I’ll get to the Rays in a moment, but first some follow-up from my last column. It was about those shoes you can step into without ever touching. I got a fair amount of feedback from readers. Most said that those shoes were mostly for elderly people who can’t bend over like they could years ago. OK, but that would not fit the profile of the two Howies seen in the TV ads, Long and Mandel. One other reader had a simple answer: “Beer Belly.” Made me laugh, but still not either of the Howies in the ads.
But, on to the Rays. Are we going to lose our baseball team? Commissioner Rob Manfred says Major League Baseball is committed to the Tampa Bay area. But he also once said MLB would never put a team in Las Vegas, and yet that’s where the Athletics are headed in a couple of years. And despite the worry of gambling seeping into America’s pastime, to watch Rays games here, we do it on FanDuel Sports Network. FanDuel is a gambling app.
If we were to build a new stadium around here, where would it be built? Probably not on the east end of Tropicana Field as originally planned, because the Rays have now ticked off Mayor Welch. Tampa pretends to be interested, but I’ve heard that song before. There simply isn’t much room in a desirable location in Tampa such as Ybor City. One idea with some merit is to build the new Rays stadium on the parking lot of Raymond James Stadium. While there is plenty of room there and it is close to Pinellas County, this obviously would require building another parking structure for Raymond James, but I think that’s doable.
However, the supposed new owner of the team is from Jacksonville. He may prefer the team to be closer to his home. Like, say, Orlando, which is aggressively trying to lure the Rays. I would hate to see that, but I recognize it could happen.
Of course, all of this could become moot. There are loud rumblings of a players’ strike after this season if the owners try to impose a salary cap. MLB is the only professional sports league without such a cap. But players insist they won’t allow one. A strike by men making millions of dollars a year (with the minimum salary $760,000) would adversely affect the enthusiasm of fans who may just decide that soccer is a pretty good sport to watch.
I will confess, I’m a union man. I was in one for most of my career. And, yes, we, on occasion, voted to strike. We never had to do convene a strike, but the option was always there as a tool in negotiations. Maybe that’s what’s happening now. But I suspect it isn’t. Just as baseball is getting more popular, the players may be about to shoot themselves in the foot. But at least they can just slip their shoes off with no touching.
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.