Watch the video to learn more about why Tampa Bay Rays name change is a bad idea. Be sure to check out The Touchback on YouTube for more videos.
If you asked ten different people what exactly the Tampa Bay Rays name embodied you’d get ten different answers. You’d hear about various locations and different ideas of what exactly Rays meant. Devil Rays. Sunshine rays. Original Ray’s. A bunch of guys named Ray. It’s a mess.
Now, the city of St. Petersburg wants to add to the confusion by forcing the team to change its name, this time to the St. Petersburg Rays. During the same week MLB pimped out a hypothetical career for Tom Brady on the Montreal Expos, baseball’s most forgettable ballclub could become even more forgettable.
Every kid in Little League during the late 1990s wanted to be on the Devil Rays team. They had the coolest logos and colors. Things have pretty much gone downhill from that moment in time for the franchise, at least from a branding perspective.
The city of St. Petersburg believes the Tampa Bay Rays aren’t quite anonymous enough these days and wishes for the ballclub to dump the Tampa Bay indicator in favor of Saint Pete, a city that is, at best, the 11th most recognizable in Florida.
Okay, let’s see if I can actually do this. Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach, Orlando, Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Gainesville, Panama City, Tampa, Pensacola…Wings of Gold. I’d also argue Epcot Center is more recognizable than St. Petersburg but that’s not a city.
Anyway, teams changing the location part of their name isn’t unheard of. In the recent video I did about the Washington Wizards, it was mentioned how the team went from being the Capital Bullets to the Washington Bullets.
In the Sunshine State, the Florida Marlins became the Miami Marlins after Miami officials demanded that the team change its name to reflect the city as part of funding LoanDepot Park. I’m sure those in the government have no buyer’s remorse on that arrangement.
However, the most apt example for the Rays is probably the NHL’s California Seals. Some people may know them as the San Francisco Seals, the Oakland Seals, the Bay Area Seals or the California Golden Seals.
Of course, the hockey side did this over the span of a decade while Tampa Bay’s changes have been much slower. The end result has been roughly the same, though. Two franchises groping around for an identity and never finding one.
Related: (Please don’t) Move the Miami Marlins
Tampa Bay Rays name change doesn’t make sense
Changing from the Tampa Bay Rays to the St. Petersburg Rays doesn’t seem like a good fix. In fact, it feels like it would only make the franchise seem minor league. At least folks have an idea of what Tampa Bay entails. St. Petersburg is an afterthought.
Here are some fun facts. Anchorage, Alaska is bigger than St. Pete population wise. Stockton freaking California is bigger than St. Petersburg population wise. Just a reminder, Rob Manfred is abandoning the massive Northern California market by moving the A’s to a city that doesn’t care about baseball as a whole.
It’s easy to understand why the St. Pete city government wants the team to include the city in the name. This would be free visibility for them. However, it is not what’s best for the Rays in any way, shape or form. And it would undoubtedly be a bad look for baseball, not that MLB owners care.
Let’s be honest, if the Tampa Bay Rays didn’t play baseball this season, would the majority of fans even notice? Maybe those Yankee fans who go to games at Tropicana Field but that’s about it.
Instead of being all persnickety about the Tampa Bay Rays’ geographical identifier, everyone should focus their time and efforts on making the team’s branding memorable or at least recognizable.
However, let’s just do a simple exercise to show how bad of an idea this is. What’s the first thing you think of when you hear St. Petersburg Rays? For me, it’s Single-A baseball. Is that really what St. Pete wants for its team?
Keep Reading: Could Sacramento support an MLB team?
