The Tampa Bay Rays are maybe the best organization in baseball. Despite carrying one of the league’s lowest payrolls, they’ve won 90 games for four straight seasons and are a perennial pennant threat. Their front office is seemingly multiple steps ahead of everybody else.
But they still play in Tropicana Field, which resembles a glorified mini-golf course. Until that changes, they’ll always maintain some of their laughingstock past. Though it’s not as funny when the stadium’s inane quirks play a role in deciding the outcome of a playoff game.
That’s what happened Thursday in the Rays’ 5-0 victory over the Red Sox. Nelson Cruz hit a blast in the bottom of the third inning that ricocheted off one of the catwalks, bouncing back into fair territory. But the ball was ruled a home run, because it clanked off one of two outermost catwalks, Catwalk C. Any ball that connects with that catwalk is a home run, whereas balls that bang off of the two inner-catwalks — Catwalk A and Catwalk B — are ruled in play.
Everybody got that?
The Cruz home run call wasn’t egregious, because the ball was smoked and seemed like it was on its way to landing onto Trop’s semi-full bleachers. The Red Sox were also shut out. One run didn’t make the difference.
But Cruz’s catwalk round-tripper is a potential harbinger of things to come. There’s a distinct possibility that somebody could hit a routine fly ball that connects with Catwalk A, and instead of being an easy out, it turns into a game-winning double.
It’s amazing something like that hasn’t happened yet. But when it does, any romanticism attached to the Rays will rightfully fade.
They still play in a Mickey Mouse ballpark that has the atmosphere of a rundown amusement park. There’s nothing fun about figuring out the catwalks.
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