Dear Major League Baseball owners and Commissioner Rob Manfred:
Just wanted to take this opportunity to welcome you to Orlando — the internationally renowned City Beautiful.
I know you’re here this week for the annual owners meetings and hopefully you guys will get a lot accomplished, including settling this ugly labor dispute with the Players Association that is threatening Spring Training and Opening Day. Just between you, me and the honeybees, I think the Players Association has become way too powerful and way too demanding. Remember what Bob Dylan once sang about the unionization of corporate America: “Sure was a good idea ‘til greed got in the way.”
But I digress.
That’s not the purpose of this letter.
I’m writing to tell you that Orlando is not just a great place to visit; it’s a great place to live.
We don’t want you baseball owners to just come to Central Florida every so often for your annual meetings; we want you to move one of your teams here permanently.
Specifically, the St. Petersburg, er, Tampa Bay Rays.
I know, I know, you guys are probably rolling your eyes right now and saying, “Why would we want another failed franchise in Florida?” I certainly understand your skepticism, considering the Rays and the Miami Marlins are almost always the bottom two teams in the league in attendance. But I’m asking you to put aside your preconceived notions and don’t hold the baseball futility in Miami and Tampa Bay against Orlando. We would be a much better baseball city than they are, and here’s why:
First and foremost, we are the biggest media market in America without an NFL or MLB team. As you guys know, the NFL is the king of all sports in our country and having an NFL team in your city is an attention magnet for sports fans and corporate sponsors. Besides the location of Tropicana Field, a major reason the Rays are so unsuccessful at attracting fans and sponsors is because they are third in popularity behind the ultra-popular Bucs and Lightning.
In Orlando, the only professional sports franchises we have are a perpetually rebuilding NBA team (the Magic) and an MLS team (Orlando City) that is still trying to regain traction with the fan base in Central Florida. What does that mean? It means the Rays could move to Orlando and immediately become the biggest fish in our ever-expanding pond.
Not only is Orlando the largest TV market in America without and MLB team, but we are growing at a rate much faster than other cities (Las Vegas, Nashville, Portland, etc.) that have expressed an interest in attracting a baseball team. Orlando is the third-fastest growing metropolitan area in the nation and the No. 1 fastest growing city for entrepreneurs (new businesses), according to LinkedIn’s State of Entrepreneurship study.
Geographically and demographically, I believe Orlando has more sports potential than any city in America. It’s one reason the Big 12 recently expanded to add UCF while snubbing USF. In the next few years, Orlando will blow by Denver, Detroit and Minneapolis and will go from the 17th largest TV market to 14th; right behind — you guessed it — Tampa Bay. Except Orlando has something Tampa Bay doesn’t have; we have between 75 and 80 million tourists per year who come here to vacation. That makes Orlando arguably the No. 1 tourist destination in the country.
And, guys, you must realize that baseball would be a huge tourist attraction for families and conventioneers who are looking for another entertainment option while visiting Orlando. Especially if the state-of-the-art baseball park is located in the I-Drive tourist corridor between Disney, Universal and our massive, world-class convention center.
Imagine if you could get just 2% of our 80 million visitors per year to buy tickets to a single baseball game. That’s 1.6 million fans per season. For comparison’s sake, the Rays drew just 1.1 million fans during their last pre-pandemic season in 2019. With Orlando’s burgeoning population and thriving tourism industry, I figure we could easily draw more than 3 million fans per season, which would put us top 5 in the league.
And you know what else those millions of tourists give us? They give us a funding apparatus to help build a new baseball stadium — something Rays owner Stuart Sternberg hasn’t been able to get done in Tampa Bay even though he’s been trying for 15 years. In Orlando, we have a world-class arena, a world-class performing art center and a refurbished football stadium that was paid for largely with the tourist development tax. It’s a beautiful thing: The tourists build the facilities and we get to enjoy them.
Now obviously Sternberg is going to have to schmooze the movers and shakers and do some wheeling and dealing like the Magic did to get the arena built, but it can be done. Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings and Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer are sports fans. And you already have an ally in Orlando Magic co-founder Pat Williams, who has been lobbying local politicians and drumming up interest for two years in an attempt to get Orlando fired up about pursuing the Rays.
Well, that’s about all I have to say.
I’ve thrown out Orlando’s first pitch and I hope you guys will step up to the plate and give us our chance.
Again, hope you enjoy your stay in the City Beautiful.
Next time you’re in town, though, I hope it’s for the All-Star Game instead of the owners meetings.
