The proposal for an all-new franchise plan backed by the Rays – to split their season between Montreal and Tampa, after new ballparks/multi-use facilities were built in both locations – was dropped by the Major League. Baseball breaks, more than two years after it was initially green-lit, and despite the comments of Rays owners that they are very pleased with how the project is progressing.
It’s a development that is, in the words of lead owner Stewart Sternberg, “flat farting”. If he knew the specifics of why the plan was scrapped by the MLB powers – he wouldn’t have spoken during his Thursday afternoon Zoom press conference.
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And so Sternberg and his Rays were back in their familiar positions. They need/want a new stadium in a new location – at best they’ve been told, over and over again, in the greater Tampa Bay area – because of the current situation at Tropicana Stadium in St.Petersburg has not been cut yet. It’s hard to imagine a more inconvenient location for the majority of the population in the area, and they have no real viable options on the table at the moment.
But here’s something different this time. Remember when the club made the first real impetus for a new stadium? It was around 2007-08, when coach Joe Maddon was brought in, the club dropped “Devil” from its name and the team started winning baseball games. . The number of games is staggering, compared to the first decade of the franchise’s existence.
The club has an unbreakable contract with the city of St.Petersburg that runs until the end of the 2027 season. Back in 2007, that seemed like an eternity. Any kind of proposal or even an idea shorthand must include a way of solving that lease problem, that is, compensating the city in some way. Even in 2017, as the Rays kept pushing again, the lease still had an impact for a decade.
Now, though? It’s 2022 and, as crazy as it sounds, 2027 isn’t far off.
Now, the Rays look at the 2028 season, dream of their potential new ballpark – wherever it may be – and think, “Oh, crap, we have to move.” For the first time in this movie about the eternal stadium, the windows actually begin to close. Sternberg admitted just as much when he said, “We’re going to have to start working for Opening Day in 2028.”
The process of building a stadium is not just about building facilities; that’s the easy part. It is a process that takes many years. Sternberg then re-emphasised previous efforts to land a new stadium and concluded with a rather obvious emotion: “Or just so we have Opening Day, most likely, in 2028 at a venue another location.”
So what are those options? At the basic level, there are two: Stay or leave.
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Whatever happens before Opening Day 2028, the Rays will certainly pursue the “stay” option now, as they regroup from this setback. Because while 2027 isn’t too far off, it’s not right around the corner either. They can’t let go of their plan to leave the market for four years, then hope to get any fan interest (and spending) on them.
That concern has influenced the idea of twin cities with Montreal. As you can imagine, loyal Rays fans weren’t too thrilled with the idea of their team being lost for half a season. And while the lineup and office staff have changed, the only thing that hasn’t changed from the winning teams is the noise – which sounds like complaints, rest assured – about the stadium situation. Stadium Rays fatigue is a real thing.
“It is entirely possible that it exists, but I can promise you and assure you it will not allow that to affect our approach and the outcome of what happens,” Sternberg said, Can convince someone somewhere? “We always seem to come up with some new ideas and new approaches.”
Sternberg was asked why this could be different, why it was possible to build a new stadium in a prime location when similar efforts have failed over the past 15 years or so.
“What I’ve learned from this process this time around is that I believe people are actually more concerned about the team losing points in the future than they might have been in the past,” he said. “And I’ve also learned that people believe the region is, rightly, doing a lot better financially than it was three or four years ago.”
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That said, there’s plenty of reason to believe that, in a new geographic location, the team could pull off significantly better traction in a still-growing market – Tampa/St. Market Size Pete ranks 13th out of 30 teams. And more fans sitting on the couch watching a team proven to be capable of sustained success will mean more companies willing to spend their advertising dollars with the club.
But it’s hard to get rid of poor attendance, even for good reasons. The Rays rank 28th out of 30 teams attending on average in 2021, despite winning the AL’s 100 best games. They are 29th in 2019, 29th in 2018 and 30th – having died last time – in every season from 2012 to 2017.
So yeah, add those numbers to the inability to get a new ballpark up and running in the last 15 years, and it’s conceivable that the team could look at options elsewhere.
OK, but where?
1. Montreal
This seems obvious, for several reasons. The motivation is there. History is there. The foundation is there. There is private and public support, built up over the past two and a half years as part of a sister cities plan. And if you’re building a baseball park that can host 40 MLB games per season, you’re also building a park that can host 81 games. There is no way for any type of facility to receive MLB approval if it does not meet the appropriate standards.
2. Nashville
If commissioner Rob Manfred and other owners are looking for a reason to tear up the current division formats and rearrange tournaments, the Motion Rays would be the perfect opportunity. However, there’s no evidence or reports that they do, so it makes the most sense for the Rays – again, if they leave Florida – to move to a geographic area that allows them to stay. back to AL East. So that means Portland and Las Vegas, while not completely out of the picture, are not at the top of the list.
Montreal works with this, obviously. So does Nashville; the flight from Boston to Nashville is about half an hour shorter than the flight from Boston to Tampa.
3. North Carolina
That’s right, Charlotte is the North Carolina city that Manfred refers to whenever he explains expandable cities. But Charlotte has logistical issues that complicate things. A little up Interstate 85, however, and you have the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill triangle, a metro area smaller than the Charlotte metro area by a split second. It’s bigger, by market size, than Nashville. The team will almost certainly be named “Carolina Rays” instead of Raleigh Rays or Triangle Rays (sounds very juco-ish, right?).
The options are all, say, a bit messy and complicated, and the clock is ticking. Meanwhile, The Rays have only consistently won against an almost empty home field (average 2021 attendance is 9,513 fans). It would be wonderful to have that excellent product played in a packed football field.
