Tampa Bay Rays

It’s bad enough that Tropicana Field has a reputation as one of baseball’s ugliest ballparks, a venue stuck in the close-roofed, close-minded ethos of the 1970s and 1980s. But the problem is worse than that. Tropicana Field fails to qualify for the three most important factors in the real estate industry: Location, location and location. Downtown St. Petersburg, where the Trop is situated, is a pleasant place with some suave looking hi-rises, but to most people within the Tampa Bay market, it’s an island that requires a long drive—a city physically connected to the Florida mainland only from the north, where less people live.

So potential fans from Tampa have to drive across a long bridge and then down another 10 or so miles of congested freeway traffic, while fans from the south have an even longer bridge (13 miles) that requires payment to cross. And among those within St. Petersburg lucky to make the short drive to the Trop, a higher-than-normal percentage are seniors—many of whom view premium prices and 7:30 starting times as anathema. For them, shuffleboard and park benches are more preferable.

Solution: Fortunately for the Rays, there is one—and that’s to move to Tampa, where they’d be closer to the majority of the area’s residents while being a more attractive reach for folks in Orlando, some 80 miles away. The wheels are currently in motion to build such a ballpark, but it’s still in the prenatal stages. Nobody knows where the money will come from or when the first shovel will be thrust into the ground. Until then, it’s St. Petersburg or bust. For the Rays, it’s usually both.

San Francisco Giants

Some might find the Giants’ inclusion on this list as a bit puzzling given their recent successes with three world titles. With that pedigree, with all that money the Giants have, with their jewel of a waterfront ballpark in Oracle Park, you’d think free agents would be flocking to San Francisco. But nope. Here’s why.

First, there’s the park itself. OraclePark is beautiful to behold, but it’s death on hitters—especially left-handed sluggers who try to power the ball over a distant right-field wall that’s not only up to 420 feet away from home plate, but also quite tall at 25 feet. Then there’s the weather. Though not as brutally chilly as the notorious Arctic-like conditions at the Giants’ previous home of Candlestick Park, Oracle Park is occasionally brisk enough, even on a July evening, to discourage players who prefer warmer climes elsewhere. Finally, there’s the economic conditions. The San Francisco Bay Area has the nation’s highest income tax rate, the nation’s highest median home price (closing in on $1 million), and the nation’s highest cost of living. Sure, anyone who comes to the Giants on a nine-figure deal will survive just fine, but don’t think that any of the above factors aren’t heavily considered when choosing the best deal—or best place to play.

Some will say that if the Giants have to deal with all of this, wouldn’t it be worse for the Oakland A’s, a poor-boy franchise playing across the bay in a crumbling stadium? Not exactly. The Coliseum is an easier place to hit home runs—so no hitter’s ego is bruised—it’s not as cold as Oracle Park, and real estate prices aren’t quite as insane the further east you go from San Francisco.

Solution: The Giants aren’t going to dome up Oracle Park anytime soon, so there’s nothing they can do about the weather, and they have no control over the real estate, taxes and cost of living. They can reduce the field distances at Oracle—for God’s sakes, at least put a yellow stripe halfway up that tall wall so any ball making contact above is ruled a home run. That has been a topic of conversation of late as the Giants perennially finish near the bottom of team home runs every season and drive away star hitters like Giancarlo Stanton, Carlos Beltran and Carlos Lee—all of whom have said thanks by no thanks to joining the Giants when given the chance.

Milwaukee Brewers

On the ‘mega’ end of the majors’ market scale, you have the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers. On the “mini” end you have the Brewers, who play in baseball’s smallest market. There are MLB cities with less people than Milwaukee’s 595,000, but the extended area adds roughly an extra million folks—and although that may sound like a lot, it’s less than those that surround the smaller cities like Cleveland and Cincinnati.

Complicating matters for the Brewers—beyond the small population and the resulting, limited potential for local/regional broadcast revenue—is that they have plenty of big-league neighbors close by. Practically next door are the Cubs and White Sox, just 90 miles to the south in Chicago, while the Minnesota Twins are 300 miles to the west. This eats away at the Brewers’ ability to appeal to more distant baseball fans, which is not quite the problem in, say, St. Louis with the Cardinals.

Solution: Get more people to move to Milwaukee. Or convince the Cubs and White Sox to leave Chicago. Okay, so we kid on all of that. In reality, the Brewers have just one option: Promote the game and get people to Miller Park. They’ve done that, drawing three million or more fans to the ballpark three different times while coming close on numerous other occasions. But it’s a high-wire act; should the Brewers freefall into the dumpster standings-wise and/or begin suffering brain farts on the marketing front, there’s nothing to fall back on except for the occasional MLB welfare check.