March 28, 2011

Rays' Sternberg: Somewhere, there's a place for me...

It must be nice to be a baseball owner, and have sportswriters like the St. Petersburg Times' Marc Topkin willing to write stories about how there's no actual news about your campaign for a new stadium. Especially when you then get to say stuff like this:

"It seems clearer to me by the day that we're going to be the last man standing," [Rays owner Stuart] Sternberg said. "And everything I know, and talking to these guys, baseball is just not going to stand for it anymore. And they'll find a place for me. They won't find a place here though. So it's up to us, to everybody, to figure out how to get it right."

But remember, Sternberg says he won't talk about moving the team. So maybe he literally means a place for him as owner of a different team, not the Rays. We'll never know, as Topkin apparently didn't ask.

In addition to the weirdness of Sternberg calling the Rays the "last man standing" in MLB stadium wheedling — ahem, Oakland A's, anybody? — there's also Topkin's semi-editorializing that "there seemingly won't be any real movement until either St. Petersburg Mayor Bill Foster allows the Rays to look at sites outside the city limits, as they've requested, or, conceivably, a plan is presented that works in the city and they accept it." Or, you know, Sternberg decides that maybe he'd be better off trying to sell tickets at his current stadium than working to convince fans that the place is a dump. It might not be as lucrative as a fully paid-for new dream home, but given that his team has appreciated an estimated 100% in the last six years, it ain't chicken feed, either.