U.S. Supreme Court rejects San Jose’s bid to lure Oakland A’s

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The U.S. Supreme Court closed the door Monday on San Jose’s bid for the Oakland A’s, turning aside the South Bay city’s claim that Major League Baseball has used illegal monopoly powers to block the relocation.

The court said without comment that it would not take up the case on appeal. The decision ended San Jose’s attempt to lure the A’s away from Oakland by challenging baseball’s unique exemption from federal antitrust laws, which restrict monopolies and encourage competition. The exemption, granted by the court in 1922, is the basis of the sport’s territorial rules that have prevented the team from moving south.

“The court’s decision, while significant, has no impact on our intense and unwavering focus on solving our ballpark issue and providing A’s fans the first class experience they deserve,” A’s co-owner and managing partner Lew Wolff said in a statement.

The antitrust rules put Santa Clara County in the San Francisco Giants’ domain — the result of an agreement between the two teams’ owners more than two decades ago, when the Giants were considering a move to San Jose — and limit the A’s territory to Alameda and Contra Costa counties. To make their own move, the A’s would need to negotiate an agreement with the Giants or win approval from three-fourths of the other teams’ owners, both unlikely prospects.

The A’s owners have sought for years to move out of aging O.co Coliseum to a more lucrative location. They have been talking with Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf about refurbishing the Coliseum or building a new ballpark on the site. In July 2014, they signed a new 10-year lease on the Coliseum, but with the right to opt out in four years. Three months later, they renewed an option agreement with San Jose to build a stadium near the city’s downtown Diridon train station.

Meanwhile, San Jose, with support from the A’s owners, sued Major League Baseball in 2013, arguing that baseball teams should have the same right as other pro sports franchises, or non-sports businesses, to relocate as they saw fit.

The city noted that the basis of the Supreme Court’s 1922 ruling — that the major leagues were not engaged in interstate commerce, subject to federal regulation — was a narrow view of commerce that the court repudiated in later cases.

But the justices upheld baseball’s antitrust exemption in 1952 and again in 1972, saying the decision was up to Congress, which had left the law unchanged since 1922. Congress rewrote the law in 1988 to accommodate to the new system of free agency by allowing veteran players to negotiate with competing teams, but did not address franchise relocation.

The Oakland A’s want their ballpark, O.co Coliseum, to be renovated or they want a new place to play. The Oakland A’s want their ballpark, O.co Coliseum, to be renovated or they want a new place to play. Photo: Kat Wade, The Chronicle Photo: Kat Wade, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 15 Caption Close U.S. Supreme Court rejects San Jose’s bid to lure Oakland A’s 1 / 15 Back to Gallery

The case reached the Supreme Court on appeal from the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, which in January also rejected the city’s arguments. “Only Congress and the Supreme Court are empowered to question the continued vitality (of the 1972 ruling), and with it, the fate of baseball’s singular and historic exemption from the antitrust laws,” the appeals court said in a 3-0 ruling.

In its appeal to the high court, San Jose’s lawyers described the antitrust exemption as “a relic from another era” that “is causing ever-increasing harm to baseball fans and their local communities.”

“More baseball fans will watch the A’s in San Jose than in Oakland, and they will enjoy the games in more pleasant surroundings,” the city’s lawyers said. “To bar the A’s from moving is to reduce consumer welfare, for the sole benefit of a competing producer, the Giants. This is precisely the harm that antitrust law is designed to prevent.”

In reply, Major League Baseball urged the court to defer to Congress. Baseball’s lawyers also argued that San Jose had lost its right to sue when a California state court found that the city violated state and local laws in parts of its option agreement with the A’s. The city plans to appeal that ruling.

San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo tried to put the case behind him Monday. He noted in a statement that the city owed no money to its lawyers — who had agreed to share in any damages the city won in the case — and that the area proposed for a stadium could be used for urban development.

“We now have big opportunities in that same Diridon area to bring thousands of jobs to downtown through a thoughtful redevelopment of those industrial parcels,” Liccardo said. “We lost this battle, but we can win the larger endeavor of creating a vibrant, urban epicenter for Silicon Valley.”

The case is San Jose vs. Commissioner of Baseball, 14-1252.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @egelko