Four years ago on Rays Index the Rays unveiled their plans for a new waterfront stadium and also announced the signing of Troy Percival. Overall, not the most productive day in franchise history.
The Rays Officially Unveil Plans For New Stadium On St. Pete Waterfront [Rays Index]
Rays Agree To Contract With Free Agent Troy Percival [Rays Index]
When the Rays defeated the Yankees in extra innings on the final day of the regular season, they did more than just clinch the third playoff spot in team history. It also guaranteed each member of the team a nice little playoff bonus of $30,758 per player (via Marc Topkin of TampaBay.com).
That is $7,690 per playoff game per player. The total haul for the entire team was $1.65 million or about $79 thousand per run scored.
$31 thousand is a nice little haul, especially when you consider that most of the players on the team are making the big league minimum of $414,000. Then again, if you consider that the World Series winning St. Louis Cardinals each received more than $320 thousand, it suddenly doesn’t seem so great.
Yesterday we heard that the Astros had contacted the Rays about interviewing Andrew Friedman. And now, Richard Justice of the Houston Chronicle is reporting that the Rays have granted permission to the Astros.
Justice calls Friedman, the Astros “No. 1 choice” to replace recently fired Ed Wade.
We speculated that Friedman would at least meet with the team to discuss their general manager position. But keep in mind, it might take more to lure Friedman away from Stuart Sternberg and Company than just throwing a lot of money at him. Friedman actually has a financial stake in the Rays.
So if the Astros are serious about signing Friedman, they may have to offer him a package similar to what Theo Epstein received with the Cubs. That is, the Astros could offer to make Friedman the team’s president. In addition to Wade, the Astros also fired team president Tal Smith.
Either way, we should know more sooner, rather than later.
