ST. PETERSBURG — The first foray back to the Trop by the best manager the Rays have had obscured the second return visit by arguably the second-best player in franchise history.
Figures.
Ben Zobrist never got much attention for how he played and certainly not how he carried himself during those nine seasons with the Rays.
Even though he was good enough to make two American League All-Star teams, earn a big deal worth nearly $30 million over six years, and compile a 36.7 WAR (Wins Above Replacement rating, per baseball-reference.com) that ranks behind only Evan Longoria among all Tampa Bay players.
So while Joe Maddon's return with the Cubs was front-page, and home-page, news, Zobrist slipped in typically fanfare-less to the stadium he still considers home and reflected on his remarkable journey.
"I think about it a lot, the amount of work that I've put in, in this stadium, and in the game in general," he said before Wednesday's game, an 8-1 Rays victory. "I feel like a lot of that development happened when I was here. Learning how to play different positions, learning how to come off the bench and then eventually to be a starter at the major-league level.
"I spent a lot of time in the cage, a lot of time in the video room, a lot of time on the field. So definitely a lot of memories here."
Acquired from Houston as a Double-A fringe shortstop prospect in the July 2006 dumping of Aubrey Huff's salary, Zobrist needed a couple of years to build himself into a major-leaguer, primarily by learning how to hit enough to stick around.
"He definitely didn't look the part (at first)," said Rays manager Kevin Cash, who was playing at Triple-A Durham when Zobrist first arrived.
Then in 2008 Maddon and the Rays molded Zobrist into the game's pre-eminent super-utility man, able play multiple infield and outfield positions, and well, while hitting with power from both sides of the plate.
"Once he started moving around, and in the process of moving around getting more consistent at-bats, all of a sudden he took off," Maddon said
And suddenly every team was trying to find their own Ben Zobrist.
"Maybe as much as anybody, and as other guys have done, he made the versatility cool and he made it special," Cash said.
From 2009-12, Zobrist led all major-leaguers — ahead of Albert Pujols, Robinson Cano, Ryan Braun and Miguel Cabrera — with 27.6 WAR, a complex formula factoring in offense, defense and baserunning to determine cumulatively how much more, in terms of wins, a specific player is than a typical replacement.
But because he played without much flash — "no chrome," as Maddon would say — and showed no sass, an ultimate pro on the field and deeply religious family man off, Zobrist didn't get nearly as much attention as he should have.
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Explore all your optionsLongoria is Mr. Ray, Carl Crawford earned more honors and David Price won the biggest prize with a Cy Young Award, but Zobrist was as valuable as any of them during that four-playoffs-in-six-years run.
"It's unfortunate doing things the right way sometimes doesn't get you that stardom deserved as one of the best players in the game," Rays pitcher and good friend Alex Cobb said.
The Rays traded Zobrist, like they do many others, when he was becoming too expensive, to Oakland in January 2015, for John Jaso, infield prospect Daniel Roberston and minor-league outfielder Boog Powell.
"To me, leaving here was like the end of an era for me," Zobrist said. "It was kind of the beginning of a new chapter."
One that has been a good one for Zobrist, wife Julianna, and kids Zion, Kruse and Blaise, as he won two World Series rings (2015 Royals and 2016 curse-breaking Cubs as Series MVP) and signed a rich free agent deal with Chicago, $56 million over four years, that reunited him with Maddon.
Just different.
"It's special for me to come back here," Zobrist said. "It's not like coming back anywhere else."