By finleyunplugged (205.225.207.97) on Wednesday, January 09, 2008 - 03:51 pm:

I'll admit, it's been a number of years since I went to Fanfest, but is this right, you have to buy online tickets to get an autograph now?

http://oakland.athletics.mlb.com/oak/ticketing/fanfest_2008.jsp

By linusalf (71.198.42.96) on Wednesday, January 09, 2008 - 08:14 pm:

bleah.

if any season ticket holder isnt using the fanfest tix i would like them.

linusalf@yahoo.com

By eyleenn (71.131.1.203) on Wednesday, January 09, 2008 - 10:55 pm:

It's been a few years for me, too, but my experience was that it was pretty tough to get autographs and/or take the clubhouse tour unless you were there really early.

By vinnieangelo (67.188.27.83) on Friday, January 11, 2008 - 11:29 am:

I will be having my own FanFest this year...It will consist of replaying the October 1st, 2000 game (Oak vs Texas) on my living room TV, where the A's clinch the West on the last day of the season (with the Izzy strikeout and all).

It should prove to be a most exciting event!

By eyleenn (38.99.44.122) on Friday, January 11, 2008 - 04:12 pm:

Good idea. I have Game 3 of the 2006 ALDS. I'll watch that.

By vinnieangelo (67.188.27.83) on Friday, January 11, 2008 - 06:12 pm:

I still have game 3 of the ALDS saved on the TiVo....Maybe I will make a weekend of it!

By oaktownfan (76.247.229.93) on Friday, January 11, 2008 - 07:01 pm:

Anybody have game 4 of the 89 World Series.

By muddlehead (69.181.176.189) on Saturday, January 12, 2008 - 01:51 pm:

gm 4 1989 ws on 2 part vhs got it
for many years searched all over for old a's vids
also have 74 ws gm 2
73 ws gm 1
72 ws gm 4
i think these 4 games often available on ebay
a regular season 71 game hunter-tiant seller wanted $50 for 4 innings - posed to be oldest a's game footage - i declined

By eyleenn (71.131.35.203) on Saturday, January 12, 2008 - 06:04 pm:

Speaking of strolls down memory lane, the A's website has the highlight clip of Rickey stealing 939. The best part is hearing Bill King, Lon Simmons and Roy Steele.

By rtd (67.180.127.182) on Sunday, January 13, 2008 - 05:08 pm:

Man I would love to build a collection of some vintage A's games. I have a few but many more have come up missing. The 70's games sound great. I would even love to watch some of the early 80's teams of varying degrees of quality. The great Murphy catches Dave Kingman etc

By mitt (4.246.45.15) on Sunday, January 13, 2008 - 07:11 pm:

I've been reminiscing about how the A's broke baseball tradition by putting first names or nicknames on their uniforms instead of the traditional last names of the players. We got so used to it that we hardly noticed! I really miss seeing names like Catfish, Mudcat, or Vida on the guys' uniforms. Do you remember Wampum 60? Or Kooz?

Baseball seemed more like fun and less like business in those days, and Oakland had it goin' on. :>)

By muddlehead (76.21.63.209) on Sunday, January 13, 2008 - 07:34 pm:

rtd. agree. can't believe now when i got a vcr 25 yrs or so ago i didn't tape an a's game a year. what have you got? you see what i have.

By wbell (70.246.24.239) on Sunday, January 13, 2008 - 08:59 pm:

If you are looking for A's playoff games, here's a site a friend found last month. I haven't bought anything from there yet, but am considering the 1989 ALCS games.

http://www.goallinesoftware.com/goalline/tc/tc_search_all.asp

By rtd (67.180.127.182) on Sunday, January 13, 2008 - 10:35 pm:

Great site wbell. I'm going to choose a few now.
I'll have to look around Muddle. I had quite a bit and it has just disapeered over the years. My Dad recently gave me a DVD of game 4 of the ALCS in 1990. (Clemens juicing ejection game) He found a copy of that one because I just so happen to make a great catch off Rickey's bat in the first inning.

By oaklandsi (67.101.147.213) on Saturday, January 26, 2008 - 07:14 pm:

early reports are that around 12,000 fans showed up. If true that's less than half the number that showed up last year.

And no, it's not because of the weather. The weather was similar last year.

By linusalf (71.198.111.189) on Sunday, January 27, 2008 - 11:18 am:

maybe it was the new black jerseys that kept fans away...

UUUUGLY.

By oaklandsi (67.101.147.213) on Sunday, January 27, 2008 - 01:01 pm:

unofficial transcript of fanfest Q&A #3:

http://www.athleticsnation.com/story/2008/1/26/18446/1356

How do you feel about the move to Fremont? Ellis: Well, I like progress and it's an honor to play for this team. But I love Oakland and I love this stadium, and I would like to play here forever. But look at the field right now behind us, it's all marked up and torn up for football, and when we get into August and September and the playoffs, that's a problem.

That's right Ellie, I agree...you don't need to move out of Oakland to resolve the shared-stadium issue.

By eyleenn (71.131.21.154) on Sunday, January 27, 2008 - 11:10 pm:

The A's actually caught a break in that the weather wasn't bad during FanFest hours yesterday. It stopped raining and the temperature was mild.

The fans were sending a message.

By oaklandsi (144.91.49.5) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 09:04 am:

Some fans on other sites are arguing that the low turnout was due to poor weather, or that you can't compare it to 2007 because last year the A's were just back from advancing in the playoffs.

Here are the (rounded out) turnout figures for the last four FanFests:

2005 (just after Huddy and Mulder were traded): 24,000+

2006 (after a season where the A's faded in September) just under 21,000

2007 (after a season where the A's advanced to the ALCS) @25,000 -- and the weather sucked

2008 (no comment) 12,000

By ws9 (24.6.129.202) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 10:28 am:

It was the poor season last year combined with the trades. Even people who agreed with the trades had no reason to go to fanfest.

By finleyunplugged (205.225.207.97) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 11:12 am:

Those jerseys would be fine...for the Pittsburgh Pirates...or the Rocky Horror Picture Show...or the discount rack at Big Lots.

The Oakland A's colors are green and gold...another team tradition this ownership group is hellbent on destroying.

It made me physically ill to see them posing next to the four World Series trophies with those clown suits on.

By renobill (75.39.244.225) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 11:57 am:

I'm WIT you on that Finley!!

I see the A's are giving away retro jerseys on some of their promotion days thru the season, hell, why not "celebrate" the 40 Oaktown years with those various jerseys as the alternate during their respective months of the giveaway. At least they were green, gold, and white in some fashion.

By raiderjohn (65.168.177.49) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 12:49 pm:

Reno, not a bad idea on those alternate jersey things, it would probably earn them a few more bucks....then with those few bucks, they can turn back the prices to the year the jerseys were last worn.

By oaklandsi (144.91.49.5) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 02:46 pm:

Huston Street expressed a concern that the ball would be easier to pick up by opposing batters, if the A's pitchers were wearing the black jerseys. You'd think that would be a concern to the A's, wouldn't you?

By renobill (75.39.244.225) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 06:13 pm:

Ta..Ta..Turn Ba..Ba..Back Prices ????

Have you gone mad, Raider ????

What a crazy, fan friendly idea. It'll never work!!!

By finleyunplugged (205.225.207.97) on Monday, January 28, 2008 - 06:14 pm:

If Kirk Saarloos is in our starting rotation, I don't think batters will have much trouble picking up the ball, whether he's wearing black, white or chartreuse.