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The rays are good and the American league is bad.
This would benefit Tampa Bay from the start. Then Rays built one of their best starts ever, while the Yankees and Red Sox struggled.
If you make the addition, you have a team with probably a 75% chance of qualifying for the playoffs, maybe better, finishing third in Ji-Man Choi in most games and fourth in Brandon Lowe . Anonymity should not be confused with quality.
The Rays thrive in race prevention and this season offensively, they lived up to the best base and slogging percentages in their history. Yes, it's a small sample. But after a surprising 90 wins last year, Tampa Bay used the first three weeks to validate 2018. At 14-6, the Rays started on Saturday with the best record for the majors, and their 4/1/2 lead was equal at the distance between the first and second of the other five divisions combined.
"We have a very good team," said Rays CEO Erik Neander by phone. "We have a young, very hungry team, playing with a small token on the shoulder. They demonstrated last year that they were very capable of competing with some of the best teams in the league and defeating them. We want to continue to prove that it is not a coincidence. Our record over the past calendar year is pretty good. If you look at that time, there are things that are legitimate. "
The spokes opened last season at 4-13. From Friday to Friday, they were 100-65, ahead of the Astros (105-58), Yankees (101-64) and Red Sox (101-65) for the best record of this period. They arrived there despite the fact that they continued to exchange established players and to deploy a pitching strategy that had gone from being generally despised to complete imitation.
The 2017 shelves were 80-82. They had four players with more than 16 circuits and traded three (Steven Souza, Corey Dickerson and Evan Longoria) and let the other (Logan Morrison) go into free agency – and remember that Longoria is the best player the history of the franchise. of the team. They had two starters with double-digit wins and a winning record and exchanged Jake Odorizzi while Alex Cobb left in free agency. Five top substitutes (Brad Boxberger, Steve Cishek, Danny Farquhar, Tommy Hunter and Chase Whitley) also did not return.
Tampa's free purchases were Carlos Gomez for $ 4 million and maintaining Sergio Romo for $ 2.5 million.
The result: Rays are one of four teams cited by the Players Association for not having properly invested their dollars in revenue sharing. Then they lost three of their best starting pitcher hopes (Anthony Banda, Jose DeLeon and Brent Honeywell) following a surgery at Tommy John. Then they opened 4-13. Then, the first week of August, they had exchanged their loved ones (Alex Colome), their catcher (Wilson Ramos), their two starters (Chris Archer and Nathan Eovaldi) and two often used controllers (Adeiny Hechavarria and Brad Miller) . None of the trades were for established players.
Still, the Rays have won 90 games in a division in which the Red Sox won 108 and the Yankees 100. They then opened the 2019 championship by winning 14 of 20.
"What I can see up to now, the pitching is real, the back of the pen is real and some of the openers are real," said a scout who covers the rays. "I'm not convinced that the offense will be what she got out of the door, but right now they are free-wheeling and doing well, and with the way they run, how many races do they need to score anyway? "
The rays are obsessed with pitching. They recognize that they are a franchise that can not buy in all the aisles, like the Red Sox and the Yankees. They strive to obtain and develop as many shots as possible and strive to support it with a high-end defense, even if it hurts the offensive. They are also known, for example, as a team with more stringent standards for pitchers to progress in miners than in most organizations, so that once promoted, the pitcher will be closer to the finished product.
Last year, with Cobb and Odorizzi gone, Archer not far behind and the three young injured beginners, the Rays were routinely using relief relays in brief relays – the first match. They had a lot of good pitchers, but not many good starters. So, instead of following the conventions, they deployed their assets as the best way to win – including a powerful arm to face the top of the makeup once and, thus, not to expose the pitcher who would cover the innings to the Obligation to get through top of the range more than twice and maybe once.
This purists annoyed. There was a lot of shouting that it was a fashion, that this strategy would lead to injury and ultimately to failure. Instead, this led to imitation.
And, let's face it, the biggest problem of the franchise (lack of attendance / coverage) has helped to solve this problem. It is easier to challenge orthodoxy in the Tampa Bay market than, say, New York or Boston, where the flashback would be so much stronger and harder to handle if it did not work instantly.
Blake Snell excelled as a starter and won the Cy Young, Tyler Glasnow was added to the Archer trade (and outperformed Archer), then the Rays made splurge in the off-season for two years. $ 30 million deal for Charlie Morton. They were still using the first game this year at two different locations – and Snell is now on the injured list with a fractured toe. But the depth of quality remains: Tampa has allowed the third less points to run in 20 games by a LA in the last 30 years.
Ideally, at the opening of Ryne Stanek, for example, the Rays use a closer pitcher, and two other players (Diego Castillo and Jose Alvarado) finish their game. This leaves a lot less outs in the middle to allow the opponents to score.
It's Tampa's ability to score that has been surprising. The Rays were the first four in the American League batting average, percentage based and slugging percentage, and their 0.993 OPS will be the best in their history. Lowe and Austin Meadows, who also came for Archer, led the way, but the Rays' ability to find gems in small deals (Choi, Yandy Diaz, Tommy Pham) was also beneficial. Those who question Tampa's head start highlight the sustainability of the offense.
In addition, they had an easy early schedule. The Rays allowed the Astros to open the season. Carlos Correa was missing, while Houston was absent. The series was then played 38-59 against five teams. But the Yankees started the season with a tight schedule and did not capitalize. And remember, it's not, say, 2012-15, when all AL East teams won the division with the exception of Tampa. The Blue Jays and Orioles are rebuilding, and maybe the Yankees and, in particular, the Red Sox are not as good as expected.
And the LA as a whole is weak and the rays can improve as the season progresses with one of the best agricultural farming systems. Their decisive test will take place from 10 May at the All Star including 13 games against the Yankees and a New York-Oakland-Minnesota road trip that will last 32 games in 33 days to close the first half.
If Tampa survives this, he will have much more than a ray of hope to win the AL East this year.
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