Progress on the Fremont front

Today's Tracy Press has an article on the A's ongoing talks with Fremont and Cisco. Quotes come from Fremont city manager Fred Diaz, who appears to be up to his eyeballs in negotiation work.

The deal is still very much in the talking stage, and that places Fred Diaz, Fremont’s city manager and Tracy’s former city manager, right in the middle of the conversations.

“Everything is very positive right now,” Diaz told me over the phone this week. “I’ve met with Lew Wolff (the A’s owner) a number of times and more often with his son, Keith. They are very serious about this.”

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Diaz said negotiations between Wolff and Cisco are nearing the final stages.

“Figuring out naming rights for the stadium is one of the last unresolved issues,” he said.

I had heard that Wolff already had a naming rights sponsor in mind when he entered these talks. Perhaps things have changed now that Cisco is officially in the picture. The San Jose-based networking firm already has a heavy advertising presence in the college basketball TV and pro football markets. The naming rights market has gotten sophisticated enough that much more than just the stadium can be sponsored. Club seating sections, lounges, and other architectural elements can all have a corporate name attached, as seen by Comerica's recently inked deal with HP Pavilion.