FoxSports reports that the Tampa Bay Rays are slowly getting local permission to start to look for alternative sites in the Tampa area for a new facility. Since the lease with the municipality prohibits actual discussions about a relocation to other areas, the report states the Rays have been approached by at least one other potential relocation spot: Montreal.
Montreal had a franchise, the Expos, who are now the Nationals.
Montreal had a long history as a minor league baseball town before the expansion Expos. But the Expos played in a terrible venue, the old Olympic Stadium. Crowds were sparse and the teams were poor (and the strike season killed the team's best chance for a World Series).
Montreal is also French speaking Quebec, and more traditional to Canadian culture than say a more culturally diverse city like Toronto or Vancouver which are fairly Americanized.
MLB claims that Montreal is a major league viable city. Montreal businessmen have approached the Rays ownership about stakes if the team relocates to Montreal. The powerful local backers would include Bell Media.
Tampa's local TV deal expires after 2018, so a new stadium deal needs to be in place or ownership would be pressed to leverage an out with MLB, which has found that Florida does not support teams well.
And the Rays are going to fall into the small market trap very soon. Despite its very good records for the past several years, the franchise is in transition. The farm system is not as good as it once was; GM Andrew Friedman and manager Joe Maddon have abandoned ship. There are rough seas ahead.
Bell Media’s interest in a Montreal baseball
franchise may be the single most significant change in that market since
the Expos left in 2004. A year ago, the NHL entered into a 12-year, $5.2-billion
television contract with rival Rogers Communications — leaving Bell (a
then-incumbent rights holder) without national packages on its English
(TSN) and French (RDS) networks. Bell has yet to secure long-term rights to a sports
television property as visible as the NHL (or MLB) with similar
programming hours in English and French.
And, presumably, Bell is pondering what to do with the $5 billion or
so it reportedly had financed in a failed effort to renew their NHL
rights package. According to Forbes, the Rays’ current franchise value is $485 million, so a cash purchase is an option (considering the league office mistake in allowing the Cubs to be acquired with a huge debt load).
