DEVIL RAYS HISTORY

The Tampa Bay Devil Rays are a Professional Major League Baseball team based in St Petersburg, Florida. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays play in the Eastern Division of the American League. The Devil Rays were founded in 1998 as an expansion of the American League. The home ballpark for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays is Tropicana Field and the uniform colors for the Devil Rays are, black, forest green, purple, and white. The Logo design for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays are the words "TAMPA BAY" superimposed on a devil ray (manta ray). In 1995 a meeting was held at the West Palm Beach, Florida and Major League Baseball owners officially welcome the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and Arizona Diamondbacks as the 13th and 14th expansion teams in Major League history. The Devil Rays was the first team to be added in the American League after two decades. The current star for the Devil rays are, Rocco Baldelli, Rob Bell, Geoff Blum, Devon Brazelton, Jorge Cantu, Carl Crawford, Brook Fordyce, Joey Gathright, Aubrey Huff and Ray Sanchez. The Players not to be forgotten are, Travis Lee, Fred McGriff, Jim Morris, Greg Vaughn and Victor Zambrano. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays have retired the following numbers, #12 belonging to Wade Boggs and #42 worn by Jackie Robinson who has retired throughout baseball. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays played their first game on 31st March, 1998, the Devil Rays lost that first game 11-6 to the Detroit Tigers but bounced back to win their first game the very next day. The Devil Rays did not win much that first year only winning 63 while narrowly avoiding the century mark in losses at 99. To attract fans to the Devil Rays, big names of the past, which are now the downsides of their career sign with Tampa in an attempt to reach career milestones. In another disappointing 69-93 season, 2 of these big stars of the past get career milestones. First up to get a milestone was Jose Canseco who singed in the off-season and hit his 400th career HR on April 14th at Toronto against one of his former teams the Blue Jays. In fact Jose hit a lot of HRs for the Rays in the early going of the season and lead the AL with 30 in late June. However, a back injury would take 2 months out of Jose's season, and he would only hit 4 more. Another HR marked a milestone on August 7th for Wade Boggs a Tampa native, when he became the first player ever to hit a Home Run for his 3,000th career base hit. After watching their partners in expansion the Arizona Diamond Backs win the NL West, the Devil Rays try to make their team more competitive in hurry by acquiring big sluggers Greg Vaughn, and Vinny Castillia from the National League. The Devil Rays end the season in last place again with a 69-92 record. The Devil Rays get off to a miserable start, and Manager Larry Rothschild is fired, before the end of April, and replaced by Hal McRae. The Devil Rays misery continues, as they become the first team in more then 20 years to lose 100 games in consecutive season posting a horrid 55-106 record. The team signed manager Lou Piniella in a four-year, $13 million contract. He was the third manager to coach the team.