On Thursday at 12:37, the last MLB game at the Oakland Coliseum began. The Athletics, a team with 57 years of history in Oakland, played one last time in front of their home crowd. For a dedicated and loyal city that will see its third professional sports team leave town, Thursday was a difficult and emotional day. 

John Fisher, the owner of the Oakland A’s, is moving the team out of the long-neglected Coliseum in hopes of landing a new stadium in Las Vegas built with taxpayer money. The Coliseum, home of the A’s since 1968, has long been lamented as a subpar facility, both for fans and players. But for many, especially those who grew up going to the ballpark like myself, the concrete structure retains a certain charm.

The massive foul territory, the on-field bullpens and the bridge to the BART station all play a role in a unique game day experience. The weather and the immaculately maintained field could always be counted on to provide an absolutely gorgeous setting for baseball, especially if you were only focused on what was inside the foul lines.

But for all its beauty, the most special part of an A’s game has always been the fans. 

Fans of the team have been much maligned in recent memory. Years of low attendance led to the national media outlets maligning A’s fans for their apathy.

What these outlets failed to realize is that the fans were being actively driven away from the team. Historically low payrolls and the constant departure of fan favorite players meant that not only were teams often uncompetitive, but fans no longer had connection points to the team. Players with any ounce of value were traded for minor leaguers. And to top it all off, the ballpark experience deteriorated. Ticket and concession prices climbed. Giveaways were reduced to those who purchased a “special ticket.” For most casual fans, there was no reason to go to a game. 

The Oakland fans that kept showing up prove just how special the team and the atmosphere was. Except for a brief pause after the announcement of the teams relocation, the outfield drums keep echoing through the concrete stadium. The fans who play the drums every single game have been constant in their support of the players — and their disdain for Fisher.

Nina Thorsen has been a drummer in right field for 12 years on a permanent basis, and coming to games long before then. She points out that many of the A’s fans spend a higher percentage of their income on the team than Fisher does, and that a real sense of community has been built in the A’s fandom, especially in the right field bleachers where flags and banners wave every game, and drums, chants and traditions echo into the brisk bay air.

For Thorsen, this community is irreplaceable. She attends Oakland Roots and Ballers games, and has even invested in both teams, but neither will match what is ripped away when the A’s leave. Even though she wishes the players well, she will not follow the A’s to Sacramento. 

Unlike Thorsen, Drew Harris, a Vacaville resident and lifelong A’s fan, plans to still root for the A’s in their new home. Harris is also a Sacramento Kings fan, and nearly experienced that team move many times until 2013. The Kings’ savior, however, is a villain to A’s fans. Vivek Ranadive bought the Kings and pledged to keep them in Sacramento. However, Ranadive has given Fisher a home, as the A’s will play rent free in Sutter Health Park for at least three seasons. Harris says he has argued with some fellow Kings fans, who approve of Ranadive’s actions, and are excited about the move. He remembers the pain of almost losing the Kings, and now to have the A’s leave Oakland evokes many of the same feelings. While he is also upset about losing the community he has built in Oakland, he says they will continue to meet up after the A’s leave. 

The Coliseum experience is incomplete without the calls of the hot dog and beer vendors roaming the stands. Perhaps the most well known of the vendors is Kenny “Ice Cold Kenny Bo” Thompson. Thompson knows many of his regular customers by name, and his game day uniform shows just how connected he is with the fanbase. His cooler is covered in many of the same stickers as the ones on the right field drums, and his knitted beanie is fan made. Kenny has been a vendor for 17 years, and when the team leaves, it will be ripping away a part of the community he grew up in.

Thompson says he’ll be a vendor at Oakland Ballers games. As for his team loyalties, he’ll continue to pull for some of his favorite A’s, past and former, but will no longer be rooting for the A’s in the same way.

“I’ll be representing Oakland wherever I go,” he said.

At 8 a.m. on Thursday, the Coliseum parking lots opened, and the cars flooded in. A sellout crowd entered the stadium, both from the parking lots and crossing the bridge from the BART station. The seats were filled with green and gold, drums and vuvuzelas echoed and flags waved. And after the A’s stood for the national anthem, wearing kelly green jerseys with Oakland across their chest, the city watched their team take to the pristine green grass under the California sun as they have so many times before.

In a concrete behemoth that has seen so much history, over 40,000 fans cheered, screamed and cried, hoping to root their A’s to one more victory, hearing “Celebration” by Kool and the Gang ring out from the PA system one last time.

Derided and ridiculed by many, the Coliseum has endeared itself to us, despite all its faults and shortcomings. And at the end of it all, Baseball’s Last Dive Bar will close its doors, making the world an emptier place.