ST. PETERSBURG -- If Evan Longoria had gotten his wish, there wouldn’t be a bright white No. 3 glowing inside a blue circle in the upper-deck seats near the left-field corner at Tropicana Field.
It would have been No. 6, instead.
When he was called up to join the Rays in 2008, Longoria wanted to wear No. 6, like he did at Long Beach State and at various stops in the Minor Leagues. But that number belonged to Tom Foley, Tampa Bay’s third-base coach at the time. It’s a fairly standard practice for a player or coach to request something in return for giving up their number, and Foley’s ask was modest: a set of golf clubs.
“I was just being cheap, and I guess I didn’t really care too much about the number,” Longoria recalled. “So I was like, ‘Well, what other single-digit numbers are available?’”
The answer came from Chris Westmoreland, the Rays’ home clubhouse/equipment manager at the time and now the senior director of team travel and logistics: He could have No. 3. At the time, it had no special meaning to him and carried no particular weight from the eight Devil Rays who wore it before.
“I just took No. 3 -- and it’s going up in the rafters,” Longoria said. “So, it’s special now.”
The Rays officially retired Longoria’s No. 3 jersey during a pregame ceremony before their 8-2 loss to the Mariners on Sunday afternoon, another honor for the franchise icon after he was inducted into the Rays Hall of Fame on Saturday and previously had a statue installed outside Tropicana Field of him celebrating his famous “Game 162” home run.
With Tantric on hand to play a live performance of his iconic walk-up song, “Down and Out,” Longoria and his family -- all wearing his No. 3 jersey -- looked to the left-field corner to see his No. 3 unveiled -- with help from longtime teammate James Shields and, appropriately enough, Foley -- next to the No. 66 recognizing Don Zimmer, one of Longoria’s earliest friends and most impactful mentors with Tampa Bay.
“The details were all super special,” said Longoria, who added one of his own after the ceremony by throwing out balls to fans in the stands before first pitch, part of his pregame routine as a player. “I'm glad we had some old, familiar faces up there to do it and just made it even that much more special.”
Fittingly, Longoria walked onto the field from an entrance adjacent to 162 Landing, where his historic walk-off shot cleared the fence. It seemed even more appropriate he was accompanied by the song inextricably linked to Longoria throughout his 16-year career.
The sharp, sinister electric violin riff of “Down and Out” sent the Tropicana Field crowd into a frenzy as Longoria made his way down the left-field line, much as it did when the song played every time he stepped to the plate during his 10 seasons with the Rays.
“I get chills every time I hear the Tantric song,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said.
That’s a pretty funny story, too, because the song chose Longoria as much as he chose the song.
As a rookie in 2008, he was given an iPod -- yes, an iPod -- that was pre-loaded with music. One of the songs just so happened to be “Down and Out.” Longoria thought the introduction sounded “cool,” so he asked the team to play it before his at-bats. When he went on to win AL Rookie of the Year during the Rays’ run to the World Series, he figured it was too good to change.
Fans later confirmed that was the case. He put out a social media post a few years later, asking what he should use as his new walk-up song. The response was universal: Don’t change it.
“So I was like, ‘OK, well, I’m never going to ask that question again,’” Longoria said. “It just stayed with me.”
So did the No. 3.
No player has worn Longoria’s number for the Rays since he was traded to the Giants in late 2017. Now, no player can ever hope to claim it again. It belongs to Longoria, and Longoria belongs to Tampa Bay.
The Rays only have four retired numbers: No. 12, worn by Hall of Famer Wade Boggs during his two seasons with Tampa Bay; No. 66, which belonged to the late Zimmer; Jackie Robinson’s No. 42, which is retired throughout Major League Baseball; and now, No. 3, for the face of the franchise from 2008-17.
“It’s definitely fitting,” Shields said. “Longo, to me, was one of my favorite teammates of all time. He was a true professional every single day. He worked hard every single day. Obviously his career spoke for itself. But more importantly, he was just a good ambassador for the game.”
But Longoria used to joke about stuff like this, actually. Whenever the Rays would visit Yankee Stadium, they’d look out to Monument Park and see all of New York’s retired numbers. They’d laugh about the idea of joining the Yankees, only to find that all the “good” numbers were gone.
Ideally, someone will share the same issue for Tampa Bay someday.
“It’s a cool thing, but at the same time, I’m like, ‘Well, 50 years from now, when the Rays have all these great players and all the numbers are gone, we’ll be complaining about the same thing – that all the good numbers are gone,’” Longoria said.
For starters, No. 3 is off-limits.
“I think it has meant so much to my family, being able to put that jersey on,” Longoria said. “From the beginning of my first opportunity here up until this moment, 20 years of just life, basically, culminating in such a special moment is really cool.”