The Athletics are one of the most storied franchises in the history of baseball. One of the original American League teams, they won three of the first 10 World Series under the guidance of the venerable Connie Mack, then won two more back-to-back when they had a one-two punch of Lefty Grove and Jimmie Foxx, then they won three in a row from 1972-74, the only non-Yankees team to do so, then they won another in 1989 in the midst of three straight AL pennants. They invented Moneyball. Their mascot, unbeknownst to most modern fans, is/was an elephant.
The A's began as one of the league’s glamour franchises in Philadelphia, which was the third-largest city in America when the franchise was new.