The Phillies played the Tampa Bay Rays today. They are the local home team and play their home games during the regular season in St. Petersburg, just South of Tampa. Their spring training home is also in St. Petersburg.
The teams the Phillies play in spring training have no relation to their division rivals during the regular season. The schedule is primarily built in regard to geographical location of spring training sites. The Phillies location in Clearwater is closest to those of the Rays (St. Petersburg), Toronto (Dunedin), Detroit (Lakeland), Yankees (Tampa), Pittsburg (Bradenton), Orioles (Sarasota), and the Braves (North Port - near Ft. Meyers) are the teams they play in the spring. They also play a couple of games with the Twins and Red Sox who train further down the west coast of Florida. Not a lot of regulars from those teams make the long bus ride to and from Clearwater. Each team however is required to have at least regular players who are on the major league roster for all away games.
All these teams are in the American League during the regular season except the Braves, who are the farthest away. All the National League teams in the Phillies Eastern Division (Mets, Nationals, and Marlins) train on the East coast of Florida along with the Astros, and Cardinals.
After the game it was back to the RV for dinner and another early to bed.
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