With just one season left in the A's O.co Coliseum lease and still no approval for their desired move to San Jose, it was clear the team had to make a deal to stay awhile longer at the aging ballpark.

In a Friday letter to East Bay officials, owner Lew Wolff put a time-frame on the deal, the team would stay for the next five seasons, in a bid to spur talks that apparently haven't gone well.

"We need to know if we're on the way to doing something that's mutually agreeable," Wolff said in an interview Friday. "Otherwise, we're going to have to find a temporary relocation somewhere, which we prefer not to do."