ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Monday marks the home opener for the Rays and their first game back at Tropicana Field.<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
Local businesses expect boost from return of the Rays to Tropicana Field
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St. Pete Area Chamber of Commerce CEO said some local businesses were down 30% without the Rays
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The Rays home opener is Monday against the Cubs<\/p>\n
The team spent last season playing in Tampa at George Steinbrenner Field after damage from Hurricane Milton.<\/p>\n
Businesses are ready for the boost that comes from game day, including Poppo\u2019s Taqueria.<\/p>\n
General Manager Kyle Frantz said they\u2019re happy to see the Rays back home.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir stadium is only like a block and a half away so the foot traffic alone increases business,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Frantz said an entire season with the Rays playing in Tampa didn\u2019t feel right.<\/p>\n
He said both Poppo\u2019s and many other shops felt the effects on their business.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo many local people depend on the people coming in and the baseball games and everything that brings people to our area,\u201d Frantz said. \u201cWithout the Rays, that is a very large amount of people that aren\u2019t showing up around here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Down the road at Ferg\u2019s, they agree.<\/p>\n
Ferg\u2019s co-owner Jake Ferguson said home games did not feel the same as past years.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe felt the difference,\u201d he said. \u201cYou know, it was like kind of dull, and there wasn\u2019t much energy during the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chris Steinocher, the President and CEO of the St. Pete Area Chamber of Commerce, said the Rays being back at the Trop should lead to a big uptick for local businesses.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor businesses in St. Pete to be down 30%, you\u2019re talking about the livelihood of jobs and shifts and people that aren\u2019t coming in to get their jobs done,\u201d he said. \u201cSo their families are starting to wonder how they get paid.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Monday marks the home opener for the Rays and their first game back at Tropicana…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[2031,558,4628,115,596,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,3815,14104],"class_list":{"0":"post-219842","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-st-petersburg","8":"tag-app-local-business","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-matt-lackritz","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-pinellas-county","13":"tag-st-pete","14":"tag-st-pete-headlines","15":"tag-st-pete-news","16":"tag-st-petersburg","17":"tag-st-petersburg-headlines","18":"tag-st-petersburg-news","19":"tag-tampa","20":"tag-tampa-bay-rays","21":"tag-topic-latest-local-business-stories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}