CEO: Rays 'working quickly' in quest for new ballpark

ORLANDO, Fla. -- For all the front office’s focus on building a roster and all the relief regarding the Rays’ return to Tropicana Field next season, make no mistake: The club’s new ownership group is still locked in on what managing partner Patrick Zalupski called their “first and highest priority."

Building a new ballpark.

“We're spending a lot of our days, nights and late evenings and weekends and early mornings focused on a ballpark and finding that forever home,” Rays CEO Ken Babby said in an interview with MLB.com at the Winter Meetings. “Conducting a lot of feasibility analysis about a lot of different sites that meet our criteria that we talked about, and that work is ahead of us. It's in front of us. And I would say it's going well, but still more work to do.”

While the Rays are obviously still in the early stages of that process, Babby noted that the ownership group has been “working quickly” since taking control of the club.

And they will have to work quickly to meet their stated goal of moving into a new ballpark in the Tampa Bay area in time for the 2029 season. Zalupski and the Rays previously laid out their criteria for what they’ve called their forever home: a fixed-roof stadium anchoring a mixed-use development -- like The Battery Atlanta -- that would require at least 100 acres of land.

They have met with designers, master planners and public officials, Babby said, and had conversations about a public-private partnership to finance the construction of the ballpark. They’re continuing conversations with other teams (in baseball and other sports) about their stadiums and visiting some to seek inspiration or ideas.

For instance, Babby said the Rays have talked to the people in charge of the project to build the A’s new ballpark in Las Vegas. And he took a trip last weekend to Minneapolis, where he checked out the roof at the Minnesota Vikings’ U.S. Bank Stadium -- “a really cool, kind of a transparent-style roof that we think is world-class,” he noted.

It’s been a lot to take in, and that’s before you even consider leading the team through the offseason.

“Lots of different learning, working quickly and also learning the organization,” Babby said. “When you have a leadership change like this, you want to make sure you understand all the great things that are happening in the building -- of which there are many -- and where maybe you'd look at things and say, 'Well, what if we did this differently?' or 'What if we did that differently?' So we're asking a lot of questions, and with that, it's really a lot of fun.”

Babby said he has made an effort to learn and ask questions from the baseball operations department in his first few months as CEO, but the owners have stuck to their vow to stay out of baseball decisions. Babby’s focus has primarily been on the business side of the club’s operations.

“I want to continue to create opportunity that allows us to be competitive, and doing so requires kind of learning the way the business works,” he said. “So, a lot of time spent asking those kinds of questions.”

Meanwhile, the Rays are preparing to return to Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg after spending this past season playing at George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa due to the damage caused by Hurricane Milton. With the roof fully restored, the city and team have shifted their focus to interior work, including repairs and the upgrades the Rays previously announced, like an expanded videoboard and a new sound system.

Babby said the Rays are planning to celebrate The Trop “all year in a number of different ways, with specifics to come at a later time,” after returning to their home ballpark against the Cubs on April 6.

“Fans have, as you know, such a deeply emotional relationship with that building,” Babby said. “People grew up going to games there. Grandparents took their grandkids there. I have people that I've met that said they met their significant other, spouse, husband, wife at Tropicana Field.

“The place has its quirks. It certainly has its challenges. We know that we need a new ballpark, and we're focused on that. But there's a love affair with that building, and I'm excited to see it, to feel it.”