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Roger Mooney

Roger Mooney covers the Tampa Bay Rays for The Tampa Tribune, TBO.com and News Channel 8. He has covered the Rays since their first season in 1998, including 11 years for the Bradenton Herald. Roger has also covered Florida, South Florida and Florida State football, the Bucs and the Lightning.

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Sternberg on future of Friedman, Maddon and payroll

Posted Sep 12, 2011 by Roger Mooney

Updated Sep 12, 2011 at 07:02 PM

ROGER MOONEY
BALTIMORE Rays owner Stuart Sternberg said before tonight’s game with the Orioles that he has not been contacted by the Cubs nor any other team about executive vice president Andrew Friedman.

He also said he doesn’t expect Friedman to leave the organization.

“I’d like to think, the environment and we have such a great personal and working relationship, him and (team president) Matt (Silverman) and the other people in the front office, that it’s, you hate to say things couldn’t be any better, but on that front, as far as everything goes, it couldn’t be better,” Sternberg said. “On that front, it would really only be because of the position the organization is in and what an uphill battle we have to go at it every year, Andrew loves climbing mountains, being an underdog, having to go at it, but at some point you want at least one of your hands not tied behind your back. So it will be one of the things we focus on is how things work out with the collective bargaining agreement, and like I’ve said in the past and will continue to reiterate, more of that changes can only be good for us.”

Sternberg said all the changes being bandied about – expanded playoffs, balanced schedule – can only help the Rays remain competitive, and should lessen Friedman’s desire to move to a team with a higher payroll.

Sternberg said he is willing to give up the revenue created from three home dates each with the Yankees and Red Sox for the balanced schedule, because he feels the Rays would have a better chance of reaching the postseason.

“We’ve thought about it, from my end, from the business side, it’s not good,” he said. “From a standpoint of what we’ll be able to reinvest back into the team, it’s not good. But from a competitive standpoint, for a guy like Andrew and his department, it would be very welcome.”

As for manager Joe Maddon’s future, Sternberg said he doesn’t see any reason why Maddon won’t receive a contract extension after the 2012 season.

“We’ve been at it now, it’s going to be six years. It doesn’t feel like six years,” he said. “I would think we’d keep the band together another six years.”

About that payroll, which is at $42 million, it doesn’t look as if the Rays will add to this offseason.

“I don’t know, but we’ve clearly fallen short on our financial projections,” Sternberg said. “We have to make some projections, but I could not have projected our attendance would be down. I don’t think anybody would have thought that. It don’t help, let’s put it that way. Nothing positive happened financially this year, but by the same token there’s not a lot positive happening in the whole economy. But I look up at Pittsburgh, teams just went by us like we were going in reverse.”

Much of the Rays revenue is tied to attendance, which is second-to-last in the major leagues at 18,548.

“It can only be helpful to have more (fans in the stands) in so many ways,” he said.

Sternberg also didn’t rule out the possibility of Friedman adding to the payroll in the offseason if he felt the Rays could get one player who could truly make a difference.

“Things can always happen,” he said. “It’s at what cost? … It’s simple to say this, any time we’re adding significantly to payroll, we can’t afford it. That’s basically the rule of thumb. We do it, and it comes out of somewhere, sometimes future years, sometimes past earnings, past revenue and sometimes my pocket. It’s coming from somewhere, but we can never afford it.”