TAMPA, Fla. — For the first time, Steinbrenner Field did not feel like a home away from home for the Yankees.
Steinbrenner Field has been the site of spring training for the franchise since 1996, but this season — because of severe damage done to Tropicana Field’s roof by Hurricane Milton last October — the AL East rival Rays are using the facility for all 81 of their “home” games this season.
“I bumped into [Rays manager] Kevin Cash walking in, I bumped into some Rays players,” Aaron Boone said Thursday before his team started a four-game series against Tampa Bay at Steinbrenner Field. “I don’t know if surreal is the right word, but it’s definitely a little bit odd.”
The oddities, of course, start with the building itself, which has been completely overhauled to the point that it is nearly impossible to find a Yankees logo anywhere. The only evidence of this being a Yankees complex is, of course, the name — George M. Steinbrenner Field, which still is atop the scoreboard in left-center, though with a “TB” logo replacing the Yankees’ — and the frieze adorning the second-level overhang.
The same goes with the home clubhouse, where it is all things Rays, including a mini-tarp hanging from the middle of the ceiling that says: “Home of the Rays.”
Steinbrenner Field underwent roughly $40 million in renovations before this past spring training began, the upgrades including a new two-story weight room, a new clubhouse kitchen and a new players’ lounge, among other amenities.
Yankees players raved about the changes throughout their six weeks of spring training, and they have been a hit with the Rays as well.
“The training room’s really nice, the food room’s pretty cool,” Rays second baseman Brandon Lowe said before Thursday’s game, also mentioning the weight room. “They did a good job covering up a bunch of the Yankees’ symbols and trying to make it as Rays as possible. But it’s not the Trop, it’s still a spring training complex.”
The Rays’ use of the Yankees’ clubhouse, of course, means the Yankees are in the visitor’s clubhouse and sitting in the third-base dugout.
Though the Steinbrenner Field visiting clubhouse is significantly smaller than the home clubhouse, several Yankees mentioned it being bigger — which it is — than the visitor’s clubhouses at two iconic ballparks, Fenway Park and Wrigley Field.
“I think [them] coming in, being back to sort of being at home to the road clubhouse will be a little bit of an adjustment, but nothing that is going to be much of a talking point,” Lowe said.
Boone did his part to make his counterpart comfortable. Before the Yankees departed spring training, Boone, taking a page from the presidential tradition started by Ronald Reagan in 1989, left a note for Cash in a desk drawer in the home manager’s office.
“A nice note,” Cash said before smiling. “And a bottle of tequila. Which I very much appreciate.”
Boone said he sent the tequila earlier in the day Thursday, something he meant to leave along with the note at the end of spring training but “forgot” to do.
“I sent it over today, which is a little anticlimactic,” Boone said. “Just kind of my housewarming gift for like, ‘hey, take care of the place.’ But just ‘good luck with the season. See you soon.’ ”
The Rays’ use of Steinbrenner Field resulted from several weeks of discussions between the organizations — the Yankees received about $15 million from the Rays to use the facility — and Major League Baseball. It was the best of no truly good options for 2025.
“It took an act of God and Mother Nature to put us in this situation,” Tampa Bay righthander Drew Rasmussen said. “We are grateful and thankful to them [the Yankees], which is a funny thing to say, for allowing us to use the facility. But also, as far as this regular season goes, this is our home and not theirs.”
Notes & quotes: Boone said DJ LeMahieu, who started the season on the injured list with a left calf strain, could start a rehab assignment as soon as Sunday but is more likely to begin it on Tuesday . . . Cash, a former Yankees player and scout and the Rays’ manager since 2015, gave a weary smile when asked about the challenges of slowing down a hot Aaron Judge, who debuted in 2016. “I feel like he’s been hot for almost a decade now,” Cash said. Judge had an RBI single in the top of the first inning and threw out a runner trying to go from first to third on a single in the bottom of the inning Thursday night.
