Tampa Bay Rays news and links: “If I could have cried, I would have cried”

You really can’t help but feel good for Denard Span, who was traded to his hometown team under circumstances that made it hard for fans to welcome him. The game didn’t start out well for him, when a perfectly-placed bloop between Span and Kevin Kiermaier turned into a hair-raising near collision and an inside-the-park home run.

But it ended well, and you can tell how meaningful that was for Span—he wore it on his sleeve.

Marc Topkin has this storyline covered very well, writing a feature on Span’s experience in the first game, and reheating a previous article on Span’s homecoming.

Also make sure to take a look at Span during the interview. The guy’s not just saying that. He cares.

There’s much more video from the locker room from Steve Kinsella at Sports Talk Florida, and Rays Radio also had audio from a good postgame interview with Kevin Cash.

Rays Links

• Look, it was the first game of the regular season for all of us, and rust is normal. I like Bill Chastain’s writing. I like how he structured the intro to his game recap to point out how difficult it can be to hit against Carson Smith, rather than treating the eventual outcome as a sure thing. But . . . I think that maybe he was looking for a different word to transition into his second sentence:

The odds didn’t favor the hometown team. Alas, the Rays turned to a hometown player to be the difference in a 6-4, come-from-behind win over the Red Sox at sold-out Tropicana Field on Thursday.

• MLB Trade Rumors (finally) did their Rays offseason review.
• Goodnight.

Other Links

• Sheryl Ring wrote about concussions in baseball, and whether there might be a lawsuit against the league on the horizon.
• Russell Carleton has a book. It’s on my reading list, but I’m not there yet. Luckily for everyone, Meg Rowley is.
• Russell Carleton also wrote about minor league wages.