For a tough, grumpy, cynical, ink-stained wretch, forgive me for indulging in a bit of Pollyannaish naivety.

I blame my late father, a small businessman who owned an engineering company that designed large-scale heating and cooling systems for factories and high-rise buildings.

It was a little old fashioned. He believed that once you negotiated a deal, it was the deal. Of course, the details would be worked out on paper. But your word, your handshake were your bond.

It was a matter of good faith. It was a question of ethics. As he liked to say, it was “the principle of the thing”.

For years, the Tampa Bay Rays have made it clear they need a new stadium for the team, which has been confined to playing in a dump called Tropicana Field. The Trop is the major league equivalent of having to play your matches in a box by the river.

Over the many years of trying to determine where the team could find a new home, many major announcements regarding plans for new stadiums in St. Petersburg and Tampa have been made. None of them came to fruition for a multitude of reasons.

Months ago, all the bickering, posturing, chatter, and accusations finally seemed to have come to an end. The Rays, the city of St. Petersburg and Pinellas County appeared to have agreed to build a $1.3 billion stadium and a comprehensive real estate project including residential units, commercial properties, affordable housing and a museum of black history.

Indeed, the agreement called for the city to provide $287.5 million for the stadium. The county would contribute $312.5 million in bond financing and the Rays would pay $700 million. The deal also gave the team and its development partners control of more than 60 acres of land in the gas plant area.

The Rays agreed. The city agreed. The county agreed. A deal was a deal.

I’ve never been a big fan of using public money to fund stadiums to help billionaire sports moguls become even richer billionaire sports moguls. But one could reasonably argue that the $700 million the Rays are willing to spend on a new stadium far exceeds the money the Tampa Bay Buccaneers shelled out for Helloooo Sucker Stadium in Tampa.

Still, a deal was a deal – until it wasn’t.

Now the city and county are all going “Hummina, hummina, hummina” about the stadium deal, hesitant to approve bonds to finance the end of a deal that everyone had already agreed to.

And that, dear reader, is stupid.

Two things happened. First, Hurricane Milton destroyed the Trop, rendering it unplayable for the foreseeable future and forcing the Rays to announce that they would decamp to George M. Steinbrenner Field, the minor league home of the New York Yankees in Tampa.

GOOD! Of all the wadded bloomers among the Poles in Pinellas County, you would have thought the Rays were planning a Black Sox Scandal Appreciation Night with every fan attending the game receiving a goody bag full of steroids and a bottle of milk believed. Simply because the team acted in its best interests by finding a temporary stadium to play outside the county, the Pinellas Commission pouted and postponed the bond vote. The city council also decided to drag its feet.

Stupid, dense, short-sighted and, by the way, stupid.

The Rays have not reached an agreement with County Commissioner Kathleen Peters, nor with her colleagues Chris Latvala or Dave Eggers, nor even with St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch. They made their deal with Pinellas County and the city of St. Petersburg, regardless of who was in office when the deal was negotiated.

Maybe I’m wrong, but clearly the Tampa Bay Rays acted in good faith. They assume the lion’s share of financing the stadium. Will they greatly benefit from the real estate development of the Gas Plant property? You bet.

But the new stadium and surrounding developments will create jobs and economic opportunities, which are now under threat due to hubris, political pettiness and – did I mention – stupidity.

Due to the ineptitude of the County Commission and City Council, the Rays stadium deal is on the brink of collapse. And for what? Because the team facing a catastrophic situation decided to play its 2025 season in Tampa? Oh, what heresy in all this!

Oh, there’s some stupid madness in all this.