Like any great dive bar, the Oakland Coliseum offers cold beer, a sporting event to watch if they feel like it, and moments of joy and hope that unfold under a cloud of sadness and memories of better days.

I had the day off and met some buddies in the old yard at 66th to catch the Oakland Athletics. We have good places, 22 rows between the house and the visitors’ canoe.

Baseball weather. Hot but not hot. Typical Oakland summer weather, the kind that makes you think this city would be a great place for a big league franchise.

If only there was a place in town that was easily accessible by public transport and by car, and had plenty of parking. Never mind.

As in any good dive bar, you have your regulars. In the row in front of us sat a woman, alone, who said she had been coming to A games regularly for 40 years. And why wouldn’t she? Management treats her like a queen, other than taking her free parking for season ticket holders, raising the price of her seat from $30 a game last year to $65 and fielding the worst team in the Major League. baseball, with the 29th lowest pay.

To Faithful Fan’s right was another regular, Strikeout Man, who tallies the strikeouts of each A pitcher by sticking a large “K” on the railing in front of him. Behind him was Scorecard Man, who holds a detailed scorecard and is happy to fill in the blanks for people nearby who suffer from lack of concentration.

Attendance was advertised at 8,215, but maybe she meant 821.5. If it was a real bar, it would be called The Elbow Room.

Athletics is a microcosm of American society today. Prices are up, quality is down, interest is fading. Maybe the A’s have the smartest fans in baseball. The team is last in MLB in hits, batting average, OPS and attendance (8,358 par, nearly 3,000 less per game than the No. 29 Marlins).

But this afternoon, the A’s were dealing their ace, Frankie Montas, which isn’t long for this world — at least not the Oakland section of this world. The A’s traded in all of their other stars, saving Montas for the trading deadline, when his value will be exorbitant.

It might seem like a sad prospect for Montas, reaching out to a team plotting to trade him as soon as possible. But it’s not. I was at the A’s clubhouse in spring training when the players heard that Sean Manaea had been traded.

Manaea is a great teammate, super popular at the clubhouse, and a hell of a pitcher. But he wasn’t traded, he was on parole. As her teammates stopped by her locker to say goodbye to her in her arms, I couldn’t see any sadness.

Either way, Montas, also a popular A’s pitcher, was busy. After a few innings, even some of us whose attention had wavered – hey, we’ve got some world issues to deal with here – noticed that Montas hadn’t allowed a hit.

Even 821.5 fans can make a buzz, even though a buzz isn’t a roar. The Last Dive Bar can be quiet. The former crew that hung out in the right field pavilion, beating drums and heaving the hell up, had that game — this season? – stopped. Maybe the A’s have you buying a ticket for your drum now.

The management doesn’t exactly promote the joy of baseball here. After the A’s made a third out, two kids about 9 years old, wearing ball gloves, walked down the aisle near us, hoping to become the lucky recipients of the baseball returned to the stands by the Mariners first baseman. An alert usher rushed over and chased the children away.

One thing that is sure to ignite a crowd is the cool replays of the action, on the big video screen, which are still fairly new and probably the stadium’s nicest feature. Yeah, show us that 98mph Frankie punch again, please! Nope? No replay? Sigh.

Still, the excitement grew, as Montas had a no-no at seven, but his pitch count was approaching the danger zone. Rookie skipper Mark Kotsay would be sent on the spot if Montas injured his arm throwing the No. 105 pitch.

Montas made it academic in the eighth, giving up a two-shot flare left. Grab Pine, Frankie, a front-row seat to watch your bullpen turn your 1-0 shutout into a 2-1 loss in the ninth, with a pair of two-out wild pitches.

The A’s last gasp in the bottom of the ninth was first baseman Seth Brown. He looked at a shot called three, which seemed to be low. Brown protested and referee Nic Lentz ran him over.

It was the perfect way to leave Baseball’s Last Dive Bar – get kicked out for misbehavior. At that time, Seth Brown was all of us.

Scott Ostler is a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: [email protected]: @scottostler