This isn’t something we see every day. Existing in a run down stadium in Tampa Bay and playing in front of less-then-stellar crowds, the Rays’ situation has become a major albatross for MLB.
It now looks like the two sides could come to somewhat of an odd agreement.
According to ESPN’s Jeff Passan, MLB has granted the Rays permission to be a two-city team. The idea here would be for the Rays to play their early-season home games in Tampa before moving up north to Montreal.
“While the plan is in its nascent stages, the Rays have embraced the two-city solution as the most feasible to saving baseball in the Tampa Bay area after years of failed attempts to build a new stadium in the region, according to sources,” Passan reported.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred just recently talked about the stadium situations in both Tampa and Oakland.
Said comments seemed to show more confidence that something would happen in Northern California before Florida.
Despite that, this seems to be a far-fetched idea for all parties involved. It also likely wouldn’t come to fruition until 2023 at the earliest.
MLB was last played in Montreal back in 2004 before the-then Expos relocated to Washington and re-branded as the Nationals.