See Tropicana Field before, during and after Hurricane Milton damage
The roof at Tropicana Field sustained major damage after Hurricane Milton made landfall along Florida’s Gulf Coast.
The Tampa Bay Rays are in exclusive sale talks with a group led by Jacksonville developer Patrick Zalupski for $1.7 billion.The team’s future has been uncertain since Hurricane Milton damaged Tropicana Field, leading to the cancellation of plans for a new stadium.Zalupski, a billionaire and University of Florida trustee, is joined in the prospective ownership group by Ken Babby and Bill Cosgrove.
The Tampa Bay Rays are in talks to sell the team to a group led by a Jacksonville developer for $1.7 billion, according to a report by Sportico.
The report claims Patrick Zalupski, founder and CEO of Dream Finders Homes, has signed a letter of intent to purchase the team from current principal owner Stu Sternberg.
The Rays released a statement, according to FanDuel Sports Network reporter Ryan Bass, saying only the team has “commenced exclusive discussions with a group led by Patrick Zalupski, Bill Cosgrove, Ken Babby and prominent Tampa Bay investors concerning a possible sale of the team.” They said neither the team nor the group would have further comment.
The future of the Rays has been in question since Hurricane Milton tore the roof off Tropicana Field, the team’s home in St. Petersburg since it came into the league in 1998. The Rays are playing at least this season at Steinbrenner Field, the New York Yankees‘ spring training facility, across the bay in Tampa. The storm led to a planned new ballpark in St. Petersburg in 2028 to be scrapped.
Sternberg bought the Rays for $200 million in 2004. His tenure as owner has been successful on the field, with the team making two World Series and turning the moribund franchise into one with the seventh-most wins in MLB since he took over. But it’s also been plagued by low attendance, averaging no more than 19,000 in average attendance since 2013 and not finishing out of the bottom-5 in baseball for attendance since 2010.
The state of the Rays led to reports over the offseason that MLB owners and commissioner Rob Manfred were pressuring Sternberg to sell the team.
Who is buying the Tampa Bay Rays?
Zalupski is worth $1.4 billion, according to Forbes, and was appointed to the University of Florida Board of Trustees by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2023. Babby, another part of the buyers group, also heads the ownership group of the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp of Minor League Baseball. Cosgrove is owner and CEO of Union Home Mortgage Corp. based in Strongsville, Ohio.