It's been a great year so far for the Rays, who have the top record in the AL in defense of their World Series title after an often frustrating 2026 regular season.
Unlike last year when they underachieved their Pythagorean record by 10 games or so, this year's team has been solid and remarkably consistent as they've seemed to win 2 out of 3 in almost every series they've played. Only weakness I can see is their record against lefties, which is odd since they're a primarily right-handed hitting lineup. Excellent on the mound and at the plate and even pretty decent in the field, a rarity for one of my teams.
It's been a bit of a weird offense with three major contributors (Franco, DeLoach, Cartaya) and a lot of other guys doing OK and filling in where needed. Some of the regulars have missed time with injury (Albies most notable) and there have been a couple of underachievers. Most notable in Natanael Santana, who was so good for us last year and helped turn the season around after coming over from San Francisco but has been dreadful this year and might start losing some playing time, at least when DeLoach comes back. Speaking of DeLoach, we've missed him offensively the last week or so since he went out and we'll have to make do without him for the next month. Also while Tork has hit his homers he hasn't done much else.
As you can see we've gone through a lot of pitchers this season mainly due to injuries and especially in the bullpen. The 5th starter spot has also been a carousel after Whitlock got hurt but Brian Gonzalez has really taken the job and run with it lately. The pen has been a bit of an adventure with late-inning stalwarts Moran and Fairbanks having their struggles but Fairbanks has been actually pretty good since "losing" the closer job a few weeks ago. Moran has been the victim of a bloated BABIP in a small sample size but still appears to have his stuff (the walks aren't helping though).