Some Q's with Stu

Continuing their splash of national media love, Rays principal owner Stuart Sternberg is featured in the latest issue of ESPN The Magazine, offering "8 Things You Should Know About Running A Small-Market Baseball Team."

Among his more interesting offerings:

1. TIMING IS EVERYTHING.
"We can't afford to compete every year, so when windows of opportunity appear, we have to press it. There's no point in expending resources just to get to .500. We have a top-ranked farm system, so we could have made a trade for Johan Santana. But then what? We don't really have enough money to pay him. It would have screwed us for the next 10 years."

And ...

2. FOLLOW THOSE MARLINS!
"Florida laid the blueprint for running a small-market club: Build your farm system, then add key guys for two-year runs. They also showed you can't hold your players forever. They knew when to let go of Josh Beckett and got Hanley Ramírez and Anibal Sánchez, pieces for a new foundation, when they traded him."

And ...

8. DESIGNATE THIS.
"The DH puts us behind the eight ball. We don't have the cash to pay a guy who doesn't field."

Click the link above for the others.

Comments

[Bob]

What do you mean you can't compete every year? The idea of building a squad is so that you CAN compete every year.

[Bodog]

I thought the object of the game is to WIN. If that is the case, why in the hell did Joe put a AAA team on the field. Riggans is a little league catcher at best. Someone Please tell me is it the Rays policy that their hitters don't swing at first pitch strikes. There are to many first ball strikes taken and too damn many called third strikes.

[phillip]

Stu- If you're reading this, while I love the "sting'em dog", I have two words for you... STEAMED BUNS!!! the hot dog buns at all of the great stadiums are steamed... the dry crunchy buns at the trop are horrible...