What’s happened to many of us has happened to the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum — it’s subscription to MacAfee ran out. Of course MacAfee Inc., makers of computer virus software, ended its yearly $1.3 million naming rights deal with the Coliseum in 2008, and the home of the A’s and Raiders have been looking for a new sponsor ever since. Enter Overstock.com, which will be announced today as the sponsor, and have its name scrawled all over the Coliseum as part of a six-year, $1.2 million per year deal.
Irony Alert: A place named Overstock will have a giant tarp blocking off thousands of empty seats in the upper deck (pictured).
But if you think that name is odd, you’re really gonna love this:
But don’t get used to the Overstock.com label. The Salt Lake City-based firm is in the process of re-branding itself as O.co in an effort to gain customers throughout the world and the company has the right to change the Coliseum’s name to the O.co Coliseum at any time.
That will quite likely lead to many future conversations such as this:
“You going to catch the game at the O.co tonight?”
“No.co”
Of course this will all be moot if the A’s leave, which Overstock.com has anticipated. They’ve included a clause that lets them back out of the deal if the baseball team moves to Sacramento, or wherever. There have also been rumblings that Al Davis might want to move the Raiders back to Los Angeles. Although that could have just been one of his night terrors that the staff overheard through his bedroom door.
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Oakland Coliseum set to be renamed Overstock.com Coliseum [Inside Bay Area]
