A Times Editorial

Break up the Devil Rays

Going into the 2002 season, the objectives of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays appeared to be: 1. Cut player payroll. 2. Cut other expenses, too. 3. Alienate the small but hardy fan base that preferred Tropicana Field's cheap seats. 4. Win some games.

In that order.

Rays management didn't wait for the start of the season to get cracking on the first three goals. After a mindless spending spree two years ago, the team now has the lowest payroll in the majors. Management also has cut expenses in many other areas, from player development to trash collection. And by closing off the upper deck for most of the season and quarantining purchasers of cheap tickets to a corner of the outfield seats, the team surely has run off some former fans in this notoriously penny-pinching community.

With the first three goals accomplished, winning some games was generally assumed to be the tricky part, as it was in the Rays' first four seasons. In fact, the zeal with which management went about goals 1, 2 & 3 led some conspiracy theorists to speculate that the Rays' owners were less interested in a pennant than a contraction check.

So far, though, the start of the season is playing out like the plot of The Producers, in which a Broadway play becomes an accidental smash hit despite the best efforts of its financial backers to sabotage it.

The young, bargain-basement Devil Rays were supposed to settle into their usual home in the basement of the American League East, but anyone who has ever worked for a large organization knows that pay often doesn't have anything to do with performance. The Rays' players suddenly look like major-leaguers, and Rays' management suddenly looks like geniuses.

Nobody really expects the Rays to challenge the Yankees all summer, but they're already off to the kind of start our still-young franchise has never seen before:

Three-and-oh.

And only 159 games to go.

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