There are a lot of people who have expressed an interest in buying a major league team. It\u2019s a hot commodity. There\u2019s only 30 opportunities, and there are multiple, multi\u2011billionaires that would love the opportunity, and they don\u2019t have to live in Sacramento.\u201d\u201c<\/p>\n

McCarty would not go into details about who would be involved in an ownership group, but said some of the deep\u2011pocketed investors vying to buy the San Diego Padres are already \u201con our radar\u201d as potential lead owners for a Sacramento expansion bid.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhoever (comes in second in the bidding process), that\u2019s a good person to talk to,\u201d McCarty said. \u201cPlus, there are others who have expressed an interest in being part of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

McCarty highlighted Sacramento\u2019s market as one of the key reasons the city is a viable option for MLB.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf the cities that are applying, Sacramento\u2019s got a lot of valuable assets that MLB would be very interested in, most importantly, our market, you know, the Northern California market with only one team.\u201d<\/p>\n

West Sacramento Mayor Martha Guerrero<\/a> confirmed that city officials are eyeing land for a stadium near Sutter Health Park, which currently hosts the Athletics. While the exact location has not been finalized, sources indicate a site adjacent to Sutter Health Park is under serious consideration.<\/p>\n

Guerrero expressed similar excitement, citing the growth an MLB team could bring to her city.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust when the Bridge District was in the process of building more housing, you saw more business come out here in West Sacramento alone, just with the housing. With the major league baseball team, I anticipate that\u2019s going to significantly grow.\u201d<\/p>\n

McCarty said a stadium on the West Sacramento side of the Sacramento River, with downtown Sacramento as the backdrop, would make the Sacramento region a compelling contestant for an MLB expansion team.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are in the mix,\u201d McCarty said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no guarantee, but we have just as much of a shot as other cities.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"West Sacramento Mayor Martha Guerrero and Sacramento Mayor Kevin McCarty prepare to throw the first pitch during a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[98703,121,123,98701,122,98704,98702],"class_list":["post-215236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-mlb-team-bid","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-mlb-expansion","tag-sacramento-news","tag-sutter-health-park-site","tag-west-sacramento-stadium"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}