After the 1954 season, A's owner Roy Mack was in serious financial trouble and sold the team to a group of local business leaders. However, the team was nearly sold to Arnold Johnson, owner of Yankee Stadium. Yankees owner Dan Topping tried to convince the other owners that the Philadelphia syndicate was underfinanced. Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey became suspicious of the apparent coziness between Mack and Topping and cast the deciding vote in favor of the Philadelphia syndicate.
What if Arnold Johnson had bought the team and moved it to Kansas City? Would the Phillies have stayed in town, or would they still have become the San Francisco Seals and been replaced by an expansion team? How would the A's have fared over the next few years (and after Johnson's death in 1960)? It sounds ASB, but a popular conspiracy theory says the Yankees were going to use the A's as a de facto farm club. That might have butterflied away the Cleveland Indians dynasty of the late 1950s/early 1960s.
What if Arnold Johnson had bought the team and moved it to Kansas City? Would the Phillies have stayed in town, or would they still have become the San Francisco Seals and been replaced by an expansion team? How would the A's have fared over the next few years (and after Johnson's death in 1960)? It sounds ASB, but a popular conspiracy theory says the Yankees were going to use the A's as a de facto farm club. That might have butterflied away the Cleveland Indians dynasty of the late 1950s/early 1960s.