Celebrities And Community Rally Around Oakland Ballers Baseball Team

Forbes

6 days ago

"Oakland Will Never Quit" banner hangs on a fence during Oakland Ballers' inaugural home opener ... More against YOLO High Wheelers at Raimondi Park in Oakland, Calif. (Photo by Scott Strazzante/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
With three major sports league franchises leaving Oakland, the Pioneer League's Oakland Ballers are receiving financial support from thousands in the community, as well as endorsements from big-name celebrities.
Oakland once hosted the NFL's Oakland Raiders, the NBA's Golden State Warriors, and the MLB's Oakland Athletics. With the Warriors moving across the bay to San Francisco, as well as the Raiders, and eventually the A's relocating to Las Vegas, Oakland, once a hotbed of sports activity, has seemed abandoned.
Out of this vacuum, the Oakland Ballers are demonstrating that there is – and always has been – a passionate fan base.
Notably, the Ballers have prioritized repairing the relationship between fans and sports teams in Oakland. To do that, they have used community investment a cornerstone which allows the fans to have a 'social contract' with the club that provides checks and balances around moving the team, changing team logos or brand marks, and making some key front office hiring positions by having a fan representative on the board of the club.
The concept of community investment has struck a chord with the community, with celebrities ranging from Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day, hip-hop star Too $hort, rapper Jwalt, former NBA player Antonio Davis, actors Blair Underwood and Alex Winter, Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughlin, MLB players Chase and Travis d'Arnaud and more, jumping in and making investments.
A total of 4,200 investors have become involved in the Ballers, with the first round garnering $1.234 million, and a second round that recently closed, netting $1.962 million. The average investment was $649.26, with representation across 740 zip codes. The most significant investment was $50,000.
'It's been humbling. We're at the point where if we just invited investors to a game, it would be a sellout,' said Paul Freedman, CEO and Co-Founder of the Ballers. 'So, for a community team like ours to have such a level of support -- not just in Oakland, not just in California, but across the nation and around the globe -- it's amazing.'
Freedman said that the goal with the investment capital is to break even this year, with the next year and beyond being a profitable, sustaining, and enduring organization. 'We want to be open forever,' he said.
How that fan model will be manifested is the core of how the Ballers are run. After decades of major sports leagues leaving on what may best be described as bad terms, the Ballers are going in the opposite direction.
'Our model is based on radical participation from the fans at every aspect of the organization,' said Bryan Carmel, Co-Founder and Chief Experience Officer of the Ballers. 'That means that from when we came up with the idea to start a new team in Oakland, in the first place, we engaged community stakeholders long before we announced the team, even in terms of where we are going to play? What should the branding be? What should the values be of the team? What's important to you, the fan base? Our fundamental idea is that the real value of a sports team lies in its fans. Like that is the product. We want to change the model for how fans and teams can build value together.'
The viral nature of community investment has reached celebrities with ties to Oakland, the Bay Area, and beyond.
'Sports in the Bay Area have been transforming over the last couple of years,' said Billie Joe Armstrong, guitarist and frontman for the band Green Day. 'We've had some emotional goodbyes to teams we grew up with, but recently, there has been a major shift. The Oakland Ballers and the Oakland Roots & Soul represent everything I love and grew up on in the Bay Area. The welcoming atmosphere, DIY attitude and the people behind it make me proud to be an investor and support the next generation of teams kids in the bay will be proud of.'
Blair Underwood, the Emmy and Grammy-winning star who has been a staple in Hollywood for years, has jumped on board with Ballers. In between voice work for Lexus, where he's the focus of the luxury car's 'The Standard of Amazing' ad campaign, he spoke to me in an exclusive interview for Forbes about what investing in the Ballers is all about.
Underwood said he became aware of the Ballers through a business partner involved in nonprofits and foundational pieces, Alameda Foster Care. When he mentioned the Ballers, what with the Raiders, Warriors, and A's leaving Oakland, Underwood was intrigued.
'I was just very, very excited about [what the Ballers represented],' Underwood said. 'And then, the other aspect I love about it is the fact that it is a fan-based, community-based opportunity to have ownership in the team. One of the fans is a member on the board, so there's a direct link – direct access to the fan base and the decision-making that's going on. So, I was really intrigued and enthralled by that whole business model of community-based investment, and also that there was such a need. And that you put those two together, you feel the need to fill the void with something that's viable and exciting to that community. And, the community can actually have a say and a financial interest in that investment. It just made sense, and I just got excited about being a part of it.'
The Oakland Ballers have just started their second season in Oakland. If there's anything to learn, it's that sports can thrive without the underpinnings of big business, where the fans are at the forefront.