Rays' future uncertain until there's a stadium endgame

The Tampa Bay Rays have spent at least two decades pursuing a stadium to replace the much-loathed Tropicana Field. March was supposed to provide the final financial hurdle for a $1.3-billion project in St. Petersburg, with funding split between the team and the public.

Instead, Rays majority owner Stu Sternberg backed out, blaming cost overruns on a month-long delay in municipal approval caused by last fall's hurricanes, which devastated the region and destroyed the Trop's roof.

The demise is a baffling development, trashing a hard-won, long-term deal over a brief delay. The breakdown leaves the Rays without a home beyond the 2028 season, raising the prospect of a franchise sale or relocation.

The saga of the Rays - a team that far outperforms its budget but has much worse attendance than its success should indicate - rolls on.

Sternberg said last week that while it was a "difficult decision" to scuttle the stadium deal, the team remains focused on a ballpark plan that suits the area and the organization. Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred was more specific, saying he wants to "secure the club's future in the Tampa Bay region."

But Sternberg and Manfred have said a lot of things about the Rays amid their quest for a new stadium, not all of them believable. Five years ago, after Sternberg announced his bonkers proposal to have the club split time between Tampa and Montreal, Manfred said he was "100% convinced" that the idea was viable. Sternberg pushed his "bold concept" for a couple of years. He somehow imagined that building two $500-million outdoor stadiums made more sense than one billion-dollar enclosed facility until MLB formally quashed the concept in 2022.

Did Manfred encourage the two-city scheme to use it as leverage for a better stadium deal out of Tampa-area taxpayers? Only he knows. It certainly wasn't popular with actual Rays fans, as was evident when the team planned to put a pro-Montreal banner up at Tropicana Field at the start of the 2021 playoffs, only to back down after public backlash.

Stenberg initially called MLB's decision to nix the Tampa-Montreal plan "deflating" and sounded less than enthused about trying to find a local solution, lamenting the team's poor attendance at the Trop. However, he eventually found a willing partner among St. Petersburg politicians who were keen to use a new ballpark as part of the redevelopment efforts of a historic neighborhood. These arrangements are, in theory, more palatable to taxpayers because of the associated development around the building. Still, they're always a sweet deal for team owners, who get a big chunk of the costs of a stadium - in this case, about half - paid for by the public.

All of which makes Sternberg's decision to bail so strange. He'd spent years finding municipal partners willing to give the Rays the money he said he needed. When Sternberg did, he used the excuse of a brief delay to set the whole process back to zero. (Technically, he wanted St. Petersburg taxpayers to help cover the cost of any overruns related to the delay, but officials wanted to stick to the deal as signed.)

A report in The Athletic in March, which also said Manfred had encouraged Sternberg to sell the team, offered one explanation for the Rays ownership's change of heart. In explaining that the team had its share of the construction cost covered, Rays president Matt Silverman said, "The question is whether it's a good use of those funds to commit us and MLB to this ballpark for the next 30 years."

That sounds a lot like cold feet; an owner wondering if a billion-dollar stadium in St. Petersburg, where fan support has been tepid, is such a great idea after all.

It's probably not something Sternberg will have to think about again. When asked if he'd consider reviving a ballpark deal in the future, St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch said, "That bridge has been burned." He added that he might consider it if the Rays had new ownership. In neighboring Tampa, officials said they're ready to talk but noted that previous attempts to make a deal with Sternberg floundered because they couldn't agree on a financing formula the Rays would accept.

The town that gave Sternberg the deal he sought was left stranded, and the city that wouldn't meet his terms the first time is now back in the picture but no more inclined to meet his price. That stalemate is why at least three potential new ownership groups have emerged in recent weeks, although Sternberg and Silverman have said the franchise isn't for sale.

The current owners haven't mentioned the prospect of relocation recently, but Sternberg previously suggested it as a possibility. Given that MLB approved the move of the Athletics from Oakland to Las Vegas via Sacramento, the Rays might also be looking to decamp. Nashville? The Carolinas? Montreal, but for real this time?

For now, the team will move to Tampa, but only to play in the New York Yankees' spring training home while repairs to Tropicana are undertaken. Then, the stadium dance can begin all over again.

Scott Stinson is a contributing writer for theScore.