Rays manager signs contract extension

The Rays have signed president of baseball operations Erik Neander and manager Kevin Cash to long-term contract extensions, according to a report from Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. The specifics of the deals are not yet known, though Topkin says they’ll run beyond the 2028 season when the club is slated to move into a new stadium in St. Petersburg.

The Rays have formally announced the pair of contract extensions.

“I believe there are none better in baseball,” owner Stuart Sternberg said of his president and manager. “What we’ve all accomplished together has been remarkable, and the best is yet to come.”

The pair’s tenure at the top of the Rays organization has been a resounding success. While Cash has been managing the club since 2015, Neander became the club’s top baseball operations executive during the 2017-18 offseason. 

He’d previously served as the senior vice president of baseball operations and general manager under then-president Matthew Silverman, but Silverman moved to the business side of the operation and ceded baseball autonomy to Neander.

From 2018 onward, the Rays have posted a winning record in each season with five postseason appearances, including a trip to the World Series in 2020. Overall, the club has enjoyed a 511-359 record under the duo’s guidance, good for a .587 winning percentage.

All that winning has come despite resources that pale in comparison to the arsenals available to other perennial contenders. 

The club’s payroll reached an all-time high of just under $84M (per Cot’s Baseball Contracts) back in 2022, at which point the team ranked 25th in the majors in terms of player payroll. The club’s payroll ranked 26th in the majors in 2021 and has sat in the bottom three among all major league clubs every other season since Neander took over baseball operations. 

That’s left the club to occasionally part ways with top talents such as Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow despite the team’s consistent success. Those losses have been offset by the club’s ability to identify talent (both in trade partners and in the draft), a subsequent perennially strong farm system and success in developing talent at the major league level.

There’s been a fair bit of turnover in the Tampa Bay front office over the years, as rival teams frequently target Rays executives when seeking to reshape their own baseball operations outfits — hopeful of emulating the team’s constant success (both in terms of on-field play and player development). 

Neander was once a top lieutenant for president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman in Tampa Bay before he was hired away by the Dodgers. Neander and Chaim Bloom were key figures in running baseball ops thereafter, concurrently holding senior vice president titles, but Bloom was hired away by the Red Sox (and has since joined the Cardinals as an advisor after being dismissed in Boston). 

Brewers GM Matt Arnold was also hired out of the Rays ranks, and more recently now-former Rays GM Peter Bendix, who’d been No. 2 on Tampa Bay’s hierarchy behind Neander, was hired as the Marlins’ president of baseball operations.

It’s a similar story among Cash’s top coaches. A look back at the Rays’ coaching staff over the past few seasons will reveal a smattering of names who’ve gone on to become big-league managers. 

Pirates skipper Derek Shelton, Royals manager Matt Quatraro and Twins manager Rocco Baldelli were all on Cash’s staff at one point, as was Charlie Montoyo, who was hired away from the Rays to manage the Blue Jays but is now the White Sox's bench coach.

That’s only a short list of the number of executives, analysts and coaches who’ve been poached by other clubs over the years. 

Throughout all those personnel changes, however, Neander and Cash have been constants as the Rays have continually defied expectations set by their minimal payroll and roster that often resembles an island of misfit toys. 

Thursday’s extensions ensure that this same duo will remain in place for another half-decade of baseball in St. Petersburg and that Neander and Cash will help to usher in a new era of Rays baseball when they move into their new stadium in 2028.