The Rays announced this morning that they will not proceed with the plan to construct a $1.3 billion stadium in St. Petersburg. The organization has telegraphed that decision for months. The Rays maintain that a delay in approval for public funding from the city and Pinellas County in the wake of the hurricanes has contributed to untenable cost overruns — which were to be the team’s responsibility under the initial plan.
Unsurprisingly, that decision has further strained an already tense relationship between the team and local officials. St. Petersburg mayor Ken Welch told reporters he “(has) no interest in working with this ownership group,” adding that the “bridge has been burned” (link via Colleen Wright of The Tampa Bay Times). County commissioner Chris Latvala also called for owner Stu Sternberg to sell the franchise. “I think the best way to keep baseball in Tampa Bay is for Stu Sternberg to sell the Rays,” he said (link via Sam Blum of The Athletic). “This was probably one of the best stadium deals that an owner has ever received in professional sports, and it wasn’t good enough for Stu Sternberg.”
This all comes a few days after The Athletic reported that commissioner Rob Manfred and various owners have privately urged Sternberg to sell. Team president Matt Silverman reiterated that’s not currently on the table. “The team is not for sale,” Silverman told Tom Krasniqi of 95.3 FM in Tampa Bay. Asked about the report that Sternberg was under pressure from the league, the team president acknowledged “the other owners aren’t happy with where our revenues are” but implied that proceeding with the stadium deal would have been “a mistake that (results) in us continuing to be an outlier and not being able to generate the necessary revenues to be a full-fledged member of Major League Baseball.”
That aligns with Sternberg’s previous comments. “If it was (for sale), people would know it,” the owner told The Tampa Bay Times last month. “I’ve always been, and I will continue to be, pretty transparent about our intentions. And pretty — not pretty — but very honest about them. And I have been.”
In December, the Rays said in a statement that they wanted to renegotiate with the city and county to “solve this funding gap together.” Local officials have maintained they will not approve more public funding. Welch stated this afternoon that St. Petersburg is through working with Sternberg’s ownership group. Silverman, in line with the Rays’ previous comments, said the team is interested in continuing discussions on a new deal (presumably with more public money).
“It doesn’t change our devotion to the Tampa Bay area. It doesn’t change our desire to figure something out. It just means this specific project on this specific timeline isn’t going to happen,” he told Krasniqi. He added that the Rays “will continue to look to the city and the county for those conversations and see how we can reengage and see if there’s a solution here because we were close.”
Additionally, it seems they’ll try to initiate new discussions with the City of Tampa, which is located in Hillsborough County. “I think we will because we have to look at all possibilities within our region to figure out an answer,” Silverman said. “We haven’t had any conversations with anyone on the Tampa/Hillsborough side. We can’t until after March 31 (the official expiration date of the St. Petersburg deal).”
Tampa mayor Jane Castor released a statement to The Tampa Bay Times that expressed openness to conversations:
“I am disappointed to hear that the Rays don’t intend to follow through with stadium plans in St. Petersburg. The goal always has been to keep the team in Tampa Bay. The City, Tampa Sports Authority, and County are happy to speak with the team once again, but any proposal will have to make sense for our taxpayers and community.”
With the St. Petersburg deal falling apart, there’ll be speculation from outside the organization about relocation. MLB said this afternoon that the league remains committed to the region. The Rays would need to get approval from the league to explore opportunities outside the Tampa Bay area.
The Rays will play the 2025 season at George M. Steinbrenner Field. They’re hoping to return to Tropicana Field for the 2026-28 seasons. The team’s lease at the Trop initially ran through ’27 but was pushed back a year with the team not playing there this season. St. Petersburg is responsible for repairing the damage to the Trop, which will reportedly cost around $55.7MM.
PUBLIC funding for oligarchs… fools rush in.
Define oligarch
It’s the new buzzword
….for liberal puppets.
Our country is literally being run by rich elites (and has been for decades) and yet there’s still so many brain-washed plebs who will blame the “liberals” and call them “puppets”. Wonder if this will still be your attitude when they slash a program that directly affects you. Comical.
Chump
This concept that rich elites run everything and bend all events to their will is comically ignorant to the actual workings of the world, we live long lives with instant access to tons of food and modern healthcare. We have climate controlled houses and climate controlled transportation, we retire early, work about 20 percent of time our ancestors did and get paid large sums of money that allow us to have disposable income on random stuff like baseball games. Yet we still act like someone is playing us and we are oppressed. I’m not saying be blind to issues that crop up in our system but we have no appreciation for the lives we live and act like the “rich” are stealing from us.
The literal definition has been long established as “rule by the few.” A monarchy is rule by a rich one. An oligarchy is rule by an assortment of wealthy individuals. Which is basically what we have now.
We all appreciate the political science, but while we’re going down that path, rule by the wealthy can more precisely be said to be aristocracy. Oligarchy is arguably a form of aristocracy.
In the context of the United States, I can see what you mean, but the analysis is thin and overly focused on a narrow group of people who have more influence over headlines then they do your day to day (at the risk of assuming you’re more or less a typical resident of the US). There are potentially several layers of governing bodies who “rule.” Think of that folks cited in this very article, sports districts, county level authorities, for example have varying levels of influence over the rules of the pertinent citizenry.
I AGREE 100%! That’s exactly what we have, right here, right now.
Players vs Owners!
Owners vs Players!
Its all political bologna sandwich-
NEITHER ONE OF THEM CARES IT COST ME AT LEAST $100 BUCKS TO PARK AND BUY A HOTDOG!
Congress governs spending. 38 trillion in the hole. Yep, the rich keep getting richer but it takes two to tango. Term limits, please.
I can appreciate what the front office is doing. Not easy trying to run a club without much funding from above. The reality is the TB market isn’t very robust. Averaging 12-14k fans a game is rough and they averaged much less when they were winning more frequently. Shame.
St. Pete market**
What makes it even worse they put good competive teams on the field and they still can’t draw fans. If they can’t get attendance up you need to look at moving. Don’t go crying when your team has been moved because another city has more interest.
I got a friend that lives in Tampa. He told me the problem is the bridge that connects St. Pete with Tampa. When there’s a game it’s easily a 45 minute to an hour ride because of traffic congestion. The area does support the team but the traffic getting there or going home is so horrendous it keeps people home. If they moved to Tampa proper I guarantee attendance would improve drastically.
They are making a play for downtown Tampa
Where they should be, right?
Don’t go out to USF it’s not nice out there
Twas just a little hazing, JM…
*sweat beads on brow*
Move this team to Montreal. Olympic stadium is being renovated as we speak and you’ll probably have more players wanting to play in Montreal and get out of the country and play for real fans.
@Al Hirschen
Montreal fans didn’t support the team either. Montreal is a terrible baseball market.
Fans in Montréal are more real than other fans? Make this make sense.
i think by real fans, he meant better than what the tampa area is providing to the local team. but i acknowledge ownership is just as guilty
Yes our 51st state!
The real
Nah, all the new states have to start with the letter “G” like Gaza and Greenland. No crazier than everything else going on.
@MLB Top 100 Commenter
Given that it’s our new state, we can rename it Ganada. Problem solved.
@Therealeman
Beautiful 51st state.
You mean how all the players have been rushing to Toronto?
I would love to see the expos back, but at the same time there are more deserving places like Tennessee and Utah that would be better
Are people demanding that the Vancouver grizzlies come back to the nba?
Actually there is a large number of people in a group that is lobbying for a new NBA team in Vancouver
Unless the renovations of Olympic Stadium include a complete overhaul of the entire Stadium the same issues that plagued the Expos would carry over to the Rays.
So basically, we didn’t like the agreement where we were responsible for cost overruns. So now we wanna try shaking down Tampa proper again, even though we already tried this and it *did not work*.
This seems exactly correct.
If those two politicians had allowed a vote to happen when it was schedule to happen, then there would have been no cost overruns upfront.
The original deal didn’t specify that the vote had to be on a specific day, it just had to happen before the end of 2024. If Stu couldn’t handle the cost overages of a five week delay, then he never had the money to be a baseball owner in the first place.
The original deal specified that it had to happen in October.
As an A’s fan, they’re gone. This is all out of the Fisher playbook. Explore alternate sites, complain about local government officials, complain about lack of public funds, say you’ve exhausted all options. They’ll be leaving Tampa soon. Sorry Rays fans. This sucks.
They’re not gone because MLB has literally said they aren’t letting them leave the market… so please sit this one out
If he wants to fight MLB, he can sue them in court for antitrust behavior. Al Davis sued the NFL when he wanted to leave Oakland and he won. So think again.
MLB has a longtime exemption from antitrust suits courtesy of the US Congress
MLB doesn’t want the Rays to relocate to an area where they can get a $2 billion+ expansion fee instead. So no move to Nashville, Charlotte, Montreal, Salt Lake City, Portland, Oakland, Buffalo, Indianapolis, Mexico City, etc. The biggest problem with the Rays’ current location is there’s no public transportation available to the stadium; to be honest, I think that was still going to be a problem with the new complex they had planned. Orlando has been bandied about as a possible relocation (as there would be no appetite for 3 Florida teams), but with Disney and Universal Studios down there, I don’t think the team would get much traction there. I wouldn’t be surprised if a move to Tampa proper is the eventual solution.
ZOINK,i agree with what you say.however you can take montreal,buffalo oakland and mexico city off your list.mlb will never expand to those cities or regions
slimray, you can take Montreal off of your list of teams to which MLB will never expand. Though it hasn’t been mentioned recently, Manfred has cited Montreal as a possibility.
Translation: “No one has offered enough yet.”
Who blinks first, MLB or Sternberg? Sternberg seems to want to move. MLB says they want the team to stay put. I do have to question the market support. They field a good product but get very little support.
Depends on how irritated the other owners are with Stu. They’ll never say it publicly, it’s probably all behind closed doors as usual.
Manfred would screw up a soup sandwich. He couldn’t have handled this and the A’s situation any worse.
And people thinks they are going to expand?
Yeah, right.
Oh they are going to expand because all the owners want that expansion fee loot. They are like Gollum with his ring in Lord of the Rings, money is their “precious “
Well I mean MLB owns the rays without actually owning the rays. The owner can’t just do as he pleases… it’ll never be approved from MLB or the other owners. Sooo Stu will be the only one blinking
He essentially needs to make Tampa work now or sell to someone with deeper pockets. If the Yankees strong-arm and pull the rug with the Steinbrenner Field lease, Sternberg has really no choice.
If the Rays chose to move to Tampa, it would mean the end of the Tarpons. The Yankees could keep their spring training facility, but they would have to find another home for their minor league team.
Man I was hoping for a team in Utah. I love the Southwest but don’t really like Arizonas stadium. And Vegas is not where I’d want to raise my kids exactly. But Utah is beautiful. Mountains etc. dang.
Worst air quality in the nation probably doesn’t help their case.
Plus weirdo Mormons.
Worst air quality??
It has to do with the shrinking Great Salt Lake’s increasingly exposed lakebed.
“Decades of industrial activities, such as the Kennecott Mine just south of the Great Salt Lake, resulted in all sorts of hazardous chemicals ending up in the lake. These include arsenic, cadmium, copper, mercury and selenium, which were all discovered in previous studies of the lakebed.”
And when that chemical dust gets kicked up in dry, windy weather, it can carry far and wide.
The U.S. cities with the worst air quality include:
Bakersfield, California
Visalia, California
Fresno-Madera-Hanford, California
Eugene-Springfield, Oregon
San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, California
Los Angeles-Long Beach, California
Sacramento-Roseville, California
Medford-Grants Pass, Oregon
Phoenix-Mesa, Arizona.
usnews.com
Here is what the American Lung Association says
lung.org/research/sota/city-rankings/most-polluted… Again, Salt Lake City is not on there.
Don’t see Salt Lake City on that list.
In what way are Mormon’s weird? Honest. Don’t drink. Don’t smoke. Are the most charitable sect of Christianity. Ok, that is weird,
The problem I would have with a team in Salt Lake City is that I have been to many Bees games, and I know how the ball flies in that altitude. MLB doesn’t need another Coors Field.
If you don’t know why the Mormons are weird, you don’t know their history.
I named their biggest oddities today. In what other ways are they weird today?
@websoulsurfer
It’s about where things have been heading at the GSL in recent decades – in terms of long term drought. It hasn’t gotten to a critical stage yet, so the problems have been limited – but the outlook is potentially dire. And I’d forgotten about the issue of their water shortages.
Here’s a key snippet:
“According to a report released by researchers at Brigham Young University in January, the Great Salt Lake will likely also disappear within five years if residents continue their current rate of “unsustainable” water consumption.”
sciencenews.org/article/great-salt-lake-shrinking-….
You might want read it, in case you actually want to have a full understanding of the situation.
Well you left out the magic underwear, to be fair
@web,
I tried to find what pollutants the ALA was ranking and couldn’t locate specifics. Any suggestions where to find that information? Thanks.
Mormons do have a few beliefs that are little out there, but they not weird people. In fact they are some of the nicest people you can meet.
Let’s give Luigi a call.
Hernandez
So, they don’t make enough money, and they can’t do the stadium deal because it wouldn’t make their financial situation and better. Look Stu, you’re a member of a trust. The other 29 members think you are doing a poor job and damaging the brand. Either cut the nonsense or sell. It’s that simple.
So he’s not selling the team, not building a new stadium and it’s stupid to fix the old POS they were playing in. Guess they’re playing on the beach?
Yep, real sandlot baseball
The Rayzies doth protest too much.
Move the team to Orlando already. Sell combo tix to Disney, Universal, Seawold/BG. Attendance solved.
Sell the team. FJF FSS
Move team to Charlotte. Switch leagues with Miami. Instant rivalry with Braves. Miami will sell out Yankee games. Boston will have big crowds also. Expand to Salt Lake City and Nashville. Four 8-team divisions. Like to see the A’s stay in Sacramento or move to Indianapolis.
the A’s are breaking ground on their stadium in Vegas soon.
kahn, not the case. They don’t even have permits to start building. Fisher keeps hedging on when they will break ground. No financing has been submitted to the state of Nevada so they can get the taxpayer money. You are putting far too much value in the words that John Fisher says.
I will never understand how taxpayer dollars go to funding these stadiums
How is the Tampa owner being cajoled to sell, but not the Mummy on the south side of Chicago?!
I was thinking the same thing. JR is driving the fan base away.
How is John Fisher not being pushed or forced to sell? The Rays are in this situation because of a hurricane, John Fisher caused all the problems in Oakland.
It fitting that they are playing in minor league park as they hardly fill up there stadium, yet Tampa think they should keep the team in state that doesn’t even fill up there ballpark.
Moving would be best
Stu needs to shut up and sell. He has no right to be an owner and complain about attendance when he doesn’t even live in the area and is a season ticket holder to the Mets. The majority of the fans hate Stu and is over his Wall Street self as the only thing he cares about is making money. He doesn’t want to invest in the team. They received over $60 million from revenue sharing last season plus whatever they got for their TV deal but managed a to have a payroll of under $100 million.
As tensions mount, trumpets play a blaring crescendo – and suddenly fall silent! Faces drip – eyes dart – well-practiced hands twitch nervously above six-guns…..
But has each of them checked to make sure his piece is still loaded?
The two guys that blocked votes being taken that would have funded the ballpark are the ones trying to say that it’s the Ray’s fault. That is rich.
St Petersburg just lost a $6.5 billion development project. Losing the team may not be that big of a deal. Turning a blighted industrial area into an entertainment mecca for the city was a big deal. According to the reports from the city, the tax revenue from that development would have recouped the city and county’s investment within 20 years.
Maybe they should have allowed it to come to a vote instead of pushing it back until they were absolutely certain it would cost the team more money to move forward.
“the team president acknowledged “the other owners aren’t happy with where our revenues are” but implied that proceeding with the stadium deal would have been “a mistake that (results) in us continuing to be an outlier and not being able to generate the necessary revenues to be a full-fledged member of Major League Baseball.””
That’s basically an admission that TB isn’t a viable market for MLB.
Its an admission that St Pete is not a viable market for MLB. Most people have been saying that as long as the team has been there.
Tampa is.
Ybor City.
Across from Raymond James
Those are viable locations.
They’re just waiting until we win the trade war and the Canadians are paying us for the privilege of giving us Steel.
I really hope the Cubs don’t have Justin Steele lined up when they face the Jays in Toronto this year. Dude will be paying Canada to pitch at that point.
“…….—pretty — not pretty — but very honest about them. And I have been.”
That is not absolutely honest then, is it?
I like that. Leaves room for intrigue….is it possible? Just perhaps?
Sternberg has been clandestinely conspiring to circumvent the Trump tarrifs by secrectly smuggling those fancy European hotdogs…. from Poland?
San Antonio/Austin area would support steam handily. There’s a need for competition in the Texas market too, great fit
The fans could pressure him to sell the team. It takes at most one fan if the pressure is tight enough.