About the Tampa Bay Rays

Beginnings

The Tampa Bay Rays came into being on March 9th, 1995 when Tampa investor Vince Naimoli and his group were awarded an expansion franchise. The team was nicknamed the Devil Rays and when $70 million worth of renovations were made to what was then called the Florida Suncoast Dome the team sold the naming rights to Tropicana Products and played its home games at the newly renamed Tropicana Field. The Arizona Diamondbacks were also a new franchise, entering the National League at the same time as the Rays were coming into the AL. In the expansion draft of 1997 the Rays chose Tony Saunders with their first pick, a member of the Florida Marlins pitching staff. Saunders went 6-15 in the Rays initial season and was out of baseball by June of 1999. The first Rays team was managed by Larry Rothschild and was predictable awful, losing 99 times with only pitcher Rolando Arrojo having more than six total victories; he finished with a 14-12 record.

The Rays struggled mightily in the ensuing seasons, losing 100 games in 2001 and 106 in 2002. The team fired Rothschild in 2001 and replaced him with Hal McRae but things only got worse. The team in its early years made moves to acquire several players from other clubs that had been sluggers in their prime but they were on the decline at the time. Hitters such as Jose Canseco, Fred McGriff, and Greg Vaughn all wore a Tampa Bay uniform at one time or another and even though future Hall of Famer Wade Boggs came to the team in its first year the pitching was so abysmal that no amount of hitting could have helped the Rays. Boggs hit a home run on August 7th, 1999 to record his 3,000th base hit and that remained one of the brightest spots in team history for years.

Manager Lou Piniella came to take over the Rays in 2003 and with him came high hopes, but despite his intense attitude Piniella could do little with the pitching staff at his disposal. In 2003 the team had an earned run average of 4.93 and four hurlers lost double digit games. In 2004 the team's earned run average was 4.81 with only Mark Hendrickson able to win as many as ten games. The 2005 season was even worse for the pitchers as the earned run average rose to 5.39. Piniella got out of the last year of his contract after the season and Tampa Bay hired Joe Maddon, a former bench coach for the Los Angeles Dodgers, to be the manager.

Maddon had no more success at first than any of the other Tampa Bay managers but the team was adding players that seemed to have bright futures through the draft. Finishing with such a poor record each season assured the club of high draft choices in the amateur draft and Tampa Bay chose players such as Carl Crawford and B.J. Upton with their early round picks in 1999 and 2002 respectively. Other drafted players included pitchers Andy Sonnenstine and James Shields and third baseman Evan Longoria. When the Rays acquired players such as Carlos Pena to play first base in 2007 and starter Matt Garza in 2008 to help in the rotation they significantly upgraded their club.

The Rays were expected to be significantly better in 2008 but they surprised even their most optimistic fans by winning the American League East Division. Pena belted 31 home runs to go with 102 runs batted in and rookie Evan Longoria had 27 home runs and 85 runs batted in over just 122 games. The pitching was much better with five starters winning at least 11 games and the bullpen getting solid years from veterans Dan Wheeler with 13 saves and closer Troy Percival with 28. In the first round of the playoff Tampa Bay met and defeated the Chicago White Sox, needing four games to win the best of five series. In a seven game series against division rival Boston the Rays went out to a three games to one lead before the Red Sox evened the series with a pair of close wins. In the deciding seventh contest the Rays won 3-1, with rookie David Price coming out of the bullpen in the eighth inning to thwart a Boston rally. In the World Series the Rays fell to the Philadelphia Phillies in five games with regular season stalwarts Pena and Longoria collecting just three hits between them in 37 at bats.