The offseason hasn’t started yet, but one of baseball’s biggest free agents has already sparked more speculation than anyone could have predicted a month ago: the Tampa Bay Rays.

The Rays will not be able to start the 2025 season at Tropicana Field, the stadium they have called home since the franchise’s inception in 1998, due to damage suffered by Hurricane Milton. Two questions loom over the now roofless indoor stadium: How long will it take to repair it, and does the city of St. Petersburg (which owns the venue) have the money and patience to fix it?

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Whatever the long-term future of Tropicana, the short-term future is clear: The Rays need a new home.

This sparked speculation from far and wide about where the team should move.

Pinellas County Commissioner Chris Latvala advocated that the team stay in the county the Rays call home.

Philadelphia 76ers executive Daryl Morey suggested Canada, writing on his Twitter/X account: “I tell Toronto to make the home swap deal with the Raptors.” The Raptors played in Tampa during the pandemic-interrupted 2020 NBA season.

Meanwhile, a column in the Chicago Tribune on Sunday argued for a new venue that would give the Windy City three Major League Baseball teams, plus the White Sox and Cubs.

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A pop-up baseball field on The 78, a 62-acre South Loop site where the Chicago White Sox also want to build a new stadium, could be converted for temporary major league use, writes Paul Sullivan:

All it would need is a team, a facility that can accommodate about 12,000 fans and some forward thinking from the Rays, MLB, the city of Chicago and the 78 developers.

This proposal comes a few days after a spokesperson for the Montreal Olympic Stadium confirmed that the site would not be playable in 2025.

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“Until 2028, the playing field will be in a construction site and therefore will not be open to the public,” stadium communications manager Anik Parisé told the Tampa Bay Times via email.

Montreal had been seen as a popular destination because in 2019 the Rays explored a “sister city” partnership with Montreal in which the Rays would play some of their home games in the former Expos home. MLB ultimately rejected this plan.

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