OK, they really have to do something about this. The Tampa Bay Rays are in a precarious position. They want fans to come back to the Trop to watch a team that’s most likely going to finish last in their division. And, they want taxpayers to help pay for a new ballpark in the worst possible location, near Raymond James Stadium and the airport. Cause there is not much traffic there anyway, right? But in order to get fans interested in the team, they need them to watch the Rays on TV.
For as long as I can remember, watching the Rays was easy. Turn on the set, find the appropriate channel, and on come Dewayne and B.A. Easy. This year, not so much. The Rays games are now streaming on a special platform that I had to pay $100 for the season. And the streaming channel is awful. It freezes a lot and as you see in the photo, when the broadcast normally would go to commercials this message comes on. Seriously, I would rather see the darn commercials than a sign telling me there is one, but it’s not available to me.
Add this to the difficult process of buying tickets. Basically, if you don’t have a smartphone, you can’t get tickets. OK, maybe you can, somehow, though I don’t know the method. Regular tickets don’t exist anymore. You have to have the MLB app, which, in my experience, annoys most users and not just customers of a certain age.
So, let’s see how this goes. Watching the games is a hassle. The tickets are expensive and inconvenient to purchase and display. The Trop is refurbished, but is still the Trop, with all its bizarre abnormalities. And the team is in constant “rebuilding” mode. What could possibly go wrong?
While I’m on a roll, the Rays keep talking about how they want the new ballpark to be surrounded by other fun things like restaurants, bars, stores and various attractions. That’s going to be very hard near the Tampa airport because there isn’t much room. Hmmmmm, what location might be better? Hey, how about that huge piece of land where Tropicana Field now sits? It’s already surrounded by all those other attractions they seek. It was the original designated spot until Hurricane Milton added to the cost. Maybe if the new owners made nice with Mayor Welch and the city of St. Petersburg that space could become available to them again.
Despite all of the above issues, the Rays are my hometown team, so I love and root hard for them. I even paid way too much for their first game back at Tropicana Field. Baseball in 2026 is underway, so Rays up!
Chris Core is a former Washington, D.C. radio and television personality who now lives in Pass-a-Grille. He is a winner of the Edward R. Murrow Award for outstanding achievement in broadcast journalism.