Coming off of a series sWWWeep of the Atlanta Braves at TD Ballpark, the Toronto Blue Jays have flown out west for a 10-game road trip starting with four against the Oakland Athletics. Tickets are still available for the series, and the A’s are trying to fill seats any way they can including selling tickets in exchange for Dogecoin.

Join us at the ballpark as the Blue Jays roll into town! 

Two-seat pods in the Plaza Infield are available for 100 Dogecoin for the series. 

🔗: https://t.co/RizI8lp46i pic.twitter.com/wdDROnpLJc

— Oakland A's (@Athletics) May 3, 2021

In case you didn’t know, Dogecoin is a cryptocurrency that people can invest in using real money in exchange for digital currency. It’s kinda like BitCoin, except Dogecoin originated out of satire in tribute to an internet meme and was considered more as a joke than anything bearing real-world implications. However, DOGE has picked up serious traction, opening the year at less than a cent and has now risen up to nearly $0.41 USD at the time of this writing. That’s still low compared to Bitcoin and stocks one would typically invest in, but considering where it began DOGE has grown a ton and made a lot of money for some people whose investments have grown 4,500% just in the past four months. Dogecoin has actually become a somewhat legitimate form of crypto, whose gained traction has largely come from Elon Musk’s internet propaganda that’s fuelled DOGE’s fire. Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has even begun to endorse it as well.

Literally pic.twitter.com/XBAUqiVsPH

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 24, 2021

A Google search could teach you more about Dogecoin than I can, but I think this is a really interesting move by the Oakland A’s and Major League Baseball for approving tickets to be sold in exchange for such a controversial cryptocurrency. What started out as an internet troll job featuring a side-eyed Shiba dog has now become a form of payment good enough for one of North America’s biggest sports leagues, which is as much of a sign of the times as it gets.

In my opinion, the Athletics are allowing fans to buy tickets with Dogecoin not because they want to increase their own share of Dogecoin themselves but because they want to increase the public’s awareness of DOGE as a legit form of crypto. 100 Dogecoin, which is how much the A’s are charging for two seats, is only about 40 bucks meaning the club isn’t making a ton off of selling these tickets. Instead, the Athletics and MLB might be trying to drive up the price of DOGE from the publicity that’ll come from selling tickets in exchange for this form of crypto. That’s what Musk and Cuban are trying to do by tweeting about it. Does the club or league have an ownership stake in Dogecoin that would make them want to engage in tactics that would drive up its price? That’s what DeanBlundell.com’s resident crypto correspondent thinks.

The A’s organization, or MLB as a whole, must benefit from Dogecoin going up, and the headlines that’d come with being able to buy tickets with [DOGE] will do just that. I think they’re doing it to get more people to buy Dogecoin rather than for the 100 Dogecoin they’re getting from each sale itself so they can further legitimize it as a popular form of cryptocurrency.

-Andrew Rybka, crypto correspondent for DeanBlundell.com

The Athletics were the first team to sell suites in exchange for Bitcoin, and this marks the first time a professional sports team in North America will be accepting Dogecoin. I wonder if more MLB clubs will hop on the DOGE wagon if the league is heavily invested in the crypto and wants it to go to the moon. It’s crazy that what was once considered fake money based on an internet meme has now become a real way for people to purchase baseball tickets.

If you’re a proud owner of Dogecoin in the Bay Area, you might want to spend your crypto on tickets to an Athletics vs Blue Jays game as this should be a good series at the newly named RingCentral Coliseum. The Blue Jays’ offense was a wagon this weekend, scoring 26 runs in three games against the Braves, while the A’s stand atop the American League West division thanks to a 13-game win streak they recently rattled off. Tune into first pitch at 9:40pm EST Monday as Steven Matz will toe the mound for the boys in blue.