New Rays Ownership Pours Cold Water On Monster Payroll

The Sobering Reality

That line about the club’s economics is the most noteworthy of the entire media gathering. Zalupski and his group just spent $1.7 billion to acquire the club. That’s just to obtain the rights to run the club. Can you imagine how much money the franchise probably lost by playing in a smaller capacity venue at Steinbrenner Field? In fact, there were perhaps massive losses.

Looking Down the Line

Rays fans should still feel optimistic about the direction of the franchise. Having said that, could a soft rebuild potentially be in the works? Probably not. There is still a solid base of foundational talent led by Junior Caminero and Jonathan Aranda. Those two players aren’t making gobs of money yet, but maybe now is the time to approach them with long-term contract extensions to establish future cost certainty. Once the money from the new stadium starts rolling in, the contracts could look like an absolute bargain.

It must be noted that the three gentlemen excessively praised the current baseball uniformed leadership, including manager Kevin Cash. The Rays may be quiet in free agency, but they should remain active in the trade market. They have plenty of talent and will need to continue augmenting before the new stadium eventually rolls around.