Former Rays owner Vince Naimoli remembered for love of Tampa Bay

TAMPA — Original Rays owner Vince Naimoli was remembered for his love of Tampa Bay and baseball on Saturday morning.

“He loved this Tampa Bay area, his final home to whom, after a long period of intense labor, he brought a baseball franchise,” said the Most Rev. Robert Lynch, now bishop emeritus of the Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg, during a memorial Mass for Naimoli at his home parish, St. Mary Catholic Church.

Naimoli died in Lutz on Aug. 25. He was 81.

Former Rays manager Lou Piniella attended the service, along with a number of former team officials who worked under Naimoli, including John Browne, Rick Nafe and Rick Vaughn. Senior vice president/general counsel John Higgins, the first employee hired by Naimoli, was the top-ranking Rays official there. Also in attendance was former Florida Gov. Bob Martinez.

“Life on earth is like a baseball game,” Lynch said in his homily. “There is an appointed time for it to begin, and only God knows when it will end.”

Naimoli led the pursuit of Major League Baseball in the bay area. He won an expansion franchise in 1995, and Lynch was present at Tropicana Field to welcome Devil Rays baseball on opening day in 1998.

“Vince asked me to say a prayer prior to the ribbon cutting on that day we entered the Trop,” Lynch said. “I only remember that my prayer included some snide remark about the hope that, some day, the ‘Devil’ would be banished from Devil Rays.”

A decade later, the bishop’s prayer was answered as the team dropped Devil from its name.

Christopher Capuano, president of Fairleigh Dickinson University, the New Jersey school where Naimoli earned his MBA, spoke before the Mass. Capuano said Naimoli accomplished the improbable by bringing big-league baseball to the area.

“Very few people would have the audacity to climb this mountain,” Capuano said.

Naimoli stepped out of the Rays spotlight when he sold a large share of the team to a group led by Stuart Sternberg in 2004. And he didn’t seek notoriety while celebrating his faith.

Lynch occasionally attended mass at St. Mary’s, and he often noticed Naimoli and his wife, Lenda, would sit in the back corner of the sanctuary.

“Here, he wanted simply to join others and not to stand out as a particularly famous member of the congregation,” Lynch said.

Naimoli, a New Jersey native, graduated from Notre Dame in 1959. As the congregation settled in between the visitation and the Mass, Notre Dame, Our Mother, the university’s alma mater, rang from the church organ. “Vince Naimoli loved his family, his faith and his friends, more even than he loved baseball,” Lynch said. “He loved Notre Dame, his alma mater, and he loved the woman who stands atop the golden dome, Mary, the mother of Jesus.”

Naimoli will be laid to rest at Notre Dame on Wednesday, Lynch said. University president John I. Jenkins of the Congregation of Holy Cross will celebrate a memorial Mass for Naimoli in Notre Dame’s Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

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Naimoli stepped out of the Rays spotlight when he sold a large share of the team to a group led by Stuart Sternberg in 2004. And he didn’t seek notoriety while celebrating his faith.

Lynch occasionally attended mass at St. Mary’s, and he often noticed Naimoli and his wife, Lenda, would sit in the back corner of the sanctuary.

“Here, he wanted simply to join others and not to stand out as a particularly famous member of the congregation,” Lynch said.

Naimoli, a New Jersey native, graduated from Notre Dame in 1959. As the congregation settled in between the visitation and the Mass, Notre Dame, Our Mother, the university’s alma mater, rang from the church organ. “Vince Naimoli loved his family, his faith and his friends, more even than he loved baseball,” Lynch said. “He loved Notre Dame, his alma mater, and he loved the woman who stands atop the golden dome, Mary, the mother of Jesus.”

Naimoli will be laid to rest at Notre Dame on Wednesday, Lynch said. University president John I. Jenkins of the Congregation of Holy Cross will celebrate a memorial Mass for Naimoli in Notre Dame’s Basilica of the Sacred Heart.