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By Alan Snel, LVSportsBiz.com Publisher-Writer
LAS VEGAS, Nevada — A’s team president Dave Kaval, who was the former point man on the MLB team’s efforts to build a $1.75 billion stadium on the Strip, has resigned.
The 49-year-old Kaval’s last day with the historic Major League Baseball franchise is Tuesday, according to a statement released by the team Friday.
“I will be staying in California to explore new opportunities at the crossroads of business and government. I am grateful to A’s ownership for the opportunities they have given me,” Kaval said in the statement. Kaval was the Athletics’ seventh president in the American League franchise’s 123-year history. The franchise was founded in Philadelphia in 1901.
Serving as interim team president will be Sandy Dean, a longtime business partner of owner John Fisher and Fisher’s family. Dean has worked with the A’s since Fisher and his family became A’s owners in 2005. The club will search for a new team president in 2025, the press release said.
The A’s say they are poised to put shovel to ground to build a new $1.75 billion stadium in Las Vegas in either April, May or June. The Las Vegas Stadium Authority Board earlier this month approved stadium development, lease and community benefits agreements with the A’s.
From a public standpoint, Kaval has not been in the public eye since March when the A’s revealed the stadium renderings during an A’s spring training weekend at Las Vegas Ballpark in Summerlin. At stadium meetings, it’s been Dean — not Kaval — who has attended and addressed questions/updates before the Las Vegas stadium panel.
Kaval also had to oversee the painful transition of a famed franchise that played its final game in Oakland in September while preparing to play the next three seasons in 2025, 2026 and 2027 at a Triple-A minor league ballpark in West Sacramento.
It was Kaval’s job to run the team’s re-location process, one that angered and saddened so many in the East Bay area.
Kaval was named A’s president Nov. 17, 2016 after he served as president of the San Jose Earthquakes, where he helped build PayPal Park, home of the Earthquakes and Bay FC.
Kaval loved baseball. After his Stanford graduation, he and a college buddy visited 30 MLB stadiums in 38 days in the summer of 1998. The duo wrote a book, The Summer That Saved Baseball, about the baseball stadium odyssey.
Five years later, Kaval founded the independent Golden Baseball League in 2003 before joining the MLS Earthquakes as team president in 2010. Six years later Kaval was president of the A’s in 2016.
