51 Questions for the Diehard Fan: Tampa Bay Rays

By Ryder Edwards

Tampa Bay, like any other expansion team, toiled and persevered in its infancy—but today, minus the Devil, the Rays have become one of the most exciting teams in baseball. This eBook will take you through the best moments and biggest names in Rays’ history—so if you’re a diehard Rays fan or you’re just a baseball fanatic in general, then it’s time to step up to the challenge and test your knowledge with these hardball questions about the Rays—all the sluggers, hurlers, and greatest moments in franchise history ... 51 questions to challenge the diehard Tampa Bay Rays fan.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tucker Elliot
• Release date: Dec 26, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301085033

Ryder Edwards

Ryder Edwards is a diehard sports fan from the great city of Chicago: NASCAR, MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL, NCAA, PGA ... he loves it all, and is passionate about the history and trivia from every major sport. Most recently he was at Medinah Country Club rooting feverishly for the US Ryder Cup team, but in the summers you can usually find him on Waveland Avenue supporting his hometown Cubs.

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

Major League Baseball has been in Florida for nearly a century in the form of Spring Training—and professional baseball has been in the Tampa-St. Pete area since 1908 when the Cincinnati Reds played an exhibition game against the semi-pro St. Petersburg Saints. Just five years later the Chicago Cubs began conducting Spring Training at Plant Field in Tampa, and by the 1920s training sites for Major League teams were being built all across the state from Jacksonville to Tampa to Fort Myers to West Palm Beach. The premiere training facility, however, was Sunshine Park in St. Petersburg. It held 5,000 fans and was built with state of the art batting cages and all the amenities necessary for a Major League team to prepare for the upcoming season.

And when the Phillies used Sunshine Park in 1915 and then proceeded to win 14 of 15 games to start the regular season, well … let’s just say that’s the moment that Florida cemented it’s reputation as Major League Baseball’s spring training capital.

The Tampa-St. Pete area witnessed more than its fair share of baseball legends throughout the decades, but it wasn’t until MLB teams voted unanimously on March 9, 1995, to accept the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Arizona Diamondbacks as the 13th and 14th expansion teams in Major League history that this Mecca of the baseball world had a team all its own. The Devil Rays began play in 1998, and the club became the first in baseball’s modern era to host spring training in its home city—St. Petersburg.

Tampa Bay, like any other expansion team, toiled and persevered in its infancy—but today, minus the Devil, the Rays have become one of the most exciting teams in baseball. This eBook will take you through the best moments and biggest names in Rays’ history—so if you’re a diehard Rays fan or you’re just a baseball fanatic in general, then it’s time to step up to the challenge and test your knowledge with these hardball questions about the Rays—all the sluggers, hurlers, and greatest moments in franchise history … 51 questions to challenge the diehard Tampa Bay Rays fan.

1. On April 1, 1998, he earned the