TAMPA, Fla. — Dozen of Tampa Bay Rays’ staff members are racing the clock Wednesday to re-brand Steinbrenner Field before Friday’s season opener.
“Four days, really a sprint to turn this from Yankees spring training to home of the Rays,” Bill Walsh, Rays’ Chief Business Officer, told ABC Action News.
The Rays are playing their 2025 home schedule in Tampa because of hurricane damage to Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. 300 full-time employees at The Trop were displaced, according to the team.
“There is really no playbook for this,” Walsh added. “We were really building the place as you fly it, so to speak.”
The Rays’ biggest rival, the New York Yankees, were gracious enough to lend their spring training ballpark for this season.
Over 3,000 pieces of Rays' art will be installed by Friday.
Staff members are covering and removing almost everything Yankees to make the space look and sound as much like the Rays’ home as possible.
“That was our goal. When you’re here, walking around, sitting in the seating bowl, is to have this place have home-field advantage for the Rays. We’re almost there,” Walsh said. “We’ve accomplished that in significant scale. It feels really good to see this transformation and see our brand come to life.”
And that’s just what the fans see. The Rays’ clubhouse also got a makeover.
“We worked on covering up the big ‘NY’ in the middle,” Tyler Wall, Rays’ clubhouse manager, said. “The nameplates covered up the ‘Welcome to the Bronx House’ over there. Down to the smallest detail. Even in the hot tubs, we’re putting suction cups over the Yankees logos.”
Wall said that seven truckloads of equipment, four from Tropicana Field and three from Port Charlotte, were brought in to make the turnover happen.
“We’re going try our best to cover everything up,” Wall said. “This is supposed to be the Rays’ place, for the next season at least. Let’s make it home and make it comfortable so they can perform well on the field.”
Steinbrenner Field will seat 10,046 fans for each game of the 81 home games in what promises to be a unique season.
“We’ve never played outdoor regular-season baseball in Tampa Bay before,” Walsh said. “This is an opportunity to define what that experience will look like. For evening games, we’re going to have some fireworks. We’re going to have home run celebrations, we’re going to have win celebrations, some rockets will go off during the national anthem. We have a flyover happening on opening day.”
The Rays will host the Colorado Rockies at 4:10 p.m. for Friday’s opening day.
