NEW YORK (AP) -Stuart Sternberg lives a short drive from Yankee Stadium and remembers how his Tampa Bay players used to be treated in the Bronx.
“Everybody sort of gives you a pat on the back – ‘Yeah, one day you’ll win a few games, maybe one day,”’ he said. “But this year was a little bit different.”
And how.
The New York Yankees are going home, and his Tampa Bay Rays will be making their first postseason appearance. Does that give him some extra satisfaction?
“Oh, yeah, Oh yeah. I think for any owner, just to be in this position in the American League East is something,” he said. “And to have beaten out the Yankees – and to beat them out and be a New Yorker …”
Having already clinched a playoff berth, Tampa Bay likely will win the AL East – the first team other than the Yankees or Red Sox to finish first in the division since the 1997 Baltimore Orioles.
ries when betting lines opened last October and 100-1 late in spring training. Now the Rays are at 5-1.
The 49-year-old Wall Street veteran, retired as a Goldman Sachs partner in 2002 and led a group that bought a large percentage of Tampa Bay’s general partnership shares in May 2004. He took over as controlling owner from franchise founder Vince Naimoli in October 2006.
Sternberg grew up in Brooklyn as a New York Mets fan, going to his first game at Shea Stadium in 1965 and watching Sandy Koufax pitch for the Dodgers that day. He was in the stands as Pete Rose brawled with Bud Harrelson during the 1973 NL championship series and attended 10-30 games per year.
He lives in suburban Rye these days and tried to buy into the Mets when Nelson Doubleday sold his shares to Fred Wilpon and Wilpon’s investors in 2002.
“I called a couple of bankers to please check into it, and I was told the ship had sort of sailed,” he recalled Thursday. “They said, ‘But gee, if you’re interested in sports teams, we can show you a few on the baseball side. You can actually meet with the CFO and owner of the Devil Rays to really get a firsthand account of what’s going on. You can see how you feel about it.’
t it could have been a real good opportunity.”
The Devil Rays foundered under Naimoli. After drawing 2.5 million fans at home in their expansion season of 1998, attendance fell for five straight years. Their best record was 70-91. Even Lou Piniella failed to turn them around when he managed his hometown team for three seasons.
“It seems clear in retrospect – you never know at the time – baseball got there too soon,” Sternberg said.
When Sternberg’s group took over, it commissioned a survey on attitudes toward the team. Opinion was negative.
“People were looking for reasons not the be associated with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays,” Sternberg said.
He fired general manager Chuck Lamar after the 2005 season and installed a young executive team led by Matt Silverman on the business side and Andrew Friedman on the baseball end. The Rays – the Devil was dropped after the 2007 season – now have a core of exciting young players headed by Evan Longoria, Carl Crawford, B.J. Upton and Scott Kazmir, and they added in productive veterans such as Carlos Pena.
“They energized the marketplace, both through their innovative plans with regard to a new ballpark – even though that has sputtered some – and young players, who have ensured that the fans are going to have potential stars to grow with,” said Bob DuPuy, baseball’s chief operating officer.
s, Piniella doesn’t hold any grudge from his time with the Devil Rays. He left his contract a year early after the 2005 season.
“When I managed there, we had a $22 million payroll. It was a little difficult,” he said. “They’ve done a real nice job there over the last three years or so and improved their pitching, improved their team. And they’ve done a darn good job there. They should be happy, and I’m happy for them.”
Even this year, when average attendance at Tropicana Field rose from 17,131 to 22,370, the Rays were ahead of only Florida, Kansas City, Oakland and Pittsburgh among the 30 major league teams. After taking two of three from Boston to seize control of the AL East, the Rays drew just 17,296 for Thursday’s opener of a four-game series against Minnesota, a team battling for the lead in the AL Central.
“I would have expected more, not that anybody had to be there,” Sternberg said. “We had prepared for more.”
To increase its regional draw, the team moved home games to Kissimmee in 2007 and 2008. Next season, spring training will shift from St. Petersburg down south to Port Charlotte.
them in advance before the season. The economy hasn’t helped. Businesses, they haven’t helped. But it’s difficult all around the country.”
Tampa Bay announced plans last November for a $450 million waterfront ballpark in St. Petersburg, then in June withdrew a proposal to have a public vote.
“We just didn’t have the leadership support that we would have hoped to get behind the project, which was the stadium and a development about a mile from the stadium,” Sternberg said. “And once you sort of see it’s not there, you just pull back.”
The ballpark decision is for another day. For now, the focus if getting ready for the playoffs – and for 2009. He realizes that expectations will be raised, and that competition from the Yankees and Red Sox will only increase. New York can even boost its already $200 million payroll next year with the revenue from the new Yankee Stadium.
“They could do that, but they’re not going to have any of our players. There’s a finite number of players to go around so if somebody has them, somebody else doesn’t,” he said. “It’s the toughest division in professional sports. And the interesting thing was we were the doormats, and we’ve made the division even harder.”
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