OAKLAND — Once considered a long shot, there is a renewed push to sell the Coliseum site as the ideal home for an Oakland A’s stadium development, weeks after the team’s plans to build near Laney College collapsed.

Preferences aside, you won’t hear a dinnertime debate this holiday season over whether the East Oakland site is the quickest route to a new ballpark. It has the backing of several Oakland council members and activists, lots of room, and has already passed environmental hurdles, unlike perceived Plan B, Howard Terminal next to Jack London Square.

But those two sites might as well be Plan Z as far as team President Dave Kaval is concerned. He has steadfastly refused to consider either one for different reasons, and although fans may not understand why, some stadium experts bolster his position. So if there is no second or third or even fourth choice in Oakland, what exactly is the future of the East Bay’s baseball team?

“Laney is probably the best they had,” said Roger Noll, a professor emeritus at Stanford University who has studied stadium developments. “I think they are in deep trouble.”

Noll pointed out that Portland, Oregon, Indianapolis and Charlotte, North Carolina, are among cities wanting an MLB franchise. While those potential markets are smaller than Oakland’s, he said the clock is ticking.

“I think the ‘we are going to stay in Oakland’ story has another year of life if they don’t find a new place to build,” Noll said.

A ‘shocking’ twist

The Peralta Community College Board’s abrupt decision on Dec. 6 to sever talks with the A’s left the team shocked and Kaval silent; an A’s spokeswoman said he is currently not doing interviews on stadium developments.

His bold September announcement — coming after months of suspense — that the team was committed to staying in Oakland and wanted to build an intimate ballpark on 15 acres tucked between Laney College and the Interstate 880 freeway, was a surprise in some ways, given the challenges of its location, including concerns about traffic and community dislocation. But it also made sense; its proximity to downtown followed the path of modern sports facilities, from Pittsburgh to San Diego.

Stadium experts say projects flourish in one notable way: as a 365-day shopping center anchoring a stadium and bringing revenue year-round. In Sacramento, the new Kings arena is coupled with downtown retail. The proposed football stadium for the Rams and Chargers in Southern California includes 3,000 units of housing, a casino, and thousands of square feet of retail.

While the Coliseum sits at the nexus of public transit, freeway access, and the Oakland International Airport, “it may not draw the same sort of customers for longer periods of time,” said Rick Eckstein, a professor at Villanova University who has written about stadium developments. “I’m not defending this logic but I have seen it at work in other places,” including the Barclays Center in downtown Brooklyn.

“I think the team wants to build a stadium where it can maximize all revenue streams, not just those directly related to the game,” Eckstein added. “The team believes, rightly or wrongly, that there is more potential revenue away from the current Coliseum site.”

Noll was more blunt about why the Coliseum, set in East Oakland and cut off from neighborhoods, will not work. In Sacramento near the arena, “you can walk in there at any time and there’s stuff to buy.”

“The problem with the existing Coliseum site is it’s in a dumpy area,” Noll said. “It would take billions upon billions of dollars to convert the area into a destination.”

If they build it, will they come?

Chris Dobbins, a member of the Coliseum authority and season ticket holder, supports rebuilding at the existing site but understands it may not draw people from Walnut Creek, Pleasanton or other suburbs year round. The A’s have projected a downtown stadium would draw an average of 30,000 fans a game, as opposed to 18,000 at the Coliseum.

“I don’t think the A’s believe the Coliseum would attract the Contra Costa money on non-game nights,” he said.

This viewpoint is not lost on other Coliseum supporters. Alvina Wong, of StAy the Right Way Coalition, said an A’s departure from East Oakland signals more disinvestment from the area. Walmart on Hegenberger Road closed in 2016. The Eastmont Mall is a shell of what it once was, Wong said. The coalition opposed the Laney site due to its proximity to Chinatown and Eastlake and the very real likelihood that plopping a stadium there would gentrify the area and push out working-class residents and small businesses.

Although Wong prefers more investment, including a new stadium, in East Oakland, it must be planned carefully for it to work for the team and for the community.

“Unregulated growth in East Oakland is just as bad as building a stadium at Peralta,” Wong said.

Scott McKibben, executive director of the Coliseum authority, isn’t buying into the criticism of the East Oakland location. McKibben said baseball stadiums set apart from downtown in Kansas City, Texas and Los Angeles have worked. The Dodgers spent hundreds of millions of dollars to renovate their stadium in Chavez Ravine, which is the third-oldest in baseball, he said.

“Dodger Stadium is about the same distance from the downtown heart of Los Angeles as the Coliseum is from the downtown heart of Oakland,” McKibben said. “They draw well.”

A few days after the Laney decision, McKibben said he sent a text to Kaval, asking for a sit down. Kaval, according to McKibben, initially responded that there was no reason to meet.

“I didn’t take it personally one bit,” McKibben said. He replied, “Let’s get the holidays behind us and have lunch.”

The executive director, who oversees operations at the Coliseum and Oracle, plans to make his pitch about a partnership with a “world class” developer, which sounds similar to a previous plan to build a “Coliseum City.” With the Warriors and Raiders leaving Oakland, more land at the site would be freed up, opening the option of selling or leasing the land to the A’s and developing around it.

At the same time, Alameda County supervisors are reigniting negotiations to possibly sell their half of the Coliseum complex to the city of Oakland, according to Supervisor Nate Miley. One fewer government entity tied to the land could smooth out stadium talks.

Miley speculated that building at the Coliseum might require the city or county to help finance it, something Mayor Libby Schaaf and others have staunchly rejected.

“What they are saying is they can finance a downtown stadium but they couldn’t finance a stadium at the Coliseum site,” said Miley, who is chairman of the stadium authority board. “That could be an indication that if we want them to stay at the Coliseum, we’d need to put some money toward that.”

Peralta is currently evaluating the district’s needs before it enters into any deal to sell or lease district headquarters at East Eighth Street and Fifth Avenue, the parcel the A’s wanted. On Friday, Chancellor Jowel Laguerre didn’t exactly slam the door shut on the A’s.

“In this world you can never say something is over,” he said. “You never know what conditions could change. But for right now we are not in a position to say yes or no to anyone.”