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St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman announced a possible agreement for the Rays to explore new regional stadium locations Tuesday morning. While the potential deal should be considered a huge step forward, the addition of any termination agreement to a contract (or in this case, a memorandum) is a complicated matter — especially when you factor in some of the less-than-popular terms which would be set in stone pending a yes vote by the St. Petersburg City Council.

The vote was initially slated for their next meeting (Thursday, December 11th) less than three days after the deal was announced. Because of it — and following an early morning lobbying effort which apparently fell short — Mayor Kriseman asked council chairman Bill Dudley to reschedule that vote for Dec. 18 to allow for a thorough review of the pending agreement. Dudley agreed.

Rays president Brian Auld said the team understand the mayor’s move to delay the vote.

“We don’t mind waiting another week,” Auld told the Tampa Bay Times. “We’ve been working on this for a very long time. We hope to get to yes when the time comes.”

In other news, as the final day of the 2015 Winter Meetings looms, Marc Topkin reported that Wil Myers has drawn interest from about a half-dozen other teams. A trade of this caliber is not one the team typically make, and will probably culminate in just fruitless discussion. Adding credence to that idea, Matt Silverman addressed the topic with Marc Topkin in San Diego,

“We don’t have any questions about Wil,” baseball operations president Matt Silverman said. “The guy we saw last year was injured and didn’t really have a chance to demonstrate what he has.

“We look at him as a rookie of the year who really missed most of the season and expect him to be back in that form as a formidable bat in the middle of the lineup who also plays a pretty good outfield.”

Myers is coming off an injury laden and tepid 2014 season where he hit .222 with six homers and 35 RBI in 87. That down year came on the heels of a Rookie of the Year, .293 BA/13 HR/53 RBI campaign. While he will likely always have a high whiff rate, the expectation is for Myers to perform closer to his 2013 form. Because of it, the Rays aren’t going to sell all of the potential they see in Myers on a rookie contract.

Also not going anywhere: Evan Longoria.

…And while we’re at it, Ben Zobrist isn’t going anywhere either. “The Nationals have inquired about Ben Zobrist,” writes James Wagner of the Washinton Post, “but it appears like a long shot to pry him away from the Tampa Bay Rays.” An interesting caveat, Andrew Friedman essentially set the market value for Ben Zobrist, Wednesday afternoon. Danny Russell (DRaysBay) wrote, “unable to acquire Ben Zobrist, as it would seem, Andrew Friedman and the massive front office from Chavez Ravine unloaded three trades on the baseball world yesterday to make something else work. Finally, the Winter Meetings have turned into what they’re supposed to be: chaos — and with great implications for the Rays.”

Noteworthiness

  • On the subject of the approach and execution of one William Bradford Myers, Jason Hanselman (Dock of the Rays blog) writes, “Overall we see him starting the at bat by being ultra passive, doing a mostly good job with one strike, and then finishing the at bat being pretty aggressive, though lefties seem to do a good job of freezing him on borderline stuff and getting him to expand on other stuff that is further off. It’s almost as if he’s operating with a traffic light guiding him. Red light on first pitch, yellow light on second pitch, green light on third pitch.” You can read his excellent piece — bolstered by charts and graphs galore — over at Dock of the Rays.
  • Your tweets of the day, courtesy of Marc Topkin,

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