Former Tampa Bay Rays ace David Price will continue his tour of duty in the AL East for the foreseeable future. (Photo Credit: Fan Sided)
Former Tampa Bay Rays ace David Price will continue his tour of duty in the AL East for the foreseeable future. (Photo Credit: Fan Sided)

Former Tampa Bay Rays ace David Price will continue his tour of duty in the AL East for the foreseeable future. Price has agreed to a massive $217-million deal with the Boston Red Sox.

The total value of the seven year contract is the largest for any pitcher ― narrowly eclipsing Clayton Kershaw‘s $215-million contract with the Dodgers. Per Ken Rosenthal (Fox Sports), Price’s contract contains an opt-out clause after the third year of the contract, also noting that his $31-million average annual value ties Miguel Cabrera for the richest average annual value (AAV) in Major League history.

The annual breakdowns of Price’s deal look like this:

2016 – $30M
2017 – $30M
2018 – $30M
2019 – $31M
2020 – $32M
2021 – $32M
2022 – $32M

Through the opt out clause, Price is afforded the opportunity to again test the open market heading into his age-33 season (2019). However, as Steve Adams (MLB Trade Rumors) noted, “It will be a challenge although not impossible, for Price to be able to secure more than the four years and $127MM that remain on his contract at the point at which he can opt out.” Adams continued:

For comparison, Price’s main competitor in free agency, Zack Greinke, opted out of the remaining three year on his $147MM contract to begin this offseason, but he did so entering his age-32 season (one year younger than Price will be after the 2018 campaign) and with $71MM remaining on his contract.

For what it’s worth, Price is 1-2 against Tampa Bay, with a 4.26 ERA over three starts (19 innings of work). After collecting what he called the best game of his career — he fanned nine and allowed just an unearned run in eight innings of work, yet was saddled with a 1-0 loss — in his 2014 return to Tropicana Field, Price allowed 12 runs (nine earned) over his next two starts against his former team.

Stadium News

All’s quiet on the eastern front as they say, yet expect things to heat up after January when the City of St. Petersburg swears in the the new city council, including Lisa Wheeler-Brown. Brown is seen as the fifth vote needed for Mayor Rick Kriseman’s stadium compromise.

However, a relevant piece of news did fly under most people’s radar this past weekend. According to Noah Pransky (Shadow of the Stadium), the Tampa Bay Buccaneers will soon be seeking a new stadium somewhere in Tampa Bay…and they’ll lean on taxpayers to pay for it.

It should be noted, “soon” is a relative term since — like the Rays — the Bucs’ lease at Raymond James Stadium runs through 2027.

Pransky wrote:

We can see the early stages of the leveraging as the Bucs jockey for leverage with the taxpayer-funded Tampa Sports Authority, regarding terms of their stadium renovations.  What should have been a simple “taxpayers pay $26 million; we’ll pay the rest” discussion has broken down over the team’s out-of-the-blue request to play multiple regular-season games in another city (or country).

In fact, I reported in October how the county asked the Bucs about extending their lease at Raymond James Stadium past 2027 in exchange for some of their requested contract & renovation concessions, but the team said it “was not interested at this time.”

What effect this may have on the Rays ability to find a viable home in Hillsborough County, if and when they are allowed to search for a new stadium site, is unknown at the moment. It’s not be hard to imagine that the citizens of Hillsborough County would not be too thrilled by not one, but two professional franchises petitioning the taxpayers for a publicly funded stadium.

If you are a proponent for the Rays staying on the Pinellas County side of the bay, this could boost the City of St. Petersburg’s leverage in the Stadium Saga. As it stands, there are currently three realistic sites in St. Petersburg (annexed land, or otherwise) — Toytown, Derby Lane, and the Trop’s 85 acres — and a funding source in the form of the bed tax.

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