By Mahika Kukday, Canela Vasquez, Alyssa Moritz and Noah Chase
The Tampa Bay Rays and the fate of their new and old stadium has been the talk of St. Petersburg for about a year, but even as city council continues to move forward with repairing Tropicana Field, the city remains unsure of how important major league baseball really is to the local economy.
“The economic impact for the region is much smaller than you would anticipate,” said city council member Richie Floyd. “I think it’s something like [4%] of visitors to the county actually attend baseball games.”
Visit St. Pete-Clearwater’s latest visitor profile study found that 4% of 4,977 tourists surveyed attended a Rays game or went to Tropicana Field during their visit. Otherwise, tourists visited St. Pete Pier (52%), the Dali Museum (25%) and the Chihuly Collection (22%) the most.
Floyd told the Neighborhood News Bureau that if he had been around, he would have opposed the 30-year contract that obligates the city to provide the Rays with an MLB-quality stadium until 2027.
“I’m not just balancing a binary decision between giving them this money and the team leaves or don’t give them this money and the team leaves,” Floyd said. “I also have to balance the infrastructure needs that our city has [and] the cost-of-living problems, so it’s really more holistic than that.”
The St. Petersburg City Council approved an additional $950,000 for preconstruction repairs to Tropicana Field on Feb. 6, the latest installment in a total $55 million price tag.
In addition to footing those repair bills, St. Petersburg is also contributing $287 million to the creation of a new Rays ballpark by 2028. Floyd said that the city’s counting on using tax dollars to pay off the debt by 2055, but it probably won’t be enough.
St. Petersburg’s Chamber of Commerce CEO Chris Steinocher, however, doesn’t agree with Floyd’s assessment of the costs being greater than the benefits.
“I’m a big believer in the impact financially, morally and spiritually of major league baseball in our downtown,” Steinocher said.
He emphasized that the “economic impact is real,” and that even if the percentage of sports- focussed visitors is low, it still amounts to “a couple hundred thousand,” people supporting baseball in the area.
In 2024, the Rays ranked third lowest in home-game attendance numbers, with an average of 16,515 fans. In the past decade, the Rays have been in the bottom four of the attendance table. Their highest ranking was 27 out of 30, with an average of 17,781 fans at home games was recorded in 2023.
Still, Steinocher remains resolute that “it’s the largest economic impact of a corporation we have in this community,” adding that the Rays Baseball Foundation is a generous and frequent donor to many local programs.
He thinks families are drawn to the area to watch baseball because it’s “still a better bargain” than watching the sport in other cities.
While Steinocher firmly believes that local bars, restaurants and other businesses will suffer with the Rays’ absence in 2025, Floyd isn’t so sure.
“I can’t tell you exactly what [that impact] looks like since there’s no baseball going on,” he said. “But it’s only a very small impact directly surrounding the immediate stadium area.”
One of those businesses is Ferg’s Sports Bar & Grill. Owner Mark Ferguson, 68, said the Rays are vital to the success of his 33-year-old establishment.
“It means a lot to all of us,” Ferguson said. “When we’re usually slow during the week, we get an influx of people from all over and they stay here for three or four days.”
Audrey Everett, environmental science and policy senior at the University of South Florida’s St. Petersburg campus, said she enjoyed being able to take the SunRunner to catch a Rays game in her city.
“We have all this history of [Tropicana Field] being misused and poorly designed,” Everett said, adding that she feels the Rays should stay in St. Petersburg because the redevelopment deal hinges on it.
Mayor Kenneth Welch remains resolute that “the greatness and future of St. Pete does not depend solely on [the Historic Gas Plant Redevelopment deal].”
At his State of the City address on Feb. 4, he stated that while moving forward with the Rays was the preferred option, the city was prepared to walk away if the deal fell through. The address was marked by a singular strong message: “the city’s success isn’t reliant on the Rays.”
Ferguson said he thought that the mayor is “playing a good hand,” but he’s confident that the Rays will stay because they have a dedicated fanbase here.
He expressed concern about much of his customer base shifting to Tampa for the upcoming season while the Rays play at Steinbrenner Field. However, he said folks who don’t want to make the drive are welcome to “come [to Ferg’s] and have a watch party for all the home games.”