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The Extra 2%

How Wall Street Strategies Took a Major League Baseball Team From Worst to First
jacobsikora
May 04, 2011jacobsikora rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
I really enjoyed this book for what it was, a history of the (Devil) Rays in Tampa and a contrast in management styles. In many ways, I prefer this baseball book to the heavily detailed, blow by blow accounts of a season. Keri lays out the challenges the Tampa/St. Pete area had acquiring a team in the first place and then details the mistakes made by the first ownership team. He praises the changes made by the new owners and shows how this led to the first division championship. It's not all happy endings, however, as the current economic situation in the area and the lingering effects of the poor decisions from the first group make it difficult for the Rays to be a profitable ball club. Much of this is blamed on Tropicana Field and the Rays inability to get funding for a new stadium. The book left me wanting to follow the current Rays and see how they work through these challenges. My one complaint is that the author tried to make each chapter stand alone, so there is a large amount of repetition.