The 2020 (and beyond) Tampa Bay Rays - Page 5

Art Deco · 07-15-2020, 04:59 PM

It's kind of unfair to play 162 games, prove that you're 20 games better than the 2nd place team but then have to play them in a short 5-game series to see who gets to advance in the playoffs. And now that the Mets find themselves behind 2-0 in that best-of-5, they're likely to get a taste of just how unfair it is. Mike Foltynewicz was dominant tonight (7.2 6 1 1 0 5) and Freddie Freeman had a solo HR and RBI single to give the Braves all the offense they would need. Mookie Betts added a 2-run HR off Corey Knebel in the 9th to give Atlanta some breathing room, and breathing room is what they have in this series as the Mets must win 3 straight to advance.

A wild back-and-forth game that St. Louis that they had won twice only for the Dodgers to rally in the bottom of the 10th to even the series. This game had a little bit of everything, including a 2-run HR by St. Louis pitcher Jack Flaherty to give them an early 3-0 lead. But the Dodgers chipped away with a Cory Bellinger HR and then Jorge Soler tied it in the 7th with a blast of his own. St. Louis went ahead in the top of 10th on an RBI double by pinch-hitter Andrew Knizner, but Kodi Whitley couldn't hold the lead in the bottom of the inning and Bellinger had the game-winning single as the teams go back to St. Louis even.

Art Deco · 07-15-2020, 05:42 PM

As expected, the Jays went with Aaron Nola in Game 3. Maybe we'll finally see Tom Thornton tomorrow.

Chris Paddack did not pitch as well as he normally he does, but it seems these days all he has to do is throw his glove on the mound and the Rays win. For the 11th time in 12 starts since his deadline move from San Diego the Rays won a Paddack start and today's 6-3 triumph puts them up 2-1 and one game away from advancing to the ALCS. It didn't start out pretty as Paddack had a walk, a HBP ahead of a Ryan Noda RBI single in the 1st, a Lourdes Gurriel Jr solo shot in the 2nd and then with two out in the fourth he allowed 3 straight singles with Bo Bichette's driving in a run. Meanwhile, Nola through 4 2/3 had picked up where he left off shutting down the Yankees in the Wild Card Game, but Abraham Toro with two out changed the momentum with a solo shot to make it 3-1, and then Nola melted down, giving up singles to Marsh and Brujan, followed by a mammoth Wander blast to right-center and the Rays were suddenly ahead. Inspired by the lead, Paddack shut down the Jays over the next 2 innings (final line: 6 8 3 3 1 4), and the Rays tacked on a couple more in the 6th aided by a Cavan Biggio error and Nola wild-pitching in a run ahead of a Toro RBI single. The new bullpen troika of Anderson/Alvarado/Harris then took over, with Alvarado coming up big with all of Toronto's lefties, getting the last out in the 7th, the entire 8th, and getting lefty Biggio to start the 9th. Will Harris got the last two outs but didn't qualify for a save.

Welp, so much for a Minnesota 0-2 comeback like in 2020:

This game (and series) was over early, as the Mariners bludgeoned the Twins. Jarred Kelenic was named series MVP and Justin Dunn threw 7 innings of 2-hit shutout ball for the win. Seattle awaits either the Rays or the Jays in the ALCS.

Art Deco · 07-15-2020, 08:38 PM

So this happened:

It looked like the Rays were going to wrap this up when Austin Meadows hit a 3-run HR in the 1st and Joey Gallo followed him with one of his own and they were up 4-0 in the 1st with 16-game winner Max Fried on the mound. But Fried, with the assistance of Abraham Toro's pair of errors, gave it right back in the first capped by a 2-run Rowdy Tellez shot, and then Vlad Jr & Reese McGuire took him deep in the 3rd to make it 9-4, Joe Ryan came in and served one up to Randall Grichuk, and the Jays got two more off Ryan in the 4th and 4-0 Rays became 12-4 Jays. But of course this offense doesn't quit (except maybe for Game 1), and they got it back to 12-11 including a Nelson Cruz grand slam. But just went they got it back to 12-11, Yonny Chirinos surrendered HRs to Gurriel and Vlad Jr to make it 14-11 and although they got one back against nemesis Keith Ginkel in the 8th it wasn't enough and we head back to St. Pete for a decisive Game 5 featuring Game 1 starters Jordan Romano and Tyler Glasnow. Fried was human batting practice, 2 6 9 7 1 2 with 3 HRs allowed and Toro channeled Alec Bohm at the hot corner with a total of 3 errors today. It was ugly, and here's hoping it doesn't turn out to be fatal.

The Mets stay alive behind their other 20-game winner, Sandy Alcantara, who went 7 6 2 2 2 6 and outdueled Atlanta ace Mike Soroka. Andres Gimenez reached base all 5 times, on 3 hits and 2 walks including a solo HR to extend the lead to 4-0. Joey Bart homered again as well, continuing to make me angry at the Giants AI for trading him for Luis Guillorme.

A wild back-and-forth game in St. Louis that saw a couple of former Rays properties win it for St. Louis. Pinch-hitter Mallex Smith singled with one out, stole second, and scored on a single by Ryan Boldt, whom the Rays lost in the Rule 5 draft in the 20-21 offseason to Houston before he was traded to St. Louis. Boldt also singled in the go-ahead run in the 7th to make it 5-4, but the Cards blew that lead as well as an early 4-0 one that chased Clayton Kershaw. The Cards are now up 2-1 in the series and will look to clinch at home tomorrow behind Ryan Helsey.

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 08:57 AM

Who'd have thought coming into this series Connor Jones would make an more effective starter than reliever? After his Game 1 gem as a start, he was on to save a 2-1 lead in the 9th and a trip to the NLCS for St. Louis, but he loaded the bases with nobody out and it went downhill from there, with Corey Seager getting a big 2-run double and the Dodgers tacking on 2 more to even the series with a 5-2 win and send it back to LA for the deciding Game 5. Alex Wood and Ryan Helsey had a pretty good pitcher's duel going after both were scored on the 1st.

Last year the Mets were the upset darlings in the NL playoffs, winning the wild card and surprising the best-in-baseball Dodgers. This year they were the 111-win hunted and the Braves took their scalp in 4 games, sending Atlanta to their third straight NLCS and making it the second straight year the Mets' postseason ended in Atlanta. The hero today was $320M man Mookie Betts with a 3-run homer in the first off Franklyn Kilome which would be all Atlanta needed. Sean Newcomb pitched the game of his life, going 7.1 5 1 1 1 6 to nail it down.

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 09:42 AM

Well it's a surprise and it's not a surprise. It's a surprise because the Rays were the best team in the AL and they were the clear favorite in this series. It's not a surprise because the Rays lost this exact matchup in Game 1. Once again the offense couldn't find a way to solve Jordan Romano, who with all due respect, is not exactly an ace pitcher. Meanwhile Tyler Glasnow can look like an ace at times but often doesn't pitch like one and today allowing single runs in the first three innings to put your team in a hole is not what an ace does. The bullpen didn't staunch the bleeding either, but a key run scored when they would have been out of the inning except that Wander Franco booted a groundball. As you can see from the story above, Wander won the series MVP, and he did hit a 3-run HR in the 9th (the irony here is they finally got to Keith Ginkel but the deficit was too large to overcome) to make the final score respectable, so I'm not going to be too hard on him. No, my ire is reserved for Josh Bell, who hit .211 in this series with 0 HR or RBI and grounded into two double plays today to kill a couple of budding rallies. They had 13 baserunners in all so they had their chances, but just couldn't get the big hit or as in the case of Bell, hit into a double play. As the manager and GM, I'm not really sure I could have done any more putting a team together - there was no glaring weakness except for perhaps the inconsistency of the starting pitching but given the group's track record there was reason to believe they'd snap out of it. The epitome of this problem came in Game 4 - when the series was really lost - after the Rays put 4 on the board in the first and Max Fried helped turn it into a 9-4 deficit before you could blink. In the end I just have to chalk it up to the vagaries of a short series (ask the Mets about that, they trotted out 3 20-game winners and lost). Meanwhile, congrats to the Jays as they face Seattle in the ALCS in a matchup of the two 1977 expansion teams. The Mariners are looking to make their first-ever World Series while the Jays want to get back there for the first time since 1993.

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 12:29 PM

The Dodgers won the Game 5 battle of aces between Walker Buehler and Jack Flaherty with a big 5-run second inning. Daniel Murphy (picked up off the scrap-heap in July), Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux all homered in that 2nd inning to put LA into the NLCS where they'll face the Braves in a rematch of their epic 7-game NLCS from 2020, won by the Dodgers on their way to a WS win. Buehler walked the bases loaded in the 5th which led to him being pulled and not getting the win, but he did enough.

With a few hours to digest a second straight year ending in a bitter playoff loss to Toronto, here's my outlook for the 2022-23 offseason and what the Rays roster is projected to look like:

Going to start off by grouping the existing roster into categories reflecting whether they’re likely to come back or not.

Not going anywhere: K.Ruiz, R.Hernandez, Bohm, Brujan, Wander, Toro, Meadows, Marsh, Y.Diaz, Glasnow, Paddack, Fried, Ryan, Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, D.Jimenez, McClanahan.

Of course there’s always a chance someone on this list gets traded if the deal is right, but I fully expect these guys to be back.

Trade bait but will otherwise keep: Kepler, Snell (final year of contract), Chirinos.

Kepler was a disappointment this year and I’m not sure how much better he is than guys in the pipeline behind him so he’ll definitely be shopped. While I liked McClanahan in the lefty middle relief role this year I’d like to give him (or Schmidt or Gray) a shot at the rotation so Snell could go if the return is decent as he’s been all over the map in the 3 years I’ve managed him and I get nothing for him if he walks at year’s end (other than a comp pick). Also it’s possible Kepler or something else brings back a starter to replace him. Yonny deserves a shot to start somewhere like Banda and T.Richards did last offseason and I’d like to think I can get something useful for him. Maybe I’ll call up the Cubs again.

Team option I don’t plan to exercise but will try to trade first: Kiermaier, Merrifield.

With the emergence of Marsh there’s no need to pay Kiermaier $12M next year to sit on the bench. And while I’d like to keep Merrifield around as a super-utility type (and a right-handed bat), $7.5M is too much for that role as well.

Free agents to be: Gallo, J.Bell, N.Cruz, Hand, W.Harris.

Gallo and Bell will be too rich for my blood, although I could do the offseason dance with Hand again depending on health, and if Will Harris doesn’t want too much, I’d gladly bring him back too. Cruz of course came cheap and produced big, but he’s going to be 43 and I can’t keep blocking my prospects.

Non-tendered: Gott, Lucchesi.

Prospects who may be traded: X.Edwards, Larnach, Josh Lowe.

Edwards is the one who can fetch me a lot and with Brujan and Wander ahead of him in the middle infield his path is severely blocked. Not sure how much Larnach and Lowe could bring but with the glut of prospect OFs I have it’s not fair to stow them at AAA again (and they’re taking up 40-man spots)

Prospects who could make the MLB roster next year: Beer, Kirilloff, Baz, Schmidt, Gray. It’s almost a running joke about how I have Seth Beer penciled in at DH every offseason but he’s had two straight 30-HR seasons hitting near .300 with an OBP around .400 so he’s more than due. Kirilloff (who can flat-out rake) could be the RF next year if Kepler is traded, and Baz has a shot as a starter or more likely in a role similar to what McClanahan had this year depending on how the bullpen shakes out. Baz probably starts the year at Durham though. I mentioned Schmidt and Gray above; both won’t make it but one might unless I try to convert one or both into power relievers.

Needs: Infield bat that can play 2B and/or SS who bats righty, a bullpen piece or two.

This should still be a very good team next year but the one issue I worry about is that the potential number of starters who are lefty hitters: Meadows, Kepler, Marsh, Beer, Kirilloff. Even the prospects at the next level down are lefties like Nick Schnell and Hunter Bishop. That’s why Cruz was a big help this year as a righty power bat. Alec Bohm is the gamble making him the everyday 1B but he’s a righty bat so if he comes through that will solve a couple of problems. If Bohm is only platoon-level then Beer can play 1B and Kirilloff DH.

Tentative 26-man roster (before any trades of course):
C: Ruiz, Hernandez.
IF: Bohm, Beer, Brujan, Wander, Toro, MI to acquire
OF: Meadows, Marsh, Kepler, Y.Diaz, Kirilloff
SP: Glasnow, Snell, Paddack, Fried, Ryan
RP: Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, D.Jimenez, McClanahan, Chirinos, ???, ??? (Schmidt/Gray)

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 01:20 PM

With the Rays out of it I'm not going to daily LCS posts so the entire round will be in this post.

Game 1 of the ALCS:

I guess Touki Toussaint proved you can pitch well against the Blue Jays. Maybe I'll try and trade for him.

Game 2 of the ALCS:

Kyle Lewis' grand slam off Anthony Kay in the 3rd inning was the key hit as Seattle goes 2-0 up (and 5-0 overall in the playoffs) in the series heading back to Toronto. Marco Gonzales kept Toronto off the board until the 6th (giving Seattle pitching 14 consecutive shutout innings), and was dominant until he ran out of gas in the 9th and gave up a 3-run HR to Rowdy Tellez but the game was long decided before that.

Game 1 of the NLCS:

Brusdar "Babe Ruth" Graterol did it all against Atlanta in Game 1 of the NLCS, going 6 4 1 1 2 9 for the win and slugging a homer in the 6th. By then the Dodgers had chased Atlanta ace Mike Soroka, scoring 6 runs off him in 4 innings. Daniel Murphy, playing for Cleveland's AAA affiliate in mid-summer, had a 2-run HR and a double to lead the Dodger offense. Ozzie Albies in a losing cause had 5 RBI for Atlanta including a 9th inning grand slam but that only made an 8-1 game an 8-5 one.

Game 2 of the NLCS:

Big win for the Braves as Robbie Ray goes 8 3 0 0 4 7 to outduel Clayton Kershaw (who went 8 himself) and HRs from Acuna and Cal Raleigh were all the offense he needed to get the series on even footing as it's starting to shape up as another great one like 2020. With Raleigh homering here, it's nice to see a trade really benefit both teams as he was acquired from Seattle for Tooki Toussaint, who's been lights out with Seattle in this playoff. Perhaps they meet in the WS to see who really wins the trade.

Game 3 of the ALCS:

Wow. Perhaps I didn't give Jordan Romano enough credit when he beat the Rays in Games 1 and 5 of the ALDS as he did the same thing to Seattle today, dealing the Mariners their first loss of the postseason and pulling the Jays back into the series. He went 6 3 1 1 3 5, only allowing a Mike Brosseau (remember him?) HR that tied it after Lourdes Gurriel Jr took Justin Dunn deep in the 3rd. Rowdy Tellez (that guy again) had a 2-run shot off Dunn in the bottom of the inning to provide the winning runs.

Game 4 of the ALCS:

The Mariners had the best pitching in the AL this season and they continue to show why as 4th starter Justus Sheffield, not needed in the ALDS, came through with a complete-game 9 6 1 1 3 9 performance to put the Mariners one win away from their first-ever trip to the World Series. Mike Brosseau's 2-run HR and Kyle Lewis's 4th blast of the postseason (the most in MLB) paced the offense until Daulton Varsho broke it open with a 3-run shot in the top of the 9th.

Game 3 of the NLCS:

An epic series needs an epic game, and that's what we got as the Dodgers beat the Braves in 12 innings to take a 2-1 series lead. Jorge Soler and Corey Seager went back-to-back off Jasseel De La Cruz in the 12th to give LA the win. The homer was Soler's 2nd of the night to go along with a pair hit by Cody Bellinger that helped get it to extras. The Dodgers bullpen threw 7 shutout innings and Kenley Jansen got the win.

Game 5 of the ALCS:

Congratulations to the Seattle Mariners for making their first-ever World Series! Mike Brosseau went 4-5 with a HR and 2 RBI and was named the MVP of the ALCS to lead the way. I'm declaring the early-2021 Poche/Brosseau for Austin Adams/Haniger deal a clear win for the Mariners even though Adams brought me back Gio Gallegos and Haniger brought Seth Beer (and intriguing power prospect Franyel Baez). I mean, look who's still playing and look who isn't. One scare for the M's, however: Tooki Toussaint had to leave in the first inning with what turned out to be a back injury. Turns out it's minor, though, so he should be good to go in the Fall Classic. Aaron Fletcher and Logan Gilbert had to pick up the slack and pick it up they did with 6.1 innings of 1-run ball combined. Also congrats to the Jays on getting as far as they did, especially considering they lost Nate Pearson and Elvis Luciano from their rotation.

Game 4 of the NLCS:

Maybe this won't be another epic series between these teams after all as the Dodgers won again in Atlanta to go up 3-1. Sean Newcomb could not repeat his heroics against the Mets and was hit for 4 runs in 3 innings to put the Braves in a hole (including Cody Bellinger's 3-run HR in the 1st), but they came back to get within 5-4 on a Christian Pache 2-run shot off Julio Urias, starting in place of the injured Alex Wood. But they could get no closer as Mitchell Verburg and Liam Hendriks shut them down over the final 3.1 innings as we're on the cusp of an all-west coast World Series.

Game 5 of the NLCS:

Mike Soroka had been far from his ace-pitcher self this postseason but came through with a vengeance when the Braves needed him most, staving off elimination and sending this series back to LA with a complete-game 9 5 1 1 2 4 performance that evoked memories of Greg Maddux. Atlanta got to Game 1 hero Brusdar Graterol for 3 runs in 4 innings and had their way with the Dodger bullpen. Ronald Acuna Jr led the offense, going 3-5 with 2 RBI including a triple and added a stolen base, and Cal Raleigh's 2-run HR broke a 1-1 tie in the 4th.

Game 6 of the NLCS:

Looks like we're having another epic series between these teams after all, as Freddie Freeman's second HR of the game off Clayton Kerhsaw broke up a 2-2 tie in the 6th and the Braves went on to a 6-3 win to force a winner-take-all Game 7 tomorrow night. Robbie Ray loaded the bases with nobody out in the first inning and got out of it, bearing down from there to go 6.2 5 2 2 3 10 and go to 3-0 for the postseason. Mookie Betts followed Freeman's 6th inning blast with one of his own against his 2020 WS-winning teammates while Cody Bellinger went deep for the Dodgers, giving him an MLB postseason-leading 6. It's Folty against Buehler for a date with Seattle tomorrow.

Game 7 of the NLCS:

Well an epic series needs an epic Game 7, and that's what we got as the Dodgers beat the Braves in a game where the teams kept exchanging the lead until Braves closer Will Smith melted down in the 8th inning with 5 walks to lead to 3 Dodger runs in a 7-5 LA win that sends them up against Seattle in the 2022 World Series. The winning run was a bases-loaded walk by Will Smith to.....Will Smith of the Dodgers, which probably broke the space/time continuum. No word on whether the Fresh Prince was in attendance. Before that there was plenty of drama as the game went 2-2 to the 7th. Christian Pache homered off Jack Little to give Atlanta a 3-2 in the top of the 7th, but Max Muncy took Ian Anderson deep for a 2-run shot to make it 4-3 Dodgers in the bottom of the inning. No problem, in the top of the 8th Freddie Freeman doubled in a run to tie it off Liam Hendriks and Cal Raleigh, who had homered earlier, had a sac fly to put the Braves back up 5-4. But then Will Smith happened, he went walk-single-walk-walk forcing in the tying run-walk forcing in the winning run-strikeout-shallow fly ball-walk to force in another run. Caleb Ferguson came on for the Dodgers in the ninth and struck out the side around a 2-out walk to nail down the win. So the Braves in 3 straight NLCS appearances now have 2 7-game losses to the Dodgers and a WS loss to the White Sox to show for it. So now will the Dodgers win for the second time in three years or will the Mariners take their first-ever championship? Stay tuned in the next post.

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 04:35 PM

Game 1:

Brusdar Graterol pitched another postseason gem to give the Dodgers Game 1 of the 2022 World Series. He went 7 3 0 0 2 8 in dominating Seattle, with only Kyle Lewis' 5th HR of the postseason off Liam Hendriks spoiling the team shutout. Max Muncy took Tooki Touissant deep for a 2-run blast in the 2nd to put LA in front to stay.

Game 2:

Seattle evened up the World Series with a drama-filled 4-3 win over the Dodgers. What was a 1-1 pitcher's duel between Mariners ace Marco Gonzalez and the Dodgers' Julio Urias finally broke serve in the 7th when Daulton Varsho's sac fly scored Wilmer Difo to give the M's a 2-1 lead. And after Difo singled in Kyle Lewis in the 8th to make it 3-1, they were looking good until Cody Bellinger hit postseason HR #7, a 2-run shot off Wyatt Mills, to tie the game up at 3 after 8. But Eugenio Suarez, who came on in a double switch when Gonzales was lifted, singled and came around to score on a Jarred Kelenic base hit off Kenley Jansen to give Seattle the lead back in the 9th and this time they held on with Mills to send the series back to Seattle even.

Game 3:

The first-ever World Series game played in the Pacific Northwest saw the home fans leave happy as the Mariners came from behind in both Game 3 and the series to take a 2-1 lead with the 5-2 victory. Justin Dunn and Walker Buehler were locked in another pitchers' duel in the 6th when Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux went deep back-to-back to make it 2-0 Los Angeles. For Bellinger it was #8, tying the single postseason record with Carlos Beltran, Barry Bonds, Nelson Cruz and teammate Will Smith in 2020. But the Mariners rallied off Buehler in the bottom of the 7th to take the lead on a JP Crawford triple and a Daulton Varsho RBI single, and then Evan White popped a 2-run HR off Kenley Jansen in the 8th to give Seattle a cushion and Wyatt Mills finished it off from there. Dunn went 7 7 2 2 1 8 while Buehler was 6.2 5 2 2 1 11 in the well-pitched game.

Game 4:

We've got a good series on our hands here as the Dodgers and Clayton Kershaw evened things up with a 7-1 over Seattle. It didn't look that way early as the Mariners and Justus Sheffield were clinging to a 1-0 lead in the 6th when Cody Bellinger tied it with his record-setting 9th HR of the postseason, and then Max Muncy followed with a 2-run blast to make it 3-1 and the Dodgers took it from there. Kershaw wasn't dominant (5.2 8 1 1 1 3) but he was good enough.

Game 5:

Touki Toussaint did it again as he led the Mariners with 6 shutout innings in a huge 3-0 win in Game 5. Toussaint was his usual hard to hit and hard to catch, going 6 4 0 0 4 8. In fact the two relievers who followed him walked 5 more batters between them and the Dodgers had the bases loaded in the 7th and 8th innings but couldn't push across a run. Meanwhile the unlikely offensive hero for Seattle was a guy who wasn't even supposed to play. After Sam Hilliard had to leave in the top of the 1st with an arm injury, Jake Fraley came on and promptly singled in a run in the bottom of the inning to put Seattle ahead to stay, and later he homered off reliever Michael Feliz. Wilmer Difo added a solo shot for the other Mariner run as the series goes back to Los Angeles with the Dodgers needing to win both.

Game 6:

The 2022 World Series is going the distance as the Dodgers made the most of their 2 hits on the night with one of them being a 2-run homer by Corey Seager off Marco Gonzales in the 3rd for all the scoring in a 2-0 win that forces a Game 7. Like in Game 5 when Jake Fraley came on as an injury replacement to be the hero, tonight it was Dodgers P Jack Little who was forced to enter in the 4th inning when starter Julio Urias's elbow started barking. Little, ranked the #23 prospect in baseball and who had a 2.05 ERA in 30.2 innings this year in the regular season for the Dodgers, showed he was ready for prime time with 3.2 innings of 1-hit, 0-walk ball, striking out 5 in the process and earning the win. Liam Hendriks nailed down a 2-inning save as Justin Dunn and Walker Buehler will go head-to-head tomorrow in Game 7.

Game 7:

Congratulations to the Los Angeles Dodgers, World Champions for the second time in three years. This time they really did it the hard way, having to go to limit in each series, winning in 5 against St Louis in the NLDS, 7 against Atlanta in the NLCS, and of course 7 here in the WS. It was a strange game and things looked good early for Seattle when Daulton Varsho homered off Walker Buehler to open the game. But after Seattle failed to get a runner from third with 0 outs in the top of the 2nd, the Dodgers exploded in the bottom of the inning off Justin Dunn and ended up with 9 runs on a series of RBI singles, a 2-run double from Corey Seager, and finally a grand slam from Gavin Lux to cap it off. But the Mariners struck right back in the top of the 3rd for 3 runs on a 2-run HR from Jake Fraley and a solo blast from Jarred Kelenic and it was 9-4 in the 3rd and it looked like a Rays-Jays game had broken out. But amazingly there was no scoring after that as Mitchell White came on for Buehler and like Jack Little yesterday, dominated in long relief going 6.1 2 0 0 1 7 before giving way to Caleb Ferguson for the final two outs. It was a case of so close yet so far for the Mariners, who only need one win in Los Angeles to take the series but got none.

And now it's on to the offseason!

Art Deco · 07-16-2020, 08:47 PM

It's time to start the offseason. In my post-mortem after the division series loss to the Jays, I set forth my ideas about where things are going for 2023 so I'm not going to repeat them here.

Going to start off with a bunch of notable retirements from MLB: Justin Verlander, Justin Upton, Carlos Carrasco, Yadier Molina, Cameron Maybin, Jake McGee, Howie Kendrick, Joakim Soria, Eric Thames, Jay Bruce, Michael Brantley, Dee Gordon, Jason Kipnis, Yoenis Cespedes, Brian Dozier.

Got this message from Stu Sternberg. For reference purposes our total payroll last year was about $135M so yay, mo' money:

Made our first trade. I wasn't going to pick up Merrifield's team option for $6.5M so I managed to get an excellent SS prospect who isn't Rule 5 eligible. Valdes can hit for average and get on base (last two years OBPs of .429 and .389). He has little power, but he's an elite defender, a 75 at SS. Echevarria had a bad scouting report: "firmly entrenched in bad habits at the plate and offers meager defensive skills", so hasta la vista.

I also have a possible deal involving Xavier Edwards that will bring us back an elite RH prospect bat, the RH 2B/3B MLB guy I was looking for, and a pretty good bullpen piece. I'm going to have to throw in a secondary prospect and I also want to explore some other potential deals with Edwards so I'm not ready to pull the trigger yet but if this is the worst I can do I'll be happy.

Let the awards roll in, both very well deserved:

And yay me!

They left out the "I'd trade this award for a World Series ring" quote, though.

Noah Syndergaard won the NL Cy Young while Lucas Giolito took it home in the AL, and to nobody's surprise Vlad Jr. in the AL and Juan Soto in the NL unanimously won their league's MVP awards. Wander finished fifth in the AL voting behind Vlad, Lindor, Rutschman and Trout, so not too shabby there.

The Cleveland Indians traded Jose Ramirez, entering the final year of his contract, to the Atlanta Braves for a couple of prospects. I had sniffed around Ramirez, briefly entertaining the idea of dealing Snell for him in a trade of free-agents-to-be.

Art Deco · 07-17-2020, 02:17 PM

Some early notable FA Signings:
Philadelphia Phillies: Signed free agent SP Jacob deGrom to a 4-year contract worth a total of $158,000,000.
Philadelphia Phillies: Signed free agent RP Ken Giles to a 3-year contract worth a total of $20,100,000.
Chicago Cubs: Signed free agent SP Tyler Anderson to a 2-year contract worth a total of $22,000,000.

Phillies breaking out the checkbook here. Nice pickup for the Cubs, I like Tyler Anderson but not $22M like.

Trade of note:
The Baltimore Orioles traded 25-year-old first baseman Ryan Mountcastle and 23-year-old minor league first baseman Dan Pruitt to the Boston Red Sox, getting 27-year-old shortstop C.J. Chatham in return.

Mountcastle should be Boston's 1B with Eric Thames retiring.

And a biggie from us:

The Tampa Bay Rays traded 25-year-old third baseman Abraham Toro, 22-year-old minor league catcher Kevin Melendez and 23-year-old minor league right fielder Tim Tawa to the Boston Red Sox, getting 26-year-old third baseman Rafael Devers, retaining 5% and 22-year-old first baseman Triston Casas in return.

Boston is looking to rebuild, and made Devers available. It hurt some to part with Toro, who actually gets on base more than Devers does, but Devers hits for more power and average, is a little better defensively and was 2 WAR better than Toro last year. With $50M to spend on payroll, absorbing Devers' $16M contract wasn't a big deal as I'm still in win-now mode. Devers effectively has another year on his contract at $21M, and he does have a player option for $21M in 2025 but I hope he does so well the next two seasons for us that he'll feel the need to opt out of it. Not looking forward to going against Toro 18-19 times a season for the foreseeable future, and Devers makes the lineup even more lefty-heavy but such it is.

The other part of the deal nets us Triston Casas, a serious power-hitting prospect that could be our 1B of the (near) future if Bohm doesn't get it done. The editor page shows he can hit 35-40 HR now and he did launch 4 in 32 big league at-bats along with 30 in 393 at AA. He'll start at Durham. Casas can also fake it at 3B (40 rating) if necessary. Melendez is a decent catching prospect but Keibert and Ronaldo have the position covered for years and Melendez was Rule 5 eligible. Tawa wasn't, but I can't swing a dead cat without hitting a good OF prospect in this organization and he's still 2-3 years away.

Another (minor) deal:

The Tampa Bay Rays traded 24-year-old minor league third baseman Osmy Gregorio and 21-year-old minor league catcher Emilio Morales to the Colorado Rockies, getting 23-year-old minor league third baseman Cory Acton in return.

This was to open the 40-man spot that Gregorio was filling. He was a bit disappointing in AA last year and with Devers holding down the fort for at least 2 years to come he was a luxury on the 40-man I could no longer afford. Acton is a decent 3B prospect that doesn't have to be protected from Rule 5 so the price was Morales, an OK but nothing special catching prospect. Yes, I've dealt away two catchers in the system now but still have Chris Betts and Patrick Bailey in the pipeline.

OK, time to turn on the siren:

This is the deal I alluded to in the last post. Edwards needed to go, not on merit but on position blockage with Brujan and Franco on the middle infield, and while I could use him as a backup infielder it's kind of a waste of his talents. So I turned him into Tork - yes, another top-notch power-hitting OF prospect but at least he's a righty batter - and I picked up two pieces that will immediately help the roster. The lesser of the two is Bannon, but he's a 2B/3B who 1) bats right 2) can play both positions decently and 3) has some pop of his own. He hit 300/352/502 with 14 HR in 257 AB for KC last season and while I don't buy that completely, knock about 30 points off each of those slash numbers and you still have a quality infield backup who can also occasionally DH against lefties. The bigger piece is Barlow, who's been an outstanding reliever for the Royals three years running now, and finished 3rd behind Alvarado for reliever of the year. The last two years he's been at 1.5 WAR, very good for a reliever and he doesn't give up HRs (only 9 allowed in 198 IP the last 3 seasons). He can close too, he had 16 saves in the second half of the season after Hunter Harvey went down for the Royals. Cairo was no problem to include, he hit .215 at High-A Charlotte and while he's fast and he's excellent defensively it's another position of excess with Nick Gonzales and Greg Jones ahead of him. Getting back to Torkelson, if he hits at Durham this season like he hit at AA last year, I can see him taking over LF in 2024 with Meadows sliding over to right to replace Max Kepler, whose 1.4 WAR last year is eminently replaceable.

Oh, and Blake Snell should be glad to have outlasted on the roster the guy he called a "slapdick prospect" back in the 19-20 offseason when Edwards was acquired in the Tommy Pham deal. Meanwhile, Durham's going to be fun to watch next year with an OF of Torkelson-Schnell-Bishop with Casas at 1B, they better order extra baseballs. Not to mention Trevor Larnach and Andrew Vaughn are still around.

And in the annual ritual of trading Rule 5 eligible guys for players who aren't here's a deal:

The Tampa Bay Rays traded 24-year-old minor league right fielder Kameron Misner and 24-year-old minor league second baseman Chase Strumpf to the Los Angeles Angels, getting 24-year-old minor league catcher Zach Britton and 23-year-old minor league catcher Noah Cardenas in return. Placed RP Austin Franklin on the 40-man roster.

Misner would be one of the top OF prospects in most organizations, but in this one he's a footnote. Still he could probably hit 25 HR in the bigs right now although with a low average. Strumpf projects as a utility guy at best. These 2 Rule-5 eligibles bring us a pair of fine catching prospects in return (you were worried about our catching depth after trading Melendez and Morales, you say?) both of whom were #1 draft picks. Hopefully this Zach Britton will have a better showing for the team that his namesake the pitcher. Franklin grabs the last 40-man spot for now, I was torn between him and Drew Strotman (and I'd like to keep both) as their profiles, scouting and numbers were virtually identical. It'll be good to have a true reliever on the 40-man I can call up during the season, that was a bit of an issue this past year.

Meanwhile around MLB, Ray-for-a-couple-of-months-in-2021 Taylor Rogers, who closed for Houston last year, signed a 1-year, $8.2M deal with the Dodgers, who along with the Yankees seem to sign all the closers on the market each offseason. Speaking of one-time closers, Delin Betances signed a 2-year, $1.7M total deal with Washington to bolster (?) their bullpen.

December 11 (I'm going to start dating these): The Blue Jays acquired Sonny Gray from the Reds in a deal that sent prize SS prospect Miguel Hiraldo the other way along with another prospect. Good pickup for the Jays assuming he can stay healthy (he's currently recovering from an arthritic elbow which doesn't sound great).

December 12: The Cardinals shelled out $78.1M over 5 years for Mike Clevinger, the best starter on the FA market. Clevinger is coming off a couple of semi-down years since leading the league in ERA in 2020, but is still worth a shot; I was going to make him a 2-year offer for about $35M but that wouldn't have flown as it turns out.

Had Clevenger stayed in Cleveland, he'd be throwing to Gary Sanchez as the former Yankee signed a 7/53.5 deal with the Indians. I know that's one bat I'll be glad not to see anymore in the Yankee lineup. Right now their starting C is Robinson Chirinos but I'm sure they'll find a way to upgrade.

Another blockbuster!!!!

It was time to finally get off the Snellacoaster, and he was entering the final year of his contract. In the three years I've managed the team the only true sustained spell of success he had was in the first half of 2021, and then he proceeded to get hurt and miss almost all of the rest of the season. So to get the uber-consistent Thor in return is a great deal, even if he too is in the final year of his contract. Of course Snell is capable of outpitching Thor this year, it's just not very likely. But the Mets not only get Snell but they get Yonny to fill a rotation hole which they have now with deGrom gone to free agency, and Josh Lowe could be the CFer next year depending on how things shake out. The deal also opens up a pair of 40-man roster spots which is not insignificant. Strotman is grabbing one of them for now.

The Tampa Bay Rays traded 26-year-old minor league left fielder Cal Stevenson to the Chicago Cubs, getting 23-year-old minor league shortstop Jason Willow in return.

Another Rule 5/loaded Durham OF crunch trade. Stevenson could lead off for a lot of MLB teams, including the Cubs, as kind of a Ryan Boldt-type. He can hit .270-.280, have a .360 OBP or better, and steal bases and play a decent LF. But there was no room for him at the inn so off he goes to our favorite trading partners the Cubs. Willow's main attribute is that he isn't Rule 5-eligible but he's a halfway decent prospect that'll probably get thrown into another deal in the next year or two.

December 13: Around MLB, the Tigers sent Kennys Vargas, who's hit 76 HR the last 2 years, to Oakland for a couple of prospects. Vargas will fill the hole left when Matt Olson became a free agent. Also Cleveland signed 36-year-old OF Lorenzo Cain to a 3-year, $46.2M deal. Cain's coming off a nice season but good luck with that.

December 14: Will Harris, who did a great job for us last year, signed a 2-year, $20.4M deal with the Cubs. Not sure I'd have wanted to go 2 years and that much $ for him, though, given his age.

December 15: The Cardinals made quite the splash today with 3 big moves. They signed our buddy Joey Gallo to a 7-year $140M contract, also signed our buddy Brad Hand to a 3-yr, $18M deal (so no dance with Hand this offseason), and traded good-hitting C Andrew Knizner to the Yankees for Jonathan Loaisaga, so the Yankees get their catcher. Knizner doesn't have Sanchez's power but he's a good one, somebody I was looking at during 2021 before getting Keibert Ruiz.

December 16: Signed P Jose Alvarado to a 2-year, $21M contract extension.

Alvarado was set to be a free agent at year's end, and we very well couldn't let the best reliever in baseball walk for nothing hence the extension. Of course there's always risk with relievers but now that we have more money to spend than in past years it's a risk worth taking in his case.

December 19: Lost P Tommy Romero in the Rule 5 draft to Colorado.

Those damn Rockies again. Last year they took Joey Wendle from us, which wasn't that big a deal but I really didn't want to lose Romero. I ended up adding Tanner Dodson as the 40th man since he popped up more often in "make this work" trade offers. Romero was Durham's closer last year and could have been part of this year's bullpen, but such are the breaks. The Rockies also took Cal Stevenson, whom the Cubs neglected to protect after getting him in trade from us; in fact, they were the only team to take more than 1 player, grabbing 3 which is quite a few to commit to keeping on the active MLB roster so I'm hoping maybe we get Romero back.

December 28: Hope everyone had a good Christmas. We're back with a couple of trades.

Traded 21-year-old minor league left fielder Oneill Manzueta to the Chicago Cubs, getting 23-year-old minor league center fielder Grant Richardson in return.

Manzueta was probably a mistake to put on the 40-man as he was only in A ball, where he hit .290 with some power and is already a 70 left fielder. He probably would have slipped through but put him on the 40-man I did and now I need room for what's coming in the next trade. So I rang up my old buddies the Cubs again and they were kind enough to offer Richardson, who ain't a bad prospect but probably not as good as Manzueta so if anyone's going to benefit from my roster mismanagement, let it be the team that traded me Brandon Marsh.

Traded 19-year-old minor league center fielder Willie Gonzalez to the Milwaukee Brewers, getting 24-year-old reliever Aaron Ashby and 23-year-old minor league starting pitcher Slade Cecconi in return.

Gonzalez was my 2021 $5M international free agent signee. He didn't exactly set the world on fire in his first extended action in the DSL this year but he's still highly regarded as a prospect. But for every Wander Franco there are 20 guys are who aren't Wander Franco so I'm going to play the odds here and hope he isn't contending for the NL MVP come 2028. And I get a couple of things I really want: an excellent lefty for the bullpen and a top-notch starting pitching prospect. Ashby can be used for three batters or he can go multiple innings as he had a 2.94 ERA in 52 innings for Milwaukee over 25 appearances with a 19/62 BB/K ratio and those numbers were supported by his minor league track record. Cecconi is potential 60 stuff with 55 control with 4 60-70 potential pitches. Scouting projects him as a mid-rotation starter and I'm going to start him at AA Montgomery this year.

Art Deco · 07-18-2020, 07:23 AM

This month shouldn't be eventful as the last one as I pretty much have the roster where I want it with an exception or two.

January 1: Happy New Year! It's a happy one for Josh Bell, who signed a 6-year, $176M deal with the Dodgers. Guess they weren't sold on Daniel Murphy going forward. In other ex-Rays news, the Braves signed Manuel Margot to a minor league deal.

January 2: Poor Josh Lowe. He bides his time behind Kiermaier in our minor league system waiting for his contract to end, and then gets surpassed by Brandon Marsh. So I do him a favor and trade him to the Mets where they could use a bona fide CF. So what do the Mets do? They sign Kiermaier! For 3 years at $14.8M/year no less. Good luck with that, Mets! Now I can look forward to seeing his name in the list whenever I do "shop a player" for the next few seasons. The arms (or bats) race continues in the NL East as the Phillies, who already splurged for Jake deGrom and Ken Giles, got perhaps the biggest prize of the FA class with Francisco Lindor, who had opted out of his Cleveland deal coming off a a career .337-44-144 year. He'll get $141M over 7 years. Also the Twins signed Trevor Gott to a 1-year $2.28M deal.

January 5: Chris Archer comes full circle to the team that traded him to the Rays back in 2011 as a prospect in the Matt Garza deal as he signs a 1-year $1.12M deal with the Cubs.

January 6: Nice try Blue Jays, offering me Simeon Woods Richardson for Brandon Marsh. Trevor Rosenthal is back with the Dodgers on a 1-year, $1.86M deal.

January 7: After testing the free agent waters, Andrew Benintendi went back to Minnesota on a 4-year, $39.2M deal. He was coming off a career-best 31 HR, 109 RBI season. Speaking of career highs in HRs I have gone back to 2018 offensive settings for next season as I've had it with what Keith Law calls the "happy fun ball". We'll see if it works. Meanwhile the Jays have picked up lefty reliever Amir Garrett from the Pirates for pitching prospect Garrett Crochet, and the Twins opened a 40-man spot for Benintendi by waiving former Rays farmhand Lucius Fox.

January 8: OK, here's some big Rays news:

We're gettin' jiggy with it over here at Rays HQ adding Will Smith to our pen. He'll be our new Brad Hand, the veteran lefty closer who gets it done. And points to Smith for not jerking me around making me increase my offer like Hand did the last two winters. My only concern is that he isn't scarred from his Game 7 meltdown in the NLCS. Otherwise the money is reasonable and now the pen is set with Ashby, Alvarado, McClanahan and Smith from the left side and Anderson, Barlow, Gallegos and Dany Jimenez from the right. Me gusta.

Need to open a 40-man spot for him, though. The candidate to go is pseudo-prospect Luke Heyer who finally has slipped out of the BNN Top 100 prospects after inexplicably being #1 at one point. He didn't hit a whole lot at Durham or Montgomery last year (250-260 with occasional power) even though the editor thinks he can hit .287 with 25 HR in the big leagues. Nevertheless I can't get anyone to offer me a prospect when I shop him, although I imagine he gets claimed if/when I put him on waivers.

January 10: In more ex-Rays news (there are a lot more of them since I took over), Oliver Drake inked a 1-year, $2.84M deal with St. Louis. Also the Phillies traded Andrew McCutchen to the Cubs for a couple of minor leaguers.

Placed 3B Luke Heyer on waivers, added P Will Smith to the active and 40-man rosters.

How radioactive is Heyer on the trade market? Aside from the fact I can't get a single team to offer me a prospect, I tried shopping him to various teams just trying to even get a 1/2 star guy that didn't have to go on the 40-man. Got nothing but "this offer is an insult" and "you've got to be kidding" and when I clicked on "make it work" I was asked for one of my top players or prospects. It's as if Heyer has negative value. Now watch someone claim him on waivers.

January 13: Yep, the Mariners claimed Heyer on waivers. Now watch him hit .287 with 25 HRs for them, which wouldn't shock me after they turned Mike Brosseau into a near all-star. The Dodgers signed former Twins reliever Tyler Duffey to a 1-year deal. I only note this because Duffey killed the Rays in a couple of games last year so I'm glad not to have to see him (although we may yet as I believe we're due for games against the NL West this season). Also in the guys-possibly-coming-back-to-haunt-us department, the Jays signed Chaz Roe to a 1-year, $1.18M deal.

January 17: The Jays signed SP Rick Porcello to a 2-year, $12M deal. I suppose he's not much better or worse than the non-Pearson starters they've been trotting out recently, but boy I don't know about Porcello in the AL East. The Phillies also swung a deal with Baltimore to acquire former Ray Peter Fairbanks.

January 18: The Hall of Fame voting is in, and let the hue and cry go out across the land as nobody was elected. First-year nominee Carlos Beltran came closest with 70.6% of the vote but undoubtedly some negative feelings about his role in the sign-stealing scandals kept him out on the first ballot. Gary Sheffield and Manny Ramirez were next closest, distantly back at around 40% each.

January 20: Wow. Matt Wisler has become a decent SP over the last few years for the Twins with ERAs ranging from 4.13 to 5.00 but I didn't realize how much he could command on the FA market as he signed a 7-year, $115.5M deal with Kansas City. He's had a good 237/800 K/BB ratio in 900 career innings but I guess the dearth of good SPs on the FA market (Clevenger was the only one who appealed to me when I looked at the list) allowed him to cash in. I guess Wisler's mother will be proud of her son. Elsewhere, Atlanta made out pretty well dealing Austin Riley, expendable due to the Jose Ramirez acquisition, to offense-starved Miami for lefty starter Trevor Rogers who put up a 3.08 ERA in 158 IP last season with a 66/145 K/BB ratio. His numbers will probably go up a bit pitching outside of the humidor known as Marlins Park but that's still a great acquisition for Atlanta as he'll take Tyler Anderson's spot in the rotation.

January 27: Things have really slowed down as the only news of note is that Boston acquired Niko Goodrum from Detroit for a minor leaguer.

Going to keep this post going for February since there really isn't enough news to warrant a new one.

February 7: Longtime A's 1B Matt Olson signs a 2-year, $20M deal with Minnesota. Guess Sano becomes the DH since Olson is a 75 at 1B.

February 8: The Marlins, who need all the offense they can get, signed veteran 35-year-old OF David Peralta to a 2-year deal for $21.6M. Peralta's usually good for a .290-.300 average and about 20 HR so that probably makes him their #3 hitter.

February 9: Man, the Mets pulled off another heist of a deal. I'm still not over the Luis Guillorme-for-Joey Bart deal from 2021, and now they trade Billy McKinney to the Angels for excellent young starter Griffin Canning. Yes, the 28-year-old McKinney had a career year last year as the likes of Nimmo and Conforto were in and out of the lineup, going .301-29-105 but he's two years removed from being a quadruple-A player, while Canning is 26 coming off a 4.2 WAR season in which he had a 3.72 ERA with 215 K's and only 52 walks in 200 innings with 4 65+ pitches. He'll join Blake Snell and holdover Sandy Alcantara as their top 3 starters with Syndergaard and deGrom gone.

February 12: Ji-Man!! He signs a 1-year deal for $6.8M with - you guessed it - Rays North a/k/a the Chicago Cubs. Cafecito was pretty awful for them last year, hitting about .250 with moderate power and Ian Happ ended up playing a lot there and having a good season. Ironically to make room for him on the 40-man they waived former Rays prospect Simon Rosenblum-Larson, whom I think we traded them for Kyle Schwarber in 2021 (I've had so many deals with the Cubs I can't remember for sure). Not going to claim him even though his 2022 #s looked good as trying to get on our 40-man roster is as tough as getting into Studio 54 during the height of disco.

February 21: Nelson Cruz gets a job about a month earlier than he got one last year when we signed him just before the season started. He's reunited with the Texas Rangers on a 1-year, $8.1M deal which is also about a million more than we gave them last year. Somewhere Seth Beer breathes a sigh of relief.

Art Deco · 07-18-2020, 11:27 AM

Time for everyone's favorite time of year when we pray nobody gets hurt. Last year we had Tyler Glasnow go down for the first two months of the season and Zack Greinke miss 3 weeks at the start. (With the way Greinke ended up pitching it was probably a good thing).

I'm not going to report on every game, just notable developments.

February 23: Prize pitching prospect Sandy Gaston looked good in his 2-inning start against the regular Baltimore lineup, striking out 3 and Niko Hulszier, an intriguing power bat who played at AA last year, doubled and homered among his 3 hits in an 8-2 win over Baltimore in which no regulars played.

Some vets getting minor league deals of note today: Aaron Nola to the Reds, Johnny Cueto to the Mariners, Matt Carpenter to the Phillies, Mallex Smith to the A's, and Ryne Stanek to the Orioles.

February 25: Triston Casas and Spencer Torkelson homered against MLB pitchers (Dylan Floro & Jharel Cotton) to lead the Rays to a 5-3 win over Oakland, Chris Paddack pitched 3 perfect innings and only threw 25 pitches.

February 26: Big news out of New York, the Mets signed Blake Snell to a 7-year extension (!) for $117.6M.

March 3: Tork hit another HR, this time against his old team the Royals. Got an intriguing trade offer with the Marlins offering prize pitching prospect Asa Lacy but they're asking for SS prospect Jorge Perez, who is the one Dominican prospect I have that actually stands a chance to be another Wander or something approaching Wander.

March 4: Wait long enough and you can get bargains in free agency; the Orioles nabbed Byron Buxton for 1 year at $2.1M. I really didn't have any interest myself but I checked in on him anyway earlier in the process and he was looking for 7-8 years at about $9-10M per. A good pickup for an 80 defender who can hit some with power but of course he's terribly injury-prone.

March 8: Alec Bohm hit 2 HRs today including a walk-off winner in the 9th against Detroit, giving him 4 HR and 11 RBI in 29 AB so far this spring as he's laying claim to the 1B job. Torkelson homered again yesterday, giving him 3 in 20 AB so far.

March 9: Well we won't be seeing Chaz Roe pitch against us for the Jays after all this year, he suffered a torn flexor tendon and is done for the year.

March 10: Jays made a strange trade, sending Anthony Kay, one of the mainstays of their rotation who pitched nearly 200 innings last year with a near-league average ERA, to the Braves for Justin Ellison, a quadruple-A type outfielder. Seems the opposite of what they need.

March 15: Traded 20-year-old minor league shortstop Jorge Perez and 25-year-old starting pitcher Josiah Gray to the Miami Marlins, getting 23-year-old reliever Asa Lacy and 20-year-old minor league shortstop Ian Lewis in return.

Well I pulled the trigger on this, Lacy is too good a pitching prospect to pass up. Miami kind of misused him, bringing him up and down to MLB from AA (and A+ the year before) and used him in relief. He'll be a starter for me, probably starting the year at Durham. Trading Perez is another long-term gamble, and I may get burned here, but you gotta give something to get something. Gray had to go off the 40-man so he was included, and Lewis is a decent prospect himself.

March 17: Happy St. Patrick's Day! It's gonna be tough to send Tork down as he hit his 5th HR of the spring. Everything's going along relatively smoothly so far with a couple of exceptions in the bullpen. First, Gio Gallegos seems to give up runs in every outing and has a 10.50 ERA. Probably nothing but I'd like to see a couple of clean innings from him before the season starts. Feeling better that I picked up Will Smith to close instead of relying on Gallegos. The other issue is Nick Anderson. He sat out a week with a tired arm, came back, and in his second outing back he gave up a 2-run HR then the PbP said the trainer took a look at his elbow but he was OK to stay in. These are ominous signs. I'll give him a couple more innings in spring but it's becoming a matter of concern.

March 19: Well, the exhibition games are over, even though we don't play for another week and a half. This is probably because we're using the 2019 schedule and Seattle and Oakland are playing early games in Japan so OOTP thinks the coming week is regular season for everyone. No serious injuries, although I'm still concerned about Anderson. He pitched in the final preseason game but not all that well.

March 20: Designated P Zack Britton for assignment; released P James Paxton.

I had both of them up on my spring roster but it wouldn't let me send Britton back to Durham so waivers he goes. At least I still have one Zack Britton in the organization. Looking at the projected Durham roster it didn't seem there was a place for Paxton as he'd eat up innings I'd rather have guys with a future pitch. He wasn't very impressive (and got hurt) since picking him up so it looks like he might be done, although someone will probably sign him.

March 22: It's MLB opening day but only for Oakland and Seattle. The Jays signed Mitch Haniger to a 1-year, $5.3M deal. He had 23 HR and 87 RBI with Arizona last year but it came with a .221 average. Not sure what the Jays plans are for him as it seems to be they should be in the market for pitching. OOTP's preseason predictions call for us to win 97 games, 11 better than the second-place Yankees. Here's hoping they're right.

Among free agents still out there, both of the New York closers remain untouched with Edwin Diaz wanting a 1-year, $18M deal and Aroldis Chapman wanting 1 year at $15M. Keeping this in the back of my mind in case Anderson continues to have health/effectiveness issues.

And opening day in Japan saw the defending AL Champion Mariners beat Oakland 11-5. The only HR came from Jarred Kelenic, who along with Mike Brosseau had 3 RBI. Touki Toussaint went 5 2/3 allowing 4 hits and 2 runs for the win, but he walked 7. Jesus Luzardo was torched for 7 runs in 1.1 innings.

March 23: Oakland beat Seattle 5-4 in the second of their two games in Japan with David Fletcher homering and driving in four. Ramon Laureano and Matt Chapman also went deep for the A's. Although he didn't get the win Jameson Tallion, who missed the entire 2022 season due to injury (and whom I forgot Oakland even had), went 6 7 2 2 3 10. Laureano's HR off Colin Poche in the 8th was the game-winner.

March 25: Scratch Diaz off the free agent list as who else but the Dodgers (who seem to be programmed to sign ALL the closers), gave him his 1-year, $18M deal or something close to that. Also among the long list of players put on waivers to start the season was Austin Adams, whom the Reds waived. The way Gallegos has been pitching this spring last year's trade might not turn out to be the greatest for either team.

March 29: Aaaannnnd there goes Chapman, signing a 1-year, $16.6M deal with the Cubs, who interestingly released their closer of last season, Blake Treinen, a couple days before.

Art Deco · 07-18-2020, 06:34 PM

Here's the opening day roster, without any real surprises like last year when Ronaldo surprisingly grabbed the 2nd catcher spot and didn't let go of it:

C: K.Ruiz, R.Hernandez
1B: Bohm
2B: Brujan
SS: Wander
3B: Devers
IF: Bannon
OF: Meadows, Marsh, Kepler, Yusniel Diaz, Kirilloff
DH: Beer

SP: Syndergaard, Glasnow, Paddack, Fried, Ryan
RP: W.Smith, Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, Barlow, Ashby, D.Jimenez, McClanahan

Neither Kirilloff nor Beer tore it up in spring training; that would be Torkelson instead. But Tork isn't on the 40-man and hasn't played above AA so he'll start at Durham for now. Not really sure how much Kirilloff is going to play, although against certain righties Beer could spell Bohm at 1B and Kirilloff can DH. Also Kepler's on a short leash.

Let the games begin!

Game 1: (I'm not going to post the recap part of the box score for every game, but Opening Day is always special)

Bohms away! Getting a shot at the 1B job, Alec Bohm went deep twice and drove in 5 to pace a 10-4 opening day win. The pitching matchup was a classic that played out many times in the NL East, with Max Scherzer against Noah Syndergaard. But a duel it wasn't as the Rays didn't waste time getting to Scherzer with Wander taking him deep in the 1st for the first of his 2 HRs and then Bohm in the 2nd to make it 2-0. And then came the fourth as the Rays put up 7, with Bohm blasting a 3-run shot that chased Scherzer and Vidal Brujan adding a 3-run homer of his own off Framber Valdez to make it 9-0 and effectively end the game. Thor, meanwhile, was rolling along (he got the side in order in the first on 5 pitches) and was at 5 3 0 0 0 7 before he ran into some trouble in the 6th, giving up a Yordan Alvarez triple and then a George Springer HR to make it 10-3. But he stuck around for the seventh and got a pair of Ks, going 7 7 3 3 1 10 in his Rays debut. Speaking of Rays debuts, Seth Beer was on base three times with a HBP, a walk, and his first major league hit, an improbable infield single. Everyone in the lineup had at least one hit except Austin Meadows, who had a rough 0-3 with all his outs being strikeouts, although he did draw a walk. Rafael Devers was 1-5 in his Rays debut as his 4th inning double got the 7-run rally started. Dany Jimenez and Aaron Ashby didn't look particularly sharp in their two innings of relief, with Jimenez giving up 3 runs and a hit and Ashby allowing 2 hits.

Elsewhere around the AL East, the Yankees beat Baltimore 3-1 behind a dominating performance from Gerrit Cole (8 2 1 1 0 10) and a HR from Aaron Hicks. With Chapman gone, it looks like David Bednar is their closer as he picked up the save. The Jays fell 2-1 to Detroit; Nate Pearson threw 6 2/3 shutout innings but Simeon Woods Richardson gave up a couple runs in the 8th while Matt Manning was an impressive 7.2 6 1 1 1 8 for the Tigers. Boston lost 6-4 at Seattle, so it's the Rays and Yanks both off to 1-0 starts.

Blake Snell won his Mets debut, going 6.1 3 3 3 2 5, and Kiermaier was 1-4 with an RBI. Francisco Lindor was 5-5 with a HR and 2 RBI in his Phillies debut as they beat Atlanta 4-3. Also looking through the various teams' opening day rosters, I see that Tommy Romero is listed as the Rockies' #4 starter, so I guess he's not getting returned unless things go poorly.

Game 2: It was Tyler Glasnow vs Lance McCullers Jr but neither of them fared very well. But Shane McClanahan most definitely did as the Rays pulled out a 6-4 win to go 2-0 on the young season. Glasnow was wild and (somewhat hittable) over his 3.2 innings, walking 5 and striking out 7. He gave up a 2-run HR to George Springer and a solo shot to Yasmani Grandal in the 2nd after the Rays had grabbed a 2-0 lead in the first on a Meadows sac fly and a Keibert single after Devers had doubled. Then after giving up another run in the 3rd after the Rays had jumped back ahead 4-3 on a Brujan RBI single, stolen base and Wander RBI single, Glasnow got into more trouble in the 4th after walking Jesus Sanchez and then hitting Yordan Alvarez with lefty Kyle Tucker due up. Enter McClanahan, who got Tucker to fly out and then did Shane McClanahan things, going 3 1 0 0 0 6 over the middle innings. This was long enough to have Brandon Marsh go deep in the 6th to give the Rays a 5-4 lead, and then after McClanahan gave up a 2-out single to Tucker in the 7th, Scott Barlow came on in his Rays debut and although he allowed a Correa single, he struck out Springer to end the threat. Then Alec Bohm hit his third homer in two days to give the Rays an insurance run in the bottom of the 7th. Alvarado came on in the 8th and got into immediate trouble by walking Grandal and giving up a single to JD Martinez but he struck out Sanchez and got Jose Altuve to hit into a double play. Will Smith then came on and had a 1-2-3 ninth, striking out Tucker to end the game. McClanahan deservedly got the win while Brujan and Wander each had 3 hits and an RBI while Seth Beer was 2-3 with a walk, now hitting .600 with a .750 OBP.

Game 3: Well it finally happened: Chris Paddack lost a game as a Tampa Bay Ray. He wasn't terrible by any means as the Rays allowed 4 runs just as they did in both Games 1 and 2. The difference this time was Forrest Whitley, who settled down after a Wander HR (his 3rd already) in the 1st inning to go 7.2 4 1 1 3 6. Paddack shut the Astros down through 3, including striking out the side in the 3rd, but gave up a Yordan Alvarez HR in the 4th to tie it, and then he gave up a couple more longballs in the 5th, George Springer's 3rd and a 2-run shot by Jose Altuve and we had our 4-1 final score. The Rays only managed 5 hits on the night, with Max Kepler getting 2 of them and doubles by Bohm and Keibert being the others. Bohm was thrown out at the plate in the 2nd trying to score on a Kepler single and that was the closest they came to scoring the rest of the game. The Yankees beat Baltimore again so they're 2-0 and a half game up. Paddack was great outside the HRs, going 7 5 4 4 0 6, Aaron Ashby and Gio Gallegos combined for 2 scoreless innings of relief.

Game 4: Man, we'll be glad to see the last of George Springer for a while. The Houston CF was 3-4 with his 4th HR in 4 games and 5 RBI. But his heroics weren't enough for the Astros today as the Rays took a much-closer-than-it-should-have-been 8-7 win to take 3 of the first 4 against a very tough opponent, the one OOTP projects to win 100 games to the Rays' 97 as the two top teams in the AL. Max Fried got the nod and he was shaky early, allowing 2 runs and 6 hits through 3 innings but he settled down from there, and left with a 6.1 8 2 2 3 3 line which was good enough for his first win of the season. That's because Rafael Devers drove in Brujan who had stolen second to tie it at 1 in the first, and then after Seth Beer was hit by another pitch and Alex Kirilloff walked in his MLB debut (he was 0-3 on the day), Ronaldo Hernandez launched a 3-run blast to deep LCF, continuing his 2022 trend of maximizing his occasional starts. Marsh then walked, stole second, and ended up scoring on a Devers fielder's choice to make it 5-1. Brujan later tripled in Hernandez in the 6th and Devers had a 2-run double in the eighth to make it 8-3 capping his 4-5 day with 4 RBI. So with it 8-3 in the 9th, Dany Jimenez got the call and gave up 3 hits and committed an error to make it 8-4, and then with two on and the tying run on deck Will Smith came on for the save and after getting out #2 served up a 3-run shot to Springer to make it 8-7. Smith then whiffed Carlos Correa to end the game and get a shaky save #2. Nick Anderson made his season debut when Fried put a couple on in the 7th and got a pop up and whiff to end that inning, so far so good then with him. Scott Barlow gave up a run in the 8th in his lone inning as the new-look bullpen has been a bit rocky to start the season but the Astros are a tough team to pitch against. Austin Meadows still can't buy a hit, now 0-12 in the first 4 games but as you can tell by only averaging 3 ABs per game he's been drawing some walks at least. The Rays move into first after the Yankees lost a wild 12-10 game to Baltimore and the Blue Jays hit 9 (!) HRs today to get their first win of the year. Elsewhere Tommy Romero gave up 5 runs (3 earned) and 6 hits in 3 innings to the light-hitting Marlins in his Rockies debut so there's still hope of a return.

Team record: 3-1.

Art Deco · 07-18-2020, 10:59 PM

Game 1: Alec Motherf***in' Bohm, man. The newly christened Rays everyday first baseman slugged two more HRs today to give him 5 in 5 games to lead the Rays to a 5-1 win over Colorado and to send the team to 4-1. The game was a scoreless duel between Joe Ryan and Ljay Newsome, whom I'd never heard of but noticed that in 117 minor league innings last year he walked a grand total of 2 batters, not a misprint or typo. But why yes, of course he walked Wander in the first inning. Anyway it was 0-0 until the bottom of the 5th when Bohm went deep to left and then in the sixth after Rafael Devers hit his first Rays HR (a 2-run job) to make it 3-0, Bohm went oppo this time off Newsome and it was 4-0. Finally in the 8th Bohm doubled in Keibert who had doubled as well. Meanwhile Ryan was dealing and keeping the ball in the park, going 7 2 0 0 3 8. Alvarado got a double play from Ryan's leadoff walk in the 8th to pitch a scoreless inning, and Aaron Ashby lost the shutout by allowing a Nolan Arenado shot in the 9th but struck out 2 otherwise. In some side notes, the 5 HR from Bohm in 19 AB so far equal the 5 he hit all of last year in the 141 AB he had in a reserve role, and Austin Meadows continues to look for his first hit (0-16). The Yankees won to keep pace 1/2 game back and Luke Heyer in his Seattle debut DHing tonight hit 2 solo HRs, because of course he did.

Game 2: Another day, another 5-1 win over the Rockies, which just happens to be the team's record now. Syndergaard was on the hill and he did his usual thing, going 8 7 1 1 1 10. He was aided by the Rockies' misadventures on the basepaths as Keibert Ruiz threw out two attempted base stealers and Meadows gunned down Nolan Arenado at 3rd base after he tried to stretch a double into a triple. Speaking of Meadows, he was 0-4 again today to go 0-20 so far this season but it didn't matter as Wander had a bases clearing double and Brujan had an RBI single and an RBI double to account for the scoring. One bit of bad news, though, Gio Gallegos came on to pitch the 9th and after getting two out had to leave with a torn triceps, which will put him out for about 4 1/2 months. Gallegos had put two men on so when Jose Alvarado got Ryan McMahon swinging to end the game, Alvarado picked up a save. Austin Franklin will be the likely callup in Gallegos' place. Trevor Bauer pitched his best game for the Yankees possibly ever, going 8 4 0 0 1 7 in a 1-0 win over Detroit to keep the Yankees 1/2 game back at 4-1.

April 5: Placed P Giovanny Gallegos on the 60-day IL with torn triceps, recalled P Austin Franklin from AAA Durham.

The expected move. Gallegos going on the 60-day opens a 40-man in case someone enticing gets waived or I want to acquire someone.

Game 3: Tyler Glasnow was dominant until he was forced to leave (more on that in a moment), going 7.2 1 1 1 1 10 in an 8-1 romp over the Rockies. The only hit he allowed was a 3rd inning leadoff double to Nolan Arenado who moved to 3rd on a fly ball and scored on a groundout. Otherwise he was untouchable, and as he had a low pitch count (80) through 7 I brought him out for the 8th which turned out to be a mistake as two batters in he had to leave. It's only a tired arm, but the report says "substantial 1-2 weeks" so he'll go on the DL. We'll need a fifth starter in a week or so against the White Sox, Clarke Schmidt will probably get the call although a reliever will come up in the short term. Speaking of recalled relievers, Austin Franklin made his MLB debut and retired all 4 hitters to finish the game, whiffing two of them. Offensively, the big stories were the first MLB HR for Seth Beer, a 2-run shot that broke a 1-1 tie and put the Rays ahead to stay, and Austin Meadows' first hit of the year, which also left the yard in the 5th. Elsewhere, Wander had another 3-hit game (now hitting a cool .452 in 31 AB) and Brandon Marsh did quite well, going 2-3 with a walk, 2 RBI, and a stolen base. The Rockies' keystone combo today was Joey Wendle and Freddy Galvis. They went 0-6. Matt Manning outdueled Gerrit Cole in a 3-2 Tigers win over the Yankees so the Rays are now 1 1/2 at 6-1.

Team record: 6-1.

Art Deco · 07-19-2020, 12:49 PM

April 7: Placed P Tyler Glasnow (tired arm) on the 15-day IL, recalled P Drew Strotman from AAA Durham.

Strotman gets the call for now, although as mentioned earlier Schmidt will probably start in Chicago.

Game 1: It was a date in San Francisco with our old friend Ryan Yarbrough, who hasn't had that much success with the Giants but pitched very well in his opening start this year. And pitch well did Yarbrough for the first 6 innings, holding the Rays to 1 hit and 1 walk while the Giants scored twice against Chris Paddack, who was looking like a tough-luck loser after a good 6 5 2 2 2 6 outing. But the Rays exploded in the 7th off Yarbrough. Devers singled, and after a Meadows fielder's choice, Keibert singled, Bohm singled to load the bases, and Yarbrough then walked Yusniel Diaz forcing a run. Brandon Marsh then ripped a 2-run double to put the Rays ahead, and pinch-hitter Rylan Bannon followed with his first Rays hit, a 2-run double to make it 5-2 and Devers, batting for the second time in the inning, had a sac fly to make it 6-2. Alvarado and Barlow threw scoreless innings while a Meadows (now 1 for 27) ground out made it 7-2 in the 9th. With a 5-run lead Dany Jimenez came in and crapped the bed, loading the bases with nobody out. With lefties due up, closer Will Smith came in and promptly gave up two hits, allowing all of Jimenez's runners to score, but he got the final 3 outs for another shaky save, #3, as the Rays go to 7-1 with the 7-5 win. Paddack hung around long enough for the win to resume his winning Rays ways. The Yankees were idle so the lead is up to 2 1/2.

Game 2: The Rays are obviously still on Eastern Time as they sleepwalked through another 5 innings and just like yesterday they were down 2-0. Wander doubled in Brandon Marsh in the 6th to get the Rays on the board and they broke through for good in the 8th when Ronaldo Hernandez led off with a single, Marsh singled, a Keibert Ruiz fly ball sent pinch-runner Yusniel Diaz to 3rd, and then Brujan singled in Diaz, Wander singled to load the bases, and Austin Meadows (moved back into the 3rd spot to try and get him going) delivered a sac fly to put the Rays ahead 3-2. In his second appearance of the season, Nick Anderson had a perfect 8th with a K, and then Will Smith delivered another shaky but less shaky than previous appearances save as he worked around a Mikie Mahtook double to get #4 in 4 tries and the Rays won their sixth straight to go to 8-1. Aaron Ashby picked up his first Rays win as he had finished the 7th in relief of Austin Franklin who was impressive again, striking out 3 in 1 1/3 scoreless. Max Fried started and had another bend-but-don't-break line of 5 5 2 2 3 2. Yankees won so the lead is still 2 1/2.

Game 3: Well today it only took them until the fourth to score, when Alex Kirilloff got his first MLB hit, an RBI single, and Vidal Brujan walked with the bases loaded to give the Rays an early 2-0 lead. Javy Baez got one right back with a HR off Joe Ryan but through 6 innings that was the only baserunner Ryan had allowed as he took a 2-1 lead into the bottom of the 7th. But Luis Guillorme (7 HR all of last year) took Ryan deep leading off the inning to tie it, and although he got the next out, he gave up a single and double to put runners on 2nd and 3rd. Enter Jose Alvarado, and for once Jose didn't have it, giving up a pair of hits to allow the two runners to score and put the Giants up 4-2. From there the offense could get nothing going, only managing a single hit over the last 3 1/3 against the San Francisco pen, and their six-game winning streak came to an abrupt end at 4-2 as the offense managed only 5 hits on the day. Ryan of course took the loss and ended up with 4 runs against his ledger on 4 hits with 0 walks and 8 Ks. Shane McClanahan pitched a nice 8th inning fanning a pair, while Kirilloff had a nice day with 2 walks in addition to that RBI single. The Orioles pounded the Yankees and Corey Kluber 8-1 so the lead remains 2 1/2.

Team record: 8-2.

Art Deco · 07-19-2020, 04:46 PM

Game 1: Noah Syndergaard was on the mound again looking to go 3-0 and he did with relative ease as the Rays pounded the White Sox 12-5. Thor was 7 5 3 3 0 6 with his only run of trouble coming in the 6th when he gave up an Adam Engel single, a Luis Gonzalez RBI double, and then a 2-run HR to Eloy Jimenez, outside of that sequence has largely untouchable. Drew Strotman made his MLB debut and pitched the final 2 innings. After striking out the first batter he faced he got through the eighth but hit a man in the 9th ahead of Jimenez who hit his 2nd 2-run HR of the game. The offense came alive in the 4th on solo HRs from Vidal Brujan and Austin Meadows (who had a double later for his first multi-hit game of the season, he'll be fine thanks for asking) and then they tacked on 4 more in the 5th capped by a 2-run double from Rafael Devers. The White Sox said "we'll make a game of this" when they got those runs in the sixth to halve the lead but then the Rays' Seth said "hold my Beer" as the rookie drilled a pinch-hit 2-run blast deep into the RF stands for his 2nd HR to make it 8-3, and then his teammates added 4 more in the 9th, including a Wander HR. Brujan, Alec Bohm and Yusniel Diaz all had 3 hits among the team's 17 as they improve to 9-2. The Yankees beat Houston, a team now off to a rough 3-8 start (including the 1-3 against us) so we're still up 2 1/2.

April 11: Optioned P Drew Strotman to AAA Durham, recalled P Clarke Schmidt from AAA Durham.

Today may be Schmidt's only start as there are a couple of off days sprinkled in over the next 7-10 days so by the time they need a 5th starter again Glasnow may be ready to come off the IL.

Game 2: Some days you kind of have everything going against you, having to start a rookie pitcher against one of the league's best. And it turned out just like predicted, with Clarke Schmidt struggling (4 7 4 3 2 2) and trailing 5-1 after 5 innings with lone run coming on an Austin Meadows RBI double in the 1st. But then the strength of the offense can change the game, and with one swing Rafael Devers did that, launching a 3-run HR off Giolito in the 6th to cut it to 5-4. With the game now close, Shane McClanahan came on for Austin Franklin (who came on for Schmidt and allowed a run in his 1.2 IP) and of course he did his middle relief thing (2.1 1 0 0 0 1) and then the Rays went to work in the 7th off the hapless Tyler Johnson who was left in to face 7 batters, none of whom he retired. Max Kepler led things off tying the game with his 1st HR of the year, Wander and Devers singled in runs, Meadows walked with the bases loaded and it was now 8-5 Rays. Devers drove in a run in the 9th with a fielder's choice and with the game 9-5, things were turned over to Aaron Ashby with a couple of lefties due up after Eloy Jimenez, who had an RBI double off Schmidt earlier and whom we couldn't seem to get out. Well Ashby got Jimenez to fly out but then he put two men on around the 2nd out, and up stepped Jose Peraza, normally a singles hitter. Well Peraza took Ashby deep to CF and like that it was 9-8. With a couple of righties due up Nick Anderson got the call, but the White Sox sent up lefty pinch-hitter Blake Rutherford and he doubled. The next pinch hitter was righty Domingo Santana, but Anderson whiffed him to mercifully end the game and the Rays held on to a 9-8 win. Devers had 5 RBI on the day to give him a team-leading 14, and Vidal Brujan was 1-3 with 2 walks, scoring 4 times. Wander had 2 hits as the team made the most of the 9 they got along with 5 walks. McClanahan got his second win and Anderson his first save as they go to 10-2. The Yankees were destroyed 16-0 by Houston (with Gerrit Cole starting!) and the division lead is now a season-high 3 1/2 games. Also on the same day Devers drove in 5, Abraham Toro had 2 HR and drove in 5 for Boston.

Game 3: Austin Meadows is finally heating up from his slow start and he made the White Sox pay today with a 2-run double in the 1st and a 3-run HR in the 7th to pace the Rays to an 8-2 win over the White Sox. I didn't call this an easy win, because after a first inning in which the Rays got 3 and the White Sox 2 (on HRs from Nick Madrigal and of course Eloy Jimenez), the game stayed that way through the sixth inning. But Vidal Brujan and Wander Franco hit consecutive doubles to start the top of the 7th to make it 4-2, and then after a walk to Rafael Devers, Meadows went yard to break it open and suddenly he's tied with Devers for the team RBI lead at 14 even though his average is still at .196. Chris Paddack did his best Joe Ryan impression in the 1st inning but was untouchable after that, going 8 4 2 2 0 9 on only 102 pitches. Scott Barlow had a 1-2-3 ninth as for once a reliever didn't give up a bunch of runs with a big lead. At 11-2 the Rays are up 4 1/2 on the Yankees (who lost) and the Orioles (who won) and are the only team above .500 in the division.

Team record: 11-2.

Art Deco · 07-20-2020, 12:15 PM

Durham finally got its season underway last night (no idea why OOTP scheduled AAA to start two weeks after MLB and one week after AA and lower began), and they beat arch-rivals Gwinnett 2-1 on back-to-back HRs by Spencer Torkleson and Triston Casas and behind a great AAA debut from Shane Baz, who went 7 5 1 1 0 6.

Game 1: If you were going to predict the first time the Rays would be shut out this season, I doubt you'd have picked a game in Toronto, and I doubt even more that the starting pitcher that you'd pick would be Rick Porcello, but that's what happened as the Jays beat the Rays 5-0. The game was effectively decided in the bottom of the 3rd when Justin Ellison hit a 2-out grand slam off Max Fried, who was returning to the scene of his Game 4 crime in last year's playoffs when he let a big early lead get away to put the Rays' playoff elimination in motion. It turned out that was all that Fried gave up over 6 innings and the case can be made that his 6 6 4 4 1 3 performance was the best of his 3 starts to date. Porcello and a pair of relievers didn't exactly dominate as the Rays had 7 hits and drew 6 walks but they couldn't get the hits when they counted, especially in the 7th when Devers grounded out with the bases loaded and 2 out. Seth Beer was 0-4 with a couple of strikeouts and his average is down to .147 although his OBP is .310. Also Alec Bohm's name hasn't been mentioned much lately as he cooled off after his ridiculous start, although he's still getting hits here and there. The Yankees won so the lead is down to 3 1/2.

Quick Durham update: In Game 2 of their season Asa Lacy made his Rays organization debut and was brilliant, going 6 5 0 0 2 9. Tristan Casas had another HR and drove in 3, although Nick Frasso and Tony Cingrani allowed 6 runs to Gwinnett in the 7th, turning a potential 4-0 win into a 6-4 loss.

Game 2: It was Joe Ryan against Nate Pearson and one of them gave up 4 runs in 5 innings on 2 HRs. It wasn't Joe Ryan though. Sure, he gave up his obligatory HR in the 2nd to Ray-for-a-month Mitch Haniger, but aside from that and an unearned Jays run in the first off two errors (one his own) Ryan went 6 2 2 1 3 8 in a 6-2 win over the Jays. After mentioning him yesterday, Alec Bohm got back on the HR board with #6 for the first Rays run in the 2nd but the big hero today was Ronaldo Hernandez, who hit a 2-run off Pearson in the 5th to put the Rays up to stay. Ronaldo was 3-3 with a walk and he's 8 for 15 with 2 HR and 5 RBI in his limited appearances this year (he actually has 2 more RBI than Keibert Ruiz, which is kind of quirky since Ruiz has been hitting). Max Kepler added a 2-run HR off Amir Garrett for the final Rays runs, and the bullpen actually got through 3 innings clean although there were some moments. After Nick Anderson's perfect 7th when it was 4-2, Scott Barlow came on in the 8th and put 2 on with 2 out and lefty Reese McGuire due up so Alvarado was summoned and responded with the strikeout. With it 6-2, Alvarado didn't come out for the 9th and Aaron Ashby pitched around a hit to finish things off. The Yankees lost but Boston won to improve to 8-7 so they are now in 2nd, 4 games back.

Another Durham update: I don't plan on giving these every game, but there are so many top-notch power prospects on the team that there always seems something to report. Today they bashed 6 HRs in a 14-9 win over Gwinnett (the bullpen sucks, it was a 14-4 game). Nick Schnell was 3-5 with a HR and 5 RBI, Tork went deep again and Hunter Bishop hit his first AAA HR.

April 16: Signed P Brandon Workman to a minor league contract; assigned him to AAA Durham.

Well there's some help for the lousy Durham bullpen. Workman was waived by Texas and released last week; his numbers still look pretty decent so there's always a chance he can help the big club as well.

Game 3: The Rays clocked the Jays 10-3 today and the Porcello-led shutout of them seems like it was weeks ago now. Thor was in command, going to 4-0 on an 8 4 3 3 1 5 line with the only Jays runs coming courtesy of a Haniger (again) 2-run shot and a Bo Bichette solo shot in the 8th when he was running out of gas. Marsh and Meadows doubled in the 1st then they added 3 more in the third with a Yusniel Diaz double the key hit. Haniger's blast cut it to 4-2 where it stood until the 6th when Seth Beer, who had to come on to play 1B after Alec Bohm suffered an oblique strain (6 days out, probably headed to the IL), hit HR #3 to make it 5-2. Beer has had his struggles but for a guy hitting .154 his OPS is .725 thanks to drawing walks and hitting with power when he does hit. He'll likely be the everyday 1B for the next 7-10 days. As they do so often, they blew it open late with 5 runs in the 8th and 9th with the highlight being a Marsh 3-run HR, giving him 4 RBI on the day. Meadows had 3 hits and is up to .241 now and Rylan Bannon was 2-3 with a walk and an RBI as Vidal Brujan got a day off. Even Dany Jimenez, who had struggled mightily with an ERA near 20 coming in, had a scoreless 9th. Those surprising Red Sox won again to stay 4 back and they're being led by none other than Abe Toro, hitting .350/444/717 with 5 HR and 15 RBI, vastly outproducing Devers so far. Great trade! (at least we got Triston Casas in the deal too, he might be coming up for Bohm). We'll be seeing Toro and the Sox next weekend at home following a 3-game set with Baltimore after a day off tomorrow. Elsewhere around MLB the Pirates lost today (in 10 innings, had to be painful) and they are 0-15 to start the season. Look out 1988 Orioles!

Durham update: As long as these guys keep blasting homers, I'll keep updating. Torkelson and Casas each hit their third in 4 games, and Nick Schnell hit #2 giving him 8 RBI now in those 4 games. Unfortunately Durham lost 8-4 as Slade Cecconi was torched for 6 runs in 1.2 innings in his Rays org debut.

Team record 13-3.

Art Deco · 07-20-2020, 05:46 PM

April 17: Optioned P Clarke Schmidt to AAA Durham, recalled P Drew Strotman from AAA Durham.

Not sure why I didn't send Schmidt down earlier, when the fifth starting spot comes up Saturday the 22nd Glasnow will be due off the IL and he's already over the tired arm. As for Alec Bohm, I've decided not to IL him since he only has 4 days left and we can play shorthanded for the time being. I'm giving some thought to sending Strotman down Thursday for the 3rd game of this series and calling Andrew Vaughn up for a game against the lefty Caleb Smith, then sending him back down for Glasnow.

Game 1: This looked like the typical Rays game with Chris Paddack on the mound, getting 3 runs on 5 hits in the first to go up 3-0. But Paddack has been slowly morphing into Joe Ryan lately with the HRs and after Baltimore hit 3 off him through the first 4 innings it was 5-3 Orioles. But you just knew the Rays would chip away and take the lead, and after they got one back in the 4th they took the lead in the 6th on RBI singles from Brujan and Devers, and then in the 7th we had a Beer blast into dead center to make it 7-5. 3 more in the 8th gave us another 10-run game, and everyone in the lineup had at least 2 hits except Brujan and Marsh who each had one, and everyone drove in at least one run except Kirilloff and Marsh. Paddack, meanwhile, as is his custom hung around long enough to get the win after settling down past the 4th. His final line was 6.2 9 5 5 1 4 and he did get into a bit of trouble in the 7th that Nick Anderson got him out of with a big strikeout of Adley Rutschman. Alvarado pitched a perfect 8th while it was still 7-5, and even though the 3 8th inning runs took away the save situation Will Smith hadn't pitched in forever, and got nicked for a run in the 9th but the Rays go to 14-3 with the 10-6 win. Boston lost yesterday while the Rays were idle and lost again to the Yankees today, putting New York in second, 4 1/2 behind. Abe Toro hit #6 in a losing cause, just waiting for him to wreak vengeance this weekend. Also the Pirates are now 0-16 after losing 2-1 to Detroit despite being up 1-0 in the 8th, allowing single runs in the 8th and 9th to lose. Ouch.

Game 2: The calendar says April 19 but those who watched this game could be forgiven if they thought it was February 2 as today's game was Groundhog Day given its similarity to yesterday. Once again a Rays starter got into early HR trouble; today it was Max Fried who served up longballs to Austin Hays and Byron Buxton and in the middle of the fifth Baltimore was ahead 3-0 behind Grayson Rodriguez. But Brandon Marsh led off the bottom of the 5th with a HR of his own, and that must have gotten the Orioles thinking "here we go again", and there they went. Rafael Devers, tired of the Toro talk, hit a 2-run shot to tie it up, and after the red-hot Austin Meadows (regression can be fun sometimes) doubled, Keibert Ruiz hit his first of the season and suddenly an inning that started 3-0 Orioles was 5-3 Rays. And in the 6th Alex Kirilloff hit his first major league round-tripper into the RF stands to make it 6-3. Fried, meanwhile, when he wasn't giving up HRs was whiffing Orioles left and right as he ended the day with 11 Ks which was 3 more than he had in his first 3 starts combined. He hung around for 5 2/3, enough to get the win, but as you could imagine his pitch count got high and Scott Barlow came on and was nasty, finishing the 6th for Fried and whiffing 2 in the 7th in a perfect 1 1/3. Jose Alvarado got a hold with a perfect 8th, and then the Rays tacked on 2 more in the bottom of the inning on a Wander HR. With it now 8-3, Will Smith sat back down in the pen and Drew Strotman pitched a scoreless 9th as he bids adieu to the big club for now. Meanwhile Meadows had 3 more hits and now sits at 284/370/522 as if the first 10 games or so never happened. Devers also had 3 hits as Max Kepler was the only Ray not to hit safely but he did reach via walk. The Rays improve to an MLB-best 15-3 as they get off to a hot start for the third year running, and with Boston beating the Yankees the lead is already up to 5 1/2. (Yes, Toro was 1-2 with an RBI to improve to 371-6-17, thanks for asking). And Pittsburgh. Oh Pittsburgh. They led Detroit 2-1 going into the bottom of the 9th and Kody Clemens hit a 2-run HR off their prize young pitcher, Brennan Malone, who is apparently their closer (there's a CL next to his name) although the position is currently theoretical. They're now 0-17, 4 games away the tying the 1988 Orioles for worst start ever. And in a real oddity, the Kansas City Royals started 0-6 but now have won 12 straight to go to 12-6 and are in first in the AL Central. Strange times.

April 20: Optioned P Drew Strotman to AAA Durham, recalled IF Andrew Vaughn from AAA Durham.

As alluded to earlier, Vaughn's going to get his MLB cup of coffee, starting today against the lefty Caleb Smith at DH. A heralded prospect out of college when drafted by the White Sox in 2019, Vaughn's kind of stagnated, showing only doubles power although he does have good on-base ability. The problem is he's barely a 1B, really a DH, so he needs to hit with some serious power (like Seth Beer does). The main thing he has to offer is his right-handedness in a team and organization overloaded with lefty hitters. He's toiling away for a second season at Durham now so we'll give him this cameo for a couple of games before Glasnow comes off the DL Saturday to start.

Game 3: Joe Ryan can usually survive a HR or two as long as they're solo shots, but he can't survive walks and that's what killed him and the Rays today as they dug too big a hole to climb out of. Brandon Marsh's 2-run opposite field HR off Caleb Smith gave the Rays a brief 2-0 lead after 3, but Ryan gave up a 2-run HR to Renato Nunez to tie the game in the 4th and a 3-run shot to Austin Hays to fall behind 5-2 in the 5th. Austin Franklin came on in the 6th and had his worst Rays outing allowing 2 runs, and Dany Jimenez's struggles continue as he gave up an eighth run in the seventh. They did try to come back from the 8-2 deficit, and it started with Andrew Vaughn's first major league HR off Smith to make it 8-3, and then they rallied for a couple of runs in the 8th to cut it to 8-5 when Alex Kirilloff, who was 3-3 with a walk mostly against a lefty, had an RBI single. But with the bases loaded and one out, Ronaldo Hernandez hit a short fly ball to right, and Marsh grounded out to 1st to end the threat and they could only manage a Brujan walk in the 9th off Drew Pomeranz. Ryan ended up 5 6 5 5 4 7, just too many baserunners for his style of pitching. In his debut Vaughn struck out his first 2 times against Smith but in addition to the HR he drew a walk in that 8th inning rally. With the 3-hit game today Kirilloff is suddenly up to .320 (albeit in 25 AB so your average can really jump). Wander and Brujan were a combined 0-7 at the top of the lineup which didn't help. The Red Sox were idle so the lead shrinks to 5 ahead of a 3-game series with them, Kansas City beat the Yankees for their 13th straight win, and Pittsburgh didn't lose today (they were off).

Team record: 15-4.

Art Deco · 07-20-2020, 10:09 PM

Game 1: Round 1 goes to the Rays and Rafael Devers (3-5, 2 RBI) over the Red Sox and Abraham Toro (0-3), although in Toro's defense he had to hit against Noah Syndergaard and Devers got Justin Dunn and Bryan Mata (more on Mata shortly). The final was 11-4 Rays and it was a very strange game in which the Rays scored 11 runs and had only one extra-base hit, a Devers double which led off an inning. Xander Bogaerts shocked the Trop crowd with a long and loud HR off Thor in the 2nd to put Boston up, but in the 3rd the Rays got 3 runs off Dunn when Kepler led off, Kirilloff and Marsh walked, Brujan and Devers delivered RBI singles and Meadows had an RBI fielder's choice. But Boston got 2 runs right back in the top of the 4th as Thor allowed a single and then walked two to load the bases, giving up a Posey sac fly then Jackie Bradley Jr. singled after 7 consecutive foul balls to tie the game. Then came the bottom of the fourth, which had to be seen to be believed. Beer singled, Kepler and Marsh walked to load the bases, Brujan singled in a pair and then Bryan Mata came on and was wild as anyone I've ever seen. He went walk, walk, bases loaded walk, bases loaded walk, wild pitch to score a run, wild pitch to score a run, RBI single by Keibert, HBP, walk to re-load, bases loaded walk, then mercifully a Marsh GIDP to end the inning with 8 runs scored. I was yelling at the computer to pull Mata but the AI left him in and he pitched another 1 2/3 (perhaps the Boston pen was tired). Syndergaard came out after 6 having thrown 112 pitches but he went to 5-0 in his 5 starts, Austin Franklin allowed an unearned run in the 8th and had to leave with an abdominal strain so Scott Barlow finished up with another 3 Ks in 4 batters outing. It was a truly bizarre game, and the lead grows to 6. Elsewhere, the Royals crushed the Yankees to make it 14 straight (KC is in town next). And the Pirates won! And how did they ever win! Luckily for them they played the awful Giants and scored a run in the bottom of the 9th to win 1-0. The 88 Orioles remain safe in history.

April 22: Activated P Tyler Glasnow from the 15-day IL, optioned IF Andrew Vaughn to AAA Durham.

Game 2: If you thought Devers made a statement against his old team in yesterday's game, just wait until you see the encore. The 3B was 5-for-5 today with a 3-run HR and 4 RBI in total in the Rays' 10-4 win. His RBI single in the 4th put the Rays in front to stay at 2-1 and then his 3-run HR in the 5th broke it open making it 7-1 as he improves to .362 with an AL-high 23 RBI. Austin Meadows drove in 3 with a RBI groundout and a 2-run double in the 6th, the same inning in which Vidal Brujan hit his 3rd HR this season. All of this run support was more than enough for the returning Tyler Glasnow, out 2 weeks with a tired arm. His arm didn't look tired as he whiffed two in the first, although he had a brief bout of wildness walking three straight batters to force in a run in the 2nd. But that was all he allowed as he went 6 2 1 1 3 8 in a brilliant outing. Shane McClanahan, who hadn't pitched in quite a well and was held in reserve to back up Glasnow in case he struggled, came on in the 7th and struck out a pair but then faltered in his second inning, allowing a 3-run HR to Marcell Ozuna and walking two batters after that. Aaron Ashby had to come on and bail him out which he did to the tune of 5 up, 5 down with 3 Ks to finish off the game. The lead is now 6 1/2 as Baltimore moves ahead of Boston into 2nd. Meanwhile, KC won yet again to make it 15 straight and they've called up none other than Xavier Edwards, who hit his first MLB HR today. Also having a big day for the Royals was former Ray Brandon Lowe, who also homered and drove in 3. So we'll be seeing these guys in a couple of days and we may have to defend our AL-record winning streak from last year. Also in the NL the Cubs improved to 16-4 but lost newly-signed closer Aroldis Chapman to a bone spur in his elbow, the surgery will knock him out until late August/early September.

Game 3: Chris Paddack was on his game and went to 4-1 with 7 shutout innings in a 5-1 Rays win over Boston to sweep the series and improve to 18-4. Paddack was 7 5 0 0 1 6 and was never really threatened, although Jose Alvarado had a rare rough outing in relief of him in the 8th, giving up a walk and 2 hits for a Boston run, the first run charged against him this season. Nick Anderson bailed him out with a strikeout and fly ball, and Will Smith pitched a perfect ninth although he lost the save opportunity when the Rays scored 2 in the 8th to go up by 4. With lefty Chris Sale on the mound for Boston and it being a Sunday afternoon, the irregulars got into the lineup, with Rylan Bannon doing his best Wander impersonation by going 2-4 with a double as Franco got his first game off and Brujan slid over to SS, Ronaldo Hernandez kept doing Ronaldo Hernandez things, homering off Sale in the 3rd to kick off the scoring, and Yusniel Diaz was the one who cost Smith a save with his 2-run double in the 8th giving the Rays a cushion. The Rays' other runs scored on an Alec Bohm sac fly and a Sale wild pitch after Brandon Marsh had tripled. Baltimore lost but the Yankees finally snapped KC's winning streak behind Gerrit Cole, so the lead is now 7 1/2 games.

(Sad) Durham update: Remember how they won 2 of their first 3 and were hitting HRs like they were going out of style and Baz and Lacy had pitched great games? Seems like 100 years ago as Durham is now 3-8, Tork is hiting .186 & still sitting on 3 HR, Casas is at .143 with the same 3 HR, and Baz was rocked in his last two starts (including 8 ER in 3 IP today) with his ERA now at 9.00 and Lacy was hit hard in his second start while Clarke Schmidt has had a couple of terrible outings since his demotion. The only one still hitting is Nick Schnell, who homered today in Durham's 12-3 loss and is 318/380/568 with 3 HR and 9 RBI.

Team record: 18-4.

This was not that surprising but good to see:

Art Deco · 07-21-2020, 01:21 PM

Game 1: The Rays haven't had to face much adversity so far this season, but facing a team that's won 15 of 16 and losing your starting pitcher to (minor) injury in the 4th inning and still winning is a measure of something. The Rays edged KC 4-3 behind 6 1/3 good innings of relief as Max Fried had to depart early with a mild calf strain. He'll be fine to make his next start and he was continuing his strikeout ways with 5 through 3 2/3 before leaving. At that point he had yielded a HR to the prior batter, Juan Pablo Martinez, which gave the Royals a brief 1-0 lead. Keibert (who had 3 hits) singled in Wander, who had led off the 4th with a double, to tie it and in the bottom of the 5th Max Kepler doubled in a run and Vidal Brujan's groundout scored Alex Kirilloff to make it 3-1. The struggling Dany Jimenez had come on in long relief of Fried and was dazzling through the 5th (striking out 5 in 3.1 overall) but may have been left in a bit long when he gave up a 2-run HR to Lewis Brinson in the top of the 6th to tie it. But after Austin Meadows (in another mini-slump) walked to lead off the bottom of the inning, Alec Bohm singled him home with 2 out for what proved to be the winning run. Scott Barlow got two outs in the 7th against his old mates before allowing a single, bringing up the lefty-hitting Martinez. Alvarado came on and whiffed him, then got into some trouble of his own in the 8th, walking Xavier Edwards to lead off the inning (Edwards was 0-1 with 3 walks against Rays pitching) and allowing a single but like yesterday Nick Anderson came in and bailed him out with a fly ball and a pair of strikeouts. Will Smith finally got a save situation and nailed it, throwing a perfect 9th and striking out Anthony Alford to end the game for save #5. The Rays didn't have it easy against KC starter Daniel Tillo, who went all 8 innings and put up an 8 8 4 3 1 3 line, no mean feat against this lineup. They go to 19-4 and with Baltimore and the Yankees losing the lead is already an eye-popping 8 1/2 games.

Durham update: After posting yesterday as to how bad things were going, figured I'd mention they pulled out a 7-6 win in the bottom of the 9th when Triston Casas (who had been in a huge slump) got his 4th hit of the game to drive in the winning run, this after he tied the game in the 7th with a solo HR. And Spencer Torkelson had a pair of HRs earlier in the game. Asa Lacy was mediocre, though, going 5 5 4 4 3 3.

Game 2: No sooner do I hint that Austin Meadows is slumping again than he heats up, and it was his heroics today that ensured an 8-6 win for the Rays. He had a 2-run double in the 5th to provide some breathing room in a game that the Rays only led 4-3, and his 2-run HR in the 8th turned out to be a big deal when the Royals got 2 runs in the 9th off the Rays "B" bullpen. Joe Ryan had a mediocre start, going 5 7 3 3 1 6 (but amazingly allowing 0 HRs), and with Anderson/Alvarado/Smith all tired, the "other guys" in the bullpen had to navigate a 6-3 lead through the final 4 innings. Aaron Ashby struck out 4 of the 5 batters he faced, but the fifth was former Ray Brandon Lowe who took him deep to make it 6-4. Austin Franklin got the final 2 outs of the 7th without incident, and although he put a couple of runners on, Shane McClanahan got a pair of Ks to get through the 8th. After Meadows expanded the lead to 8-4, I left McClanahan in to see if he could finish it out but he immediately put two men on so Scott Barlow was summoned for the save. Barlow gave up a walk to load the bases and allowed a hit to score both of McClanahan's runners but he got Lowe to fly out with the tying runs on to end the game. Earlier, Vidal Brujan led off the 1st inning with HR #4 off another former Ray, Lucas Sims, who was opening for Jake Junis, whom the Rays treated like a pinata with 5 runs and 7 hits off him in 2 2/3. Brujan ended up 3-4 with that HR, 2 RBI and a SB, and Alec Bohm had a 2-run HR off Junis in the 4th, his team-leading 7th. We go to 20-4 and with Syndergaard going tomorrow hopefully the bullpen can get some rest. The Os and the Yankees both won so the big lead doesn't get any bigger.

Game 3: What a pleasure it is to have a true ace, a #1 starter you can rely on. Noah Syndergaard is one of those guys and with only Nick Anderson and Will Smith fully rested in the pen we needed innings from Thor. And innings he gave us, pitching a complete game in a 4-2 win over the Royals, sweeping the series and making it 6 wins in a row. Syndergaard went 9 6 2 2 1 9 and the pitch count was up there at 126, but he got better as the game went on and put an exclamation point on it by striking out the final two batters in the 9th. He now goes to 6-0 with an even 3.00 ERA. The Rays got all the offense they would need in the first inning when Rafael Devers hit a 2-run HR and then two batters later Alec Bohm, heating up again, hit #8. Bohm added a double later and a big sac fly to get an insurance run in the 8th. Devers (with 3, now hitting .355) and Bohm combined for half of the team's 10 hits. With Syndergaard's CG and a day off tomorrow, the bullpen will be fully rested for a 3-game series in Boston starting Friday. The Yankees won to take sole possession of 2nd, 8 1/2 behind.

Team record: 21-4.

With 25 games under our belt, let's see how the Rays stack up:

The big improvement over last year is on the run prevention side of things. Obviously being #1 ERA and runs allowed is big. The bullpen is good like last year but the starters have been so much better, primarily due to trading the inconsistency of Snell and McKay for the consistency of Thor and Paddack. (Snell is having a nice year so far with the Mets, but I trust Syndergaard to keep it going). But the other major improvement is in team defense. We're first in the league in turning batted balls into outs, and the +3.9 zone rating is a far cry from last year's negative numbers. I'm not sure how or to whom to attribute the difference, but I will note that Devers is slightly better than Toro at 3B, and Alec Bohm is a 75 defender at 1B although I've always been under the impression that 1B defense only has a slight impact either way. Otherwise, it's pretty much the same team in the field. Let's hope this keeps up. Like last year we're #1 or close to it in all the important offensive categories but notice that we're only 7th in HRs as while there's power up and down the lineup this is not a team that relies on the longball by any stretch which is what makes them relatively impervious to being shut down on a given night. Walks are down a bit with Toro and the likes of Gallo and Bell gone but Devers replaces the walks with hits and this team also doesn't strike out, averaging less than 6 per game which is an outrageous number in this era of the strikeout. Also the base stealing is down a bit this year but when you're up 8-2 you're not going to run as much. So the numbers under the hood support the great record, even if we are 3 games above the Pythagorean record as no team is a true .840 team. But this could be a true .733 team or at least .700 if the key performers stay healthy.

07-15-2020, 04:59 PM	#81
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 8, 2022: Division Series Round It's kind of unfair to play 162 games, prove that you're 20 games better than the 2nd place team but then have to play them in a short 5-game series to see who gets to advance in the playoffs. And now that the Mets find themselves behind 2-0 in that best-of-5, they're likely to get a taste of just how unfair it is. Mike Foltynewicz was dominant tonight (7.2 6 1 1 0 5) and Freddie Freeman had a solo HR and RBI single to give the Braves all the offense they would need. Mookie Betts added a 2-run HR off Corey Knebel in the 9th to give Atlanta some breathing room, and breathing room is what they have in this series as the Mets must win 3 straight to advance. A wild back-and-forth game that St. Louis that they had won twice only for the Dodgers to rally in the bottom of the 10th to even the series. This game had a little bit of everything, including a 2-run HR by St. Louis pitcher Jack Flaherty to give them an early 3-0 lead. But the Dodgers chipped away with a Cory Bellinger HR and then Jorge Soler tied it in the 7th with a blast of his own. St. Louis went ahead in the top of 10th on an RBI double by pinch-hitter Andrew Knizner, but Kodi Whitley couldn't hold the lead in the bottom of the inning and Bellinger had the game-winning single as the teams go back to St. Louis even. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-15-2020 at 05:14 PM.

07-15-2020, 05:42 PM	#82
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 9, 2022: Division Series Round As expected, the Jays went with Aaron Nola in Game 3. Maybe we'll finally see Tom Thornton tomorrow. Chris Paddack did not pitch as well as he normally he does, but it seems these days all he has to do is throw his glove on the mound and the Rays win. For the 11th time in 12 starts since his deadline move from San Diego the Rays won a Paddack start and today's 6-3 triumph puts them up 2-1 and one game away from advancing to the ALCS. It didn't start out pretty as Paddack had a walk, a HBP ahead of a Ryan Noda RBI single in the 1st, a Lourdes Gurriel Jr solo shot in the 2nd and then with two out in the fourth he allowed 3 straight singles with Bo Bichette's driving in a run. Meanwhile, Nola through 4 2/3 had picked up where he left off shutting down the Yankees in the Wild Card Game, but Abraham Toro with two out changed the momentum with a solo shot to make it 3-1, and then Nola melted down, giving up singles to Marsh and Brujan, followed by a mammoth Wander blast to right-center and the Rays were suddenly ahead. Inspired by the lead, Paddack shut down the Jays over the next 2 innings (final line: 6 8 3 3 1 4), and the Rays tacked on a couple more in the 6th aided by a Cavan Biggio error and Nola wild-pitching in a run ahead of a Toro RBI single. The new bullpen troika of Anderson/Alvarado/Harris then took over, with Alvarado coming up big with all of Toronto's lefties, getting the last out in the 7th, the entire 8th, and getting lefty Biggio to start the 9th. Will Harris got the last two outs but didn't qualify for a save. Welp, so much for a Minnesota 0-2 comeback like in 2020: This game (and series) was over early, as the Mariners bludgeoned the Twins. Jarred Kelenic was named series MVP and Justin Dunn threw 7 innings of 2-hit shutout ball for the win. Seattle awaits either the Rays or the Jays in the ALCS. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-15-2020 at 08:10 PM.

07-15-2020, 08:38 PM	#83
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 10, 2022: Divisional Series Round So this happened: It looked like the Rays were going to wrap this up when Austin Meadows hit a 3-run HR in the 1st and Joey Gallo followed him with one of his own and they were up 4-0 in the 1st with 16-game winner Max Fried on the mound. But Fried, with the assistance of Abraham Toro's pair of errors, gave it right back in the first capped by a 2-run Rowdy Tellez shot, and then Vlad Jr & Reese McGuire took him deep in the 3rd to make it 9-4, Joe Ryan came in and served one up to Randall Grichuk, and the Jays got two more off Ryan in the 4th and 4-0 Rays became 12-4 Jays. But of course this offense doesn't quit (except maybe for Game 1), and they got it back to 12-11 including a Nelson Cruz grand slam. But just went they got it back to 12-11, Yonny Chirinos surrendered HRs to Gurriel and Vlad Jr to make it 14-11 and although they got one back against nemesis Keith Ginkel in the 8th it wasn't enough and we head back to St. Pete for a decisive Game 5 featuring Game 1 starters Jordan Romano and Tyler Glasnow. Fried was human batting practice, 2 6 9 7 1 2 with 3 HRs allowed and Toro channeled Alec Bohm at the hot corner with a total of 3 errors today. It was ugly, and here's hoping it doesn't turn out to be fatal. The Mets stay alive behind their other 20-game winner, Sandy Alcantara, who went 7 6 2 2 2 6 and outdueled Atlanta ace Mike Soroka. Andres Gimenez reached base all 5 times, on 3 hits and 2 walks including a solo HR to extend the lead to 4-0. Joey Bart homered again as well, continuing to make me angry at the Giants AI for trading him for Luis Guillorme. A wild back-and-forth game in St. Louis that saw a couple of former Rays properties win it for St. Louis. Pinch-hitter Mallex Smith singled with one out, stole second, and scored on a single by Ryan Boldt, whom the Rays lost in the Rule 5 draft in the 20-21 offseason to Houston before he was traded to St. Louis. Boldt also singled in the go-ahead run in the 7th to make it 5-4, but the Cards blew that lead as well as an early 4-0 one that chased Clayton Kershaw. The Cards are now up 2-1 in the series and will look to clinch at home tomorrow behind Ryan Helsey. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-15-2020 at 10:48 PM.

07-16-2020, 08:57 AM	#84
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 11, 2022: Divisional Series Round Who'd have thought coming into this series Connor Jones would make an more effective starter than reliever? After his Game 1 gem as a start, he was on to save a 2-1 lead in the 9th and a trip to the NLCS for St. Louis, but he loaded the bases with nobody out and it went downhill from there, with Corey Seager getting a big 2-run double and the Dodgers tacking on 2 more to even the series with a 5-2 win and send it back to LA for the deciding Game 5. Alex Wood and Ryan Helsey had a pretty good pitcher's duel going after both were scored on the 1st. Last year the Mets were the upset darlings in the NL playoffs, winning the wild card and surprising the best-in-baseball Dodgers. This year they were the 111-win hunted and the Braves took their scalp in 4 games, sending Atlanta to their third straight NLCS and making it the second straight year the Mets' postseason ended in Atlanta. The hero today was $320M man Mookie Betts with a 3-run homer in the first off Franklyn Kilome which would be all Atlanta needed. Sean Newcomb pitched the game of his life, going 7.1 5 1 1 1 6 to nail it down. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-16-2020 at 09:16 AM.

07-16-2020, 09:42 AM	#85
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 12, 2022: Divisional Series Round Well it's a surprise and it's not a surprise. It's a surprise because the Rays were the best team in the AL and they were the clear favorite in this series. It's not a surprise because the Rays lost this exact matchup in Game 1. Once again the offense couldn't find a way to solve Jordan Romano, who with all due respect, is not exactly an ace pitcher. Meanwhile Tyler Glasnow can look like an ace at times but often doesn't pitch like one and today allowing single runs in the first three innings to put your team in a hole is not what an ace does. The bullpen didn't staunch the bleeding either, but a key run scored when they would have been out of the inning except that Wander Franco booted a groundball. As you can see from the story above, Wander won the series MVP, and he did hit a 3-run HR in the 9th (the irony here is they finally got to Keith Ginkel but the deficit was too large to overcome) to make the final score respectable, so I'm not going to be too hard on him. No, my ire is reserved for Josh Bell, who hit .211 in this series with 0 HR or RBI and grounded into two double plays today to kill a couple of budding rallies. They had 13 baserunners in all so they had their chances, but just couldn't get the big hit or as in the case of Bell, hit into a double play. As the manager and GM, I'm not really sure I could have done any more putting a team together - there was no glaring weakness except for perhaps the inconsistency of the starting pitching but given the group's track record there was reason to believe they'd snap out of it. The epitome of this problem came in Game 4 - when the series was really lost - after the Rays put 4 on the board in the first and Max Fried helped turn it into a 9-4 deficit before you could blink. In the end I just have to chalk it up to the vagaries of a short series (ask the Mets about that, they trotted out 3 20-game winners and lost). Meanwhile, congrats to the Jays as they face Seattle in the ALCS in a matchup of the two 1977 expansion teams. The Mariners are looking to make their first-ever World Series while the Jays want to get back there for the first time since 1993. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-16-2020 at 09:58 AM.

07-16-2020, 12:29 PM	#86
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	October 13, 2022: Division Series Round & Rays offseason outlook The Dodgers won the Game 5 battle of aces between Walker Buehler and Jack Flaherty with a big 5-run second inning. Daniel Murphy (picked up off the scrap-heap in July), Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux all homered in that 2nd inning to put LA into the NLCS where they'll face the Braves in a rematch of their epic 7-game NLCS from 2020, won by the Dodgers on their way to a WS win. Buehler walked the bases loaded in the 5th which led to him being pulled and not getting the win, but he did enough. With a few hours to digest a second straight year ending in a bitter playoff loss to Toronto, here's my outlook for the 2022-23 offseason and what the Rays roster is projected to look like: Going to start off by grouping the existing roster into categories reflecting whether they’re likely to come back or not. Not going anywhere: K.Ruiz, R.Hernandez, Bohm, Brujan, Wander, Toro, Meadows, Marsh, Y.Diaz, Glasnow, Paddack, Fried, Ryan, Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, D.Jimenez, McClanahan. Of course there’s always a chance someone on this list gets traded if the deal is right, but I fully expect these guys to be back. Trade bait but will otherwise keep: Kepler, Snell (final year of contract), Chirinos. Kepler was a disappointment this year and I’m not sure how much better he is than guys in the pipeline behind him so he’ll definitely be shopped. While I liked McClanahan in the lefty middle relief role this year I’d like to give him (or Schmidt or Gray) a shot at the rotation so Snell could go if the return is decent as he’s been all over the map in the 3 years I’ve managed him and I get nothing for him if he walks at year’s end (other than a comp pick). Also it’s possible Kepler or something else brings back a starter to replace him. Yonny deserves a shot to start somewhere like Banda and T.Richards did last offseason and I’d like to think I can get something useful for him. Maybe I’ll call up the Cubs again. Team option I don’t plan to exercise but will try to trade first: Kiermaier, Merrifield. With the emergence of Marsh there’s no need to pay Kiermaier $12M next year to sit on the bench. And while I’d like to keep Merrifield around as a super-utility type (and a right-handed bat), $7.5M is too much for that role as well. Free agents to be: Gallo, J.Bell, N.Cruz, Hand, W.Harris. Gallo and Bell will be too rich for my blood, although I could do the offseason dance with Hand again depending on health, and if Will Harris doesn’t want too much, I’d gladly bring him back too. Cruz of course came cheap and produced big, but he’s going to be 43 and I can’t keep blocking my prospects. Non-tendered: Gott, Lucchesi. Prospects who may be traded: X.Edwards, Larnach, Josh Lowe. Edwards is the one who can fetch me a lot and with Brujan and Wander ahead of him in the middle infield his path is severely blocked. Not sure how much Larnach and Lowe could bring but with the glut of prospect OFs I have it’s not fair to stow them at AAA again (and they’re taking up 40-man spots) Prospects who could make the MLB roster next year: Beer, Kirilloff, Baz, Schmidt, Gray. It’s almost a running joke about how I have Seth Beer penciled in at DH every offseason but he’s had two straight 30-HR seasons hitting near .300 with an OBP around .400 so he’s more than due. Kirilloff (who can flat-out rake) could be the RF next year if Kepler is traded, and Baz has a shot as a starter or more likely in a role similar to what McClanahan had this year depending on how the bullpen shakes out. Baz probably starts the year at Durham though. I mentioned Schmidt and Gray above; both won’t make it but one might unless I try to convert one or both into power relievers. Needs: Infield bat that can play 2B and/or SS who bats righty, a bullpen piece or two. This should still be a very good team next year but the one issue I worry about is that the potential number of starters who are lefty hitters: Meadows, Kepler, Marsh, Beer, Kirilloff. Even the prospects at the next level down are lefties like Nick Schnell and Hunter Bishop. That’s why Cruz was a big help this year as a righty power bat. Alec Bohm is the gamble making him the everyday 1B but he’s a righty bat so if he comes through that will solve a couple of problems. If Bohm is only platoon-level then Beer can play 1B and Kirilloff DH. Tentative 26-man roster (before any trades of course): C: Ruiz, Hernandez. IF: Bohm, Beer, Brujan, Wander, Toro, MI to acquire OF: Meadows, Marsh, Kepler, Y.Diaz, Kirilloff SP: Glasnow, Snell, Paddack, Fried, Ryan RP: Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, D.Jimenez, McClanahan, Chirinos, ???, ??? (Schmidt/Gray) Last edited by Art Deco; 07-16-2020 at 12:54 PM.

07-16-2020, 01:20 PM	#87
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	2022 AL & NL League Championship Series Round. With the Rays out of it I'm not going to daily LCS posts so the entire round will be in this post. Game 1 of the ALCS: I guess Touki Toussaint proved you can pitch well against the Blue Jays. Maybe I'll try and trade for him. Game 2 of the ALCS: Kyle Lewis' grand slam off Anthony Kay in the 3rd inning was the key hit as Seattle goes 2-0 up (and 5-0 overall in the playoffs) in the series heading back to Toronto. Marco Gonzales kept Toronto off the board until the 6th (giving Seattle pitching 14 consecutive shutout innings), and was dominant until he ran out of gas in the 9th and gave up a 3-run HR to Rowdy Tellez but the game was long decided before that. Game 1 of the NLCS: Brusdar "Babe Ruth" Graterol did it all against Atlanta in Game 1 of the NLCS, going 6 4 1 1 2 9 for the win and slugging a homer in the 6th. By then the Dodgers had chased Atlanta ace Mike Soroka, scoring 6 runs off him in 4 innings. Daniel Murphy, playing for Cleveland's AAA affiliate in mid-summer, had a 2-run HR and a double to lead the Dodger offense. Ozzie Albies in a losing cause had 5 RBI for Atlanta including a 9th inning grand slam but that only made an 8-1 game an 8-5 one. Game 2 of the NLCS: Big win for the Braves as Robbie Ray goes 8 3 0 0 4 7 to outduel Clayton Kershaw (who went 8 himself) and HRs from Acuna and Cal Raleigh were all the offense he needed to get the series on even footing as it's starting to shape up as another great one like 2020. With Raleigh homering here, it's nice to see a trade really benefit both teams as he was acquired from Seattle for Tooki Toussaint, who's been lights out with Seattle in this playoff. Perhaps they meet in the WS to see who really wins the trade. Game 3 of the ALCS: Wow. Perhaps I didn't give Jordan Romano enough credit when he beat the Rays in Games 1 and 5 of the ALDS as he did the same thing to Seattle today, dealing the Mariners their first loss of the postseason and pulling the Jays back into the series. He went 6 3 1 1 3 5, only allowing a Mike Brosseau (remember him?) HR that tied it after Lourdes Gurriel Jr took Justin Dunn deep in the 3rd. Rowdy Tellez (that guy again) had a 2-run shot off Dunn in the bottom of the inning to provide the winning runs. Game 4 of the ALCS: The Mariners had the best pitching in the AL this season and they continue to show why as 4th starter Justus Sheffield, not needed in the ALDS, came through with a complete-game 9 6 1 1 3 9 performance to put the Mariners one win away from their first-ever trip to the World Series. Mike Brosseau's 2-run HR and Kyle Lewis's 4th blast of the postseason (the most in MLB) paced the offense until Daulton Varsho broke it open with a 3-run shot in the top of the 9th. Game 3 of the NLCS: An epic series needs an epic game, and that's what we got as the Dodgers beat the Braves in 12 innings to take a 2-1 series lead. Jorge Soler and Corey Seager went back-to-back off Jasseel De La Cruz in the 12th to give LA the win. The homer was Soler's 2nd of the night to go along with a pair hit by Cody Bellinger that helped get it to extras. The Dodgers bullpen threw 7 shutout innings and Kenley Jansen got the win. Game 5 of the ALCS: Congratulations to the Seattle Mariners for making their first-ever World Series! Mike Brosseau went 4-5 with a HR and 2 RBI and was named the MVP of the ALCS to lead the way. I'm declaring the early-2021 Poche/Brosseau for Austin Adams/Haniger deal a clear win for the Mariners even though Adams brought me back Gio Gallegos and Haniger brought Seth Beer (and intriguing power prospect Franyel Baez). I mean, look who's still playing and look who isn't. One scare for the M's, however: Tooki Toussaint had to leave in the first inning with what turned out to be a back injury. Turns out it's minor, though, so he should be good to go in the Fall Classic. Aaron Fletcher and Logan Gilbert had to pick up the slack and pick it up they did with 6.1 innings of 1-run ball combined. Also congrats to the Jays on getting as far as they did, especially considering they lost Nate Pearson and Elvis Luciano from their rotation. Game 4 of the NLCS: Maybe this won't be another epic series between these teams after all as the Dodgers won again in Atlanta to go up 3-1. Sean Newcomb could not repeat his heroics against the Mets and was hit for 4 runs in 3 innings to put the Braves in a hole (including Cody Bellinger's 3-run HR in the 1st), but they came back to get within 5-4 on a Christian Pache 2-run shot off Julio Urias, starting in place of the injured Alex Wood. But they could get no closer as Mitchell Verburg and Liam Hendriks shut them down over the final 3.1 innings as we're on the cusp of an all-west coast World Series. Game 5 of the NLCS: Mike Soroka had been far from his ace-pitcher self this postseason but came through with a vengeance when the Braves needed him most, staving off elimination and sending this series back to LA with a complete-game 9 5 1 1 2 4 performance that evoked memories of Greg Maddux. Atlanta got to Game 1 hero Brusdar Graterol for 3 runs in 4 innings and had their way with the Dodger bullpen. Ronald Acuna Jr led the offense, going 3-5 with 2 RBI including a triple and added a stolen base, and Cal Raleigh's 2-run HR broke a 1-1 tie in the 4th. Game 6 of the NLCS: Looks like we're having another epic series between these teams after all, as Freddie Freeman's second HR of the game off Clayton Kerhsaw broke up a 2-2 tie in the 6th and the Braves went on to a 6-3 win to force a winner-take-all Game 7 tomorrow night. Robbie Ray loaded the bases with nobody out in the first inning and got out of it, bearing down from there to go 6.2 5 2 2 3 10 and go to 3-0 for the postseason. Mookie Betts followed Freeman's 6th inning blast with one of his own against his 2020 WS-winning teammates while Cody Bellinger went deep for the Dodgers, giving him an MLB postseason-leading 6. It's Folty against Buehler for a date with Seattle tomorrow. Game 7 of the NLCS: Well an epic series needs an epic Game 7, and that's what we got as the Dodgers beat the Braves in a game where the teams kept exchanging the lead until Braves closer Will Smith melted down in the 8th inning with 5 walks to lead to 3 Dodger runs in a 7-5 LA win that sends them up against Seattle in the 2022 World Series. The winning run was a bases-loaded walk by Will Smith to.....Will Smith of the Dodgers, which probably broke the space/time continuum. No word on whether the Fresh Prince was in attendance. Before that there was plenty of drama as the game went 2-2 to the 7th. Christian Pache homered off Jack Little to give Atlanta a 3-2 in the top of the 7th, but Max Muncy took Ian Anderson deep for a 2-run shot to make it 4-3 Dodgers in the bottom of the inning. No problem, in the top of the 8th Freddie Freeman doubled in a run to tie it off Liam Hendriks and Cal Raleigh, who had homered earlier, had a sac fly to put the Braves back up 5-4. But then Will Smith happened, he went walk-single-walk-walk forcing in the tying run-walk forcing in the winning run-strikeout-shallow fly ball-walk to force in another run. Caleb Ferguson came on for the Dodgers in the ninth and struck out the side around a 2-out walk to nail down the win. So the Braves in 3 straight NLCS appearances now have 2 7-game losses to the Dodgers and a WS loss to the White Sox to show for it. So now will the Dodgers win for the second time in three years or will the Mariners take their first-ever championship? Stay tuned in the next post. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-16-2020 at 04:19 PM.

07-16-2020, 04:35 PM	#88
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	The 2022 World Series Game 1: Brusdar Graterol pitched another postseason gem to give the Dodgers Game 1 of the 2022 World Series. He went 7 3 0 0 2 8 in dominating Seattle, with only Kyle Lewis' 5th HR of the postseason off Liam Hendriks spoiling the team shutout. Max Muncy took Tooki Touissant deep for a 2-run blast in the 2nd to put LA in front to stay. Game 2: Seattle evened up the World Series with a drama-filled 4-3 win over the Dodgers. What was a 1-1 pitcher's duel between Mariners ace Marco Gonzalez and the Dodgers' Julio Urias finally broke serve in the 7th when Daulton Varsho's sac fly scored Wilmer Difo to give the M's a 2-1 lead. And after Difo singled in Kyle Lewis in the 8th to make it 3-1, they were looking good until Cody Bellinger hit postseason HR #7, a 2-run shot off Wyatt Mills, to tie the game up at 3 after 8. But Eugenio Suarez, who came on in a double switch when Gonzales was lifted, singled and came around to score on a Jarred Kelenic base hit off Kenley Jansen to give Seattle the lead back in the 9th and this time they held on with Mills to send the series back to Seattle even. Game 3: The first-ever World Series game played in the Pacific Northwest saw the home fans leave happy as the Mariners came from behind in both Game 3 and the series to take a 2-1 lead with the 5-2 victory. Justin Dunn and Walker Buehler were locked in another pitchers' duel in the 6th when Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux went deep back-to-back to make it 2-0 Los Angeles. For Bellinger it was #8, tying the single postseason record with Carlos Beltran, Barry Bonds, Nelson Cruz and teammate Will Smith in 2020. But the Mariners rallied off Buehler in the bottom of the 7th to take the lead on a JP Crawford triple and a Daulton Varsho RBI single, and then Evan White popped a 2-run HR off Kenley Jansen in the 8th to give Seattle a cushion and Wyatt Mills finished it off from there. Dunn went 7 7 2 2 1 8 while Buehler was 6.2 5 2 2 1 11 in the well-pitched game. Game 4: We've got a good series on our hands here as the Dodgers and Clayton Kershaw evened things up with a 7-1 over Seattle. It didn't look that way early as the Mariners and Justus Sheffield were clinging to a 1-0 lead in the 6th when Cody Bellinger tied it with his record-setting 9th HR of the postseason, and then Max Muncy followed with a 2-run blast to make it 3-1 and the Dodgers took it from there. Kershaw wasn't dominant (5.2 8 1 1 1 3) but he was good enough. Game 5: Touki Toussaint did it again as he led the Mariners with 6 shutout innings in a huge 3-0 win in Game 5. Toussaint was his usual hard to hit and hard to catch, going 6 4 0 0 4 8. In fact the two relievers who followed him walked 5 more batters between them and the Dodgers had the bases loaded in the 7th and 8th innings but couldn't push across a run. Meanwhile the unlikely offensive hero for Seattle was a guy who wasn't even supposed to play. After Sam Hilliard had to leave in the top of the 1st with an arm injury, Jake Fraley came on and promptly singled in a run in the bottom of the inning to put Seattle ahead to stay, and later he homered off reliever Michael Feliz. Wilmer Difo added a solo shot for the other Mariner run as the series goes back to Los Angeles with the Dodgers needing to win both. Game 6: The 2022 World Series is going the distance as the Dodgers made the most of their 2 hits on the night with one of them being a 2-run homer by Corey Seager off Marco Gonzales in the 3rd for all the scoring in a 2-0 win that forces a Game 7. Like in Game 5 when Jake Fraley came on as an injury replacement to be the hero, tonight it was Dodgers P Jack Little who was forced to enter in the 4th inning when starter Julio Urias's elbow started barking. Little, ranked the #23 prospect in baseball and who had a 2.05 ERA in 30.2 innings this year in the regular season for the Dodgers, showed he was ready for prime time with 3.2 innings of 1-hit, 0-walk ball, striking out 5 in the process and earning the win. Liam Hendriks nailed down a 2-inning save as Justin Dunn and Walker Buehler will go head-to-head tomorrow in Game 7. Game 7: Congratulations to the Los Angeles Dodgers, World Champions for the second time in three years. This time they really did it the hard way, having to go to limit in each series, winning in 5 against St Louis in the NLDS, 7 against Atlanta in the NLCS, and of course 7 here in the WS. It was a strange game and things looked good early for Seattle when Daulton Varsho homered off Walker Buehler to open the game. But after Seattle failed to get a runner from third with 0 outs in the top of the 2nd, the Dodgers exploded in the bottom of the inning off Justin Dunn and ended up with 9 runs on a series of RBI singles, a 2-run double from Corey Seager, and finally a grand slam from Gavin Lux to cap it off. But the Mariners struck right back in the top of the 3rd for 3 runs on a 2-run HR from Jake Fraley and a solo blast from Jarred Kelenic and it was 9-4 in the 3rd and it looked like a Rays-Jays game had broken out. But amazingly there was no scoring after that as Mitchell White came on for Buehler and like Jack Little yesterday, dominated in long relief going 6.1 2 0 0 1 7 before giving way to Caleb Ferguson for the final two outs. It was a case of so close yet so far for the Mariners, who only need one win in Los Angeles to take the series but got none. And now it's on to the offseason! Last edited by Art Deco; 07-16-2020 at 07:46 PM.

07-16-2020, 08:47 PM	#89
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	2022-2023 Offseason, Part 1 It's time to start the offseason. In my post-mortem after the division series loss to the Jays, I set forth my ideas about where things are going for 2023 so I'm not going to repeat them here. Going to start off with a bunch of notable retirements from MLB: Justin Verlander, Justin Upton, Carlos Carrasco, Yadier Molina, Cameron Maybin, Jake McGee, Howie Kendrick, Joakim Soria, Eric Thames, Jay Bruce, Michael Brantley, Dee Gordon, Jason Kipnis, Yoenis Cespedes, Brian Dozier. Got this message from Stu Sternberg. For reference purposes our total payroll last year was about $135M so yay, mo' money: Made our first trade. I wasn't going to pick up Merrifield's team option for $6.5M so I managed to get an excellent SS prospect who isn't Rule 5 eligible. Valdes can hit for average and get on base (last two years OBPs of .429 and .389). He has little power, but he's an elite defender, a 75 at SS. Echevarria had a bad scouting report: "firmly entrenched in bad habits at the plate and offers meager defensive skills", so hasta la vista. I also have a possible deal involving Xavier Edwards that will bring us back an elite RH prospect bat, the RH 2B/3B MLB guy I was looking for, and a pretty good bullpen piece. I'm going to have to throw in a secondary prospect and I also want to explore some other potential deals with Edwards so I'm not ready to pull the trigger yet but if this is the worst I can do I'll be happy. Let the awards roll in, both very well deserved: And yay me! They left out the "I'd trade this award for a World Series ring" quote, though. Noah Syndergaard won the NL Cy Young while Lucas Giolito took it home in the AL, and to nobody's surprise Vlad Jr. in the AL and Juan Soto in the NL unanimously won their league's MVP awards. Wander finished fifth in the AL voting behind Vlad, Lindor, Rutschman and Trout, so not too shabby there. The Cleveland Indians traded Jose Ramirez, entering the final year of his contract, to the Atlanta Braves for a couple of prospects. I had sniffed around Ramirez, briefly entertaining the idea of dealing Snell for him in a trade of free-agents-to-be. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-17-2020 at 11:57 AM.

07-17-2020, 02:17 PM	#90
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	2022-2023 Offseason, Part 2 (December) Some early notable FA Signings: Philadelphia Phillies: Signed free agent SP Jacob deGrom to a 4-year contract worth a total of $158,000,000. Philadelphia Phillies: Signed free agent RP Ken Giles to a 3-year contract worth a total of $20,100,000. Chicago Cubs: Signed free agent SP Tyler Anderson to a 2-year contract worth a total of $22,000,000. Phillies breaking out the checkbook here. Nice pickup for the Cubs, I like Tyler Anderson but not $22M like. Trade of note: The Baltimore Orioles traded 25-year-old first baseman Ryan Mountcastle and 23-year-old minor league first baseman Dan Pruitt to the Boston Red Sox, getting 27-year-old shortstop C.J. Chatham in return. Mountcastle should be Boston's 1B with Eric Thames retiring. And a biggie from us: The Tampa Bay Rays traded 25-year-old third baseman Abraham Toro, 22-year-old minor league catcher Kevin Melendez and 23-year-old minor league right fielder Tim Tawa to the Boston Red Sox, getting 26-year-old third baseman Rafael Devers, retaining 5% and 22-year-old first baseman Triston Casas in return. Boston is looking to rebuild, and made Devers available. It hurt some to part with Toro, who actually gets on base more than Devers does, but Devers hits for more power and average, is a little better defensively and was 2 WAR better than Toro last year. With $50M to spend on payroll, absorbing Devers' $16M contract wasn't a big deal as I'm still in win-now mode. Devers effectively has another year on his contract at $21M, and he does have a player option for $21M in 2025 but I hope he does so well the next two seasons for us that he'll feel the need to opt out of it. Not looking forward to going against Toro 18-19 times a season for the foreseeable future, and Devers makes the lineup even more lefty-heavy but such it is. The other part of the deal nets us Triston Casas, a serious power-hitting prospect that could be our 1B of the (near) future if Bohm doesn't get it done. The editor page shows he can hit 35-40 HR now and he did launch 4 in 32 big league at-bats along with 30 in 393 at AA. He'll start at Durham. Casas can also fake it at 3B (40 rating) if necessary. Melendez is a decent catching prospect but Keibert and Ronaldo have the position covered for years and Melendez was Rule 5 eligible. Tawa wasn't, but I can't swing a dead cat without hitting a good OF prospect in this organization and he's still 2-3 years away. Another (minor) deal: The Tampa Bay Rays traded 24-year-old minor league third baseman Osmy Gregorio and 21-year-old minor league catcher Emilio Morales to the Colorado Rockies, getting 23-year-old minor league third baseman Cory Acton in return. This was to open the 40-man spot that Gregorio was filling. He was a bit disappointing in AA last year and with Devers holding down the fort for at least 2 years to come he was a luxury on the 40-man I could no longer afford. Acton is a decent 3B prospect that doesn't have to be protected from Rule 5 so the price was Morales, an OK but nothing special catching prospect. Yes, I've dealt away two catchers in the system now but still have Chris Betts and Patrick Bailey in the pipeline. OK, time to turn on the siren: This is the deal I alluded to in the last post. Edwards needed to go, not on merit but on position blockage with Brujan and Franco on the middle infield, and while I could use him as a backup infielder it's kind of a waste of his talents. So I turned him into Tork - yes, another top-notch power-hitting OF prospect but at least he's a righty batter - and I picked up two pieces that will immediately help the roster. The lesser of the two is Bannon, but he's a 2B/3B who 1) bats right 2) can play both positions decently and 3) has some pop of his own. He hit 300/352/502 with 14 HR in 257 AB for KC last season and while I don't buy that completely, knock about 30 points off each of those slash numbers and you still have a quality infield backup who can also occasionally DH against lefties. The bigger piece is Barlow, who's been an outstanding reliever for the Royals three years running now, and finished 3rd behind Alvarado for reliever of the year. The last two years he's been at 1.5 WAR, very good for a reliever and he doesn't give up HRs (only 9 allowed in 198 IP the last 3 seasons). He can close too, he had 16 saves in the second half of the season after Hunter Harvey went down for the Royals. Cairo was no problem to include, he hit .215 at High-A Charlotte and while he's fast and he's excellent defensively it's another position of excess with Nick Gonzales and Greg Jones ahead of him. Getting back to Torkelson, if he hits at Durham this season like he hit at AA last year, I can see him taking over LF in 2024 with Meadows sliding over to right to replace Max Kepler, whose 1.4 WAR last year is eminently replaceable. Oh, and Blake Snell should be glad to have outlasted on the roster the guy he called a "slapdick prospect" back in the 19-20 offseason when Edwards was acquired in the Tommy Pham deal. Meanwhile, Durham's going to be fun to watch next year with an OF of Torkelson-Schnell-Bishop with Casas at 1B, they better order extra baseballs. Not to mention Trevor Larnach and Andrew Vaughn are still around. And in the annual ritual of trading Rule 5 eligible guys for players who aren't here's a deal: The Tampa Bay Rays traded 24-year-old minor league right fielder Kameron Misner and 24-year-old minor league second baseman Chase Strumpf to the Los Angeles Angels, getting 24-year-old minor league catcher Zach Britton and 23-year-old minor league catcher Noah Cardenas in return. Placed RP Austin Franklin on the 40-man roster. Misner would be one of the top OF prospects in most organizations, but in this one he's a footnote. Still he could probably hit 25 HR in the bigs right now although with a low average. Strumpf projects as a utility guy at best. These 2 Rule-5 eligibles bring us a pair of fine catching prospects in return (you were worried about our catching depth after trading Melendez and Morales, you say?) both of whom were #1 draft picks. Hopefully this Zach Britton will have a better showing for the team that his namesake the pitcher. Franklin grabs the last 40-man spot for now, I was torn between him and Drew Strotman (and I'd like to keep both) as their profiles, scouting and numbers were virtually identical. It'll be good to have a true reliever on the 40-man I can call up during the season, that was a bit of an issue this past year. Meanwhile around MLB, Ray-for-a-couple-of-months-in-2021 Taylor Rogers, who closed for Houston last year, signed a 1-year, $8.2M deal with the Dodgers, who along with the Yankees seem to sign all the closers on the market each offseason. Speaking of one-time closers, Delin Betances signed a 2-year, $1.7M total deal with Washington to bolster (?) their bullpen. December 11 (I'm going to start dating these): The Blue Jays acquired Sonny Gray from the Reds in a deal that sent prize SS prospect Miguel Hiraldo the other way along with another prospect. Good pickup for the Jays assuming he can stay healthy (he's currently recovering from an arthritic elbow which doesn't sound great). December 12: The Cardinals shelled out $78.1M over 5 years for Mike Clevinger, the best starter on the FA market. Clevinger is coming off a couple of semi-down years since leading the league in ERA in 2020, but is still worth a shot; I was going to make him a 2-year offer for about $35M but that wouldn't have flown as it turns out. Had Clevenger stayed in Cleveland, he'd be throwing to Gary Sanchez as the former Yankee signed a 7/53.5 deal with the Indians. I know that's one bat I'll be glad not to see anymore in the Yankee lineup. Right now their starting C is Robinson Chirinos but I'm sure they'll find a way to upgrade. Another blockbuster!!!! It was time to finally get off the Snellacoaster, and he was entering the final year of his contract. In the three years I've managed the team the only true sustained spell of success he had was in the first half of 2021, and then he proceeded to get hurt and miss almost all of the rest of the season. So to get the uber-consistent Thor in return is a great deal, even if he too is in the final year of his contract. Of course Snell is capable of outpitching Thor this year, it's just not very likely. But the Mets not only get Snell but they get Yonny to fill a rotation hole which they have now with deGrom gone to free agency, and Josh Lowe could be the CFer next year depending on how things shake out. The deal also opens up a pair of 40-man roster spots which is not insignificant. Strotman is grabbing one of them for now. The Tampa Bay Rays traded 26-year-old minor league left fielder Cal Stevenson to the Chicago Cubs, getting 23-year-old minor league shortstop Jason Willow in return. Another Rule 5/loaded Durham OF crunch trade. Stevenson could lead off for a lot of MLB teams, including the Cubs, as kind of a Ryan Boldt-type. He can hit .270-.280, have a .360 OBP or better, and steal bases and play a decent LF. But there was no room for him at the inn so off he goes to our favorite trading partners the Cubs. Willow's main attribute is that he isn't Rule 5-eligible but he's a halfway decent prospect that'll probably get thrown into another deal in the next year or two. December 13: Around MLB, the Tigers sent Kennys Vargas, who's hit 76 HR the last 2 years, to Oakland for a couple of prospects. Vargas will fill the hole left when Matt Olson became a free agent. Also Cleveland signed 36-year-old OF Lorenzo Cain to a 3-year, $46.2M deal. Cain's coming off a nice season but good luck with that. December 14: Will Harris, who did a great job for us last year, signed a 2-year, $20.4M deal with the Cubs. Not sure I'd have wanted to go 2 years and that much $ for him, though, given his age. December 15: The Cardinals made quite the splash today with 3 big moves. They signed our buddy Joey Gallo to a 7-year $140M contract, also signed our buddy Brad Hand to a 3-yr, $18M deal (so no dance with Hand this offseason), and traded good-hitting C Andrew Knizner to the Yankees for Jonathan Loaisaga, so the Yankees get their catcher. Knizner doesn't have Sanchez's power but he's a good one, somebody I was looking at during 2021 before getting Keibert Ruiz. December 16: Signed P Jose Alvarado to a 2-year, $21M contract extension. Alvarado was set to be a free agent at year's end, and we very well couldn't let the best reliever in baseball walk for nothing hence the extension. Of course there's always risk with relievers but now that we have more money to spend than in past years it's a risk worth taking in his case. December 19: Lost P Tommy Romero in the Rule 5 draft to Colorado. Those damn Rockies again. Last year they took Joey Wendle from us, which wasn't that big a deal but I really didn't want to lose Romero. I ended up adding Tanner Dodson as the 40th man since he popped up more often in "make this work" trade offers. Romero was Durham's closer last year and could have been part of this year's bullpen, but such are the breaks. The Rockies also took Cal Stevenson, whom the Cubs neglected to protect after getting him in trade from us; in fact, they were the only team to take more than 1 player, grabbing 3 which is quite a few to commit to keeping on the active MLB roster so I'm hoping maybe we get Romero back. December 28: Hope everyone had a good Christmas. We're back with a couple of trades. Traded 21-year-old minor league left fielder Oneill Manzueta to the Chicago Cubs, getting 23-year-old minor league center fielder Grant Richardson in return. Manzueta was probably a mistake to put on the 40-man as he was only in A ball, where he hit .290 with some power and is already a 70 left fielder. He probably would have slipped through but put him on the 40-man I did and now I need room for what's coming in the next trade. So I rang up my old buddies the Cubs again and they were kind enough to offer Richardson, who ain't a bad prospect but probably not as good as Manzueta so if anyone's going to benefit from my roster mismanagement, let it be the team that traded me Brandon Marsh. Traded 19-year-old minor league center fielder Willie Gonzalez to the Milwaukee Brewers, getting 24-year-old reliever Aaron Ashby and 23-year-old minor league starting pitcher Slade Cecconi in return. Gonzalez was my 2021 $5M international free agent signee. He didn't exactly set the world on fire in his first extended action in the DSL this year but he's still highly regarded as a prospect. But for every Wander Franco there are 20 guys are who aren't Wander Franco so I'm going to play the odds here and hope he isn't contending for the NL MVP come 2028. And I get a couple of things I really want: an excellent lefty for the bullpen and a top-notch starting pitching prospect. Ashby can be used for three batters or he can go multiple innings as he had a 2.94 ERA in 52 innings for Milwaukee over 25 appearances with a 19/62 BB/K ratio and those numbers were supported by his minor league track record. Cecconi is potential 60 stuff with 55 control with 4 60-70 potential pitches. Scouting projects him as a mid-rotation starter and I'm going to start him at AA Montgomery this year. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-17-2020 at 09:16 PM.

07-18-2020, 07:23 AM	#91
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	2022-2023 Offseason (January) This month shouldn't be eventful as the last one as I pretty much have the roster where I want it with an exception or two. January 1: Happy New Year! It's a happy one for Josh Bell, who signed a 6-year, $176M deal with the Dodgers. Guess they weren't sold on Daniel Murphy going forward. In other ex-Rays news, the Braves signed Manuel Margot to a minor league deal. January 2: Poor Josh Lowe. He bides his time behind Kiermaier in our minor league system waiting for his contract to end, and then gets surpassed by Brandon Marsh. So I do him a favor and trade him to the Mets where they could use a bona fide CF. So what do the Mets do? They sign Kiermaier! For 3 years at $14.8M/year no less. Good luck with that, Mets! Now I can look forward to seeing his name in the list whenever I do "shop a player" for the next few seasons. The arms (or bats) race continues in the NL East as the Phillies, who already splurged for Jake deGrom and Ken Giles, got perhaps the biggest prize of the FA class with Francisco Lindor, who had opted out of his Cleveland deal coming off a a career .337-44-144 year. He'll get $141M over 7 years. Also the Twins signed Trevor Gott to a 1-year $2.28M deal. January 5: Chris Archer comes full circle to the team that traded him to the Rays back in 2011 as a prospect in the Matt Garza deal as he signs a 1-year $1.12M deal with the Cubs. January 6: Nice try Blue Jays, offering me Simeon Woods Richardson for Brandon Marsh. Trevor Rosenthal is back with the Dodgers on a 1-year, $1.86M deal. January 7: After testing the free agent waters, Andrew Benintendi went back to Minnesota on a 4-year, $39.2M deal. He was coming off a career-best 31 HR, 109 RBI season. Speaking of career highs in HRs I have gone back to 2018 offensive settings for next season as I've had it with what Keith Law calls the "happy fun ball". We'll see if it works. Meanwhile the Jays have picked up lefty reliever Amir Garrett from the Pirates for pitching prospect Garrett Crochet, and the Twins opened a 40-man spot for Benintendi by waiving former Rays farmhand Lucius Fox. January 8: OK, here's some big Rays news: We're gettin' jiggy with it over here at Rays HQ adding Will Smith to our pen. He'll be our new Brad Hand, the veteran lefty closer who gets it done. And points to Smith for not jerking me around making me increase my offer like Hand did the last two winters. My only concern is that he isn't scarred from his Game 7 meltdown in the NLCS. Otherwise the money is reasonable and now the pen is set with Ashby, Alvarado, McClanahan and Smith from the left side and Anderson, Barlow, Gallegos and Dany Jimenez from the right. Me gusta. Need to open a 40-man spot for him, though. The candidate to go is pseudo-prospect Luke Heyer who finally has slipped out of the BNN Top 100 prospects after inexplicably being #1 at one point. He didn't hit a whole lot at Durham or Montgomery last year (250-260 with occasional power) even though the editor thinks he can hit .287 with 25 HR in the big leagues. Nevertheless I can't get anyone to offer me a prospect when I shop him, although I imagine he gets claimed if/when I put him on waivers. January 10: In more ex-Rays news (there are a lot more of them since I took over), Oliver Drake inked a 1-year, $2.84M deal with St. Louis. Also the Phillies traded Andrew McCutchen to the Cubs for a couple of minor leaguers. Placed 3B Luke Heyer on waivers, added P Will Smith to the active and 40-man rosters. How radioactive is Heyer on the trade market? Aside from the fact I can't get a single team to offer me a prospect, I tried shopping him to various teams just trying to even get a 1/2 star guy that didn't have to go on the 40-man. Got nothing but "this offer is an insult" and "you've got to be kidding" and when I clicked on "make it work" I was asked for one of my top players or prospects. It's as if Heyer has negative value. Now watch someone claim him on waivers. January 13: Yep, the Mariners claimed Heyer on waivers. Now watch him hit .287 with 25 HRs for them, which wouldn't shock me after they turned Mike Brosseau into a near all-star. The Dodgers signed former Twins reliever Tyler Duffey to a 1-year deal. I only note this because Duffey killed the Rays in a couple of games last year so I'm glad not to have to see him (although we may yet as I believe we're due for games against the NL West this season). Also in the guys-possibly-coming-back-to-haunt-us department, the Jays signed Chaz Roe to a 1-year, $1.18M deal. January 17: The Jays signed SP Rick Porcello to a 2-year, $12M deal. I suppose he's not much better or worse than the non-Pearson starters they've been trotting out recently, but boy I don't know about Porcello in the AL East. The Phillies also swung a deal with Baltimore to acquire former Ray Peter Fairbanks. January 18: The Hall of Fame voting is in, and let the hue and cry go out across the land as nobody was elected. First-year nominee Carlos Beltran came closest with 70.6% of the vote but undoubtedly some negative feelings about his role in the sign-stealing scandals kept him out on the first ballot. Gary Sheffield and Manny Ramirez were next closest, distantly back at around 40% each. January 20: Wow. Matt Wisler has become a decent SP over the last few years for the Twins with ERAs ranging from 4.13 to 5.00 but I didn't realize how much he could command on the FA market as he signed a 7-year, $115.5M deal with Kansas City. He's had a good 237/800 K/BB ratio in 900 career innings but I guess the dearth of good SPs on the FA market (Clevenger was the only one who appealed to me when I looked at the list) allowed him to cash in. I guess Wisler's mother will be proud of her son. Elsewhere, Atlanta made out pretty well dealing Austin Riley, expendable due to the Jose Ramirez acquisition, to offense-starved Miami for lefty starter Trevor Rogers who put up a 3.08 ERA in 158 IP last season with a 66/145 K/BB ratio. His numbers will probably go up a bit pitching outside of the humidor known as Marlins Park but that's still a great acquisition for Atlanta as he'll take Tyler Anderson's spot in the rotation. January 27: Things have really slowed down as the only news of note is that Boston acquired Niko Goodrum from Detroit for a minor leaguer. Going to keep this post going for February since there really isn't enough news to warrant a new one. February 7: Longtime A's 1B Matt Olson signs a 2-year, $20M deal with Minnesota. Guess Sano becomes the DH since Olson is a 75 at 1B. February 8: The Marlins, who need all the offense they can get, signed veteran 35-year-old OF David Peralta to a 2-year deal for $21.6M. Peralta's usually good for a .290-.300 average and about 20 HR so that probably makes him their #3 hitter. February 9: Man, the Mets pulled off another heist of a deal. I'm still not over the Luis Guillorme-for-Joey Bart deal from 2021, and now they trade Billy McKinney to the Angels for excellent young starter Griffin Canning. Yes, the 28-year-old McKinney had a career year last year as the likes of Nimmo and Conforto were in and out of the lineup, going .301-29-105 but he's two years removed from being a quadruple-A player, while Canning is 26 coming off a 4.2 WAR season in which he had a 3.72 ERA with 215 K's and only 52 walks in 200 innings with 4 65+ pitches. He'll join Blake Snell and holdover Sandy Alcantara as their top 3 starters with Syndergaard and deGrom gone. February 12: Ji-Man!! He signs a 1-year deal for $6.8M with - you guessed it - Rays North a/k/a the Chicago Cubs. Cafecito was pretty awful for them last year, hitting about .250 with moderate power and Ian Happ ended up playing a lot there and having a good season. Ironically to make room for him on the 40-man they waived former Rays prospect Simon Rosenblum-Larson, whom I think we traded them for Kyle Schwarber in 2021 (I've had so many deals with the Cubs I can't remember for sure). Not going to claim him even though his 2022 #s looked good as trying to get on our 40-man roster is as tough as getting into Studio 54 during the height of disco. February 21: Nelson Cruz gets a job about a month earlier than he got one last year when we signed him just before the season started. He's reunited with the Texas Rangers on a 1-year, $8.1M deal which is also about a million more than we gave them last year. Somewhere Seth Beer breathes a sigh of relief. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-18-2020 at 10:25 AM.

07-18-2020, 11:27 AM	#92
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	2023 Spring Training Time for everyone's favorite time of year when we pray nobody gets hurt. Last year we had Tyler Glasnow go down for the first two months of the season and Zack Greinke miss 3 weeks at the start. (With the way Greinke ended up pitching it was probably a good thing). I'm not going to report on every game, just notable developments. February 23: Prize pitching prospect Sandy Gaston looked good in his 2-inning start against the regular Baltimore lineup, striking out 3 and Niko Hulszier, an intriguing power bat who played at AA last year, doubled and homered among his 3 hits in an 8-2 win over Baltimore in which no regulars played. Some vets getting minor league deals of note today: Aaron Nola to the Reds, Johnny Cueto to the Mariners, Matt Carpenter to the Phillies, Mallex Smith to the A's, and Ryne Stanek to the Orioles. February 25: Triston Casas and Spencer Torkelson homered against MLB pitchers (Dylan Floro & Jharel Cotton) to lead the Rays to a 5-3 win over Oakland, Chris Paddack pitched 3 perfect innings and only threw 25 pitches. February 26: Big news out of New York, the Mets signed Blake Snell to a 7-year extension (!) for $117.6M. March 3: Tork hit another HR, this time against his old team the Royals. Got an intriguing trade offer with the Marlins offering prize pitching prospect Asa Lacy but they're asking for SS prospect Jorge Perez, who is the one Dominican prospect I have that actually stands a chance to be another Wander or something approaching Wander. March 4: Wait long enough and you can get bargains in free agency; the Orioles nabbed Byron Buxton for 1 year at $2.1M. I really didn't have any interest myself but I checked in on him anyway earlier in the process and he was looking for 7-8 years at about $9-10M per. A good pickup for an 80 defender who can hit some with power but of course he's terribly injury-prone. March 8: Alec Bohm hit 2 HRs today including a walk-off winner in the 9th against Detroit, giving him 4 HR and 11 RBI in 29 AB so far this spring as he's laying claim to the 1B job. Torkelson homered again yesterday, giving him 3 in 20 AB so far. March 9: Well we won't be seeing Chaz Roe pitch against us for the Jays after all this year, he suffered a torn flexor tendon and is done for the year. March 10: Jays made a strange trade, sending Anthony Kay, one of the mainstays of their rotation who pitched nearly 200 innings last year with a near-league average ERA, to the Braves for Justin Ellison, a quadruple-A type outfielder. Seems the opposite of what they need. March 15: Traded 20-year-old minor league shortstop Jorge Perez and 25-year-old starting pitcher Josiah Gray to the Miami Marlins, getting 23-year-old reliever Asa Lacy and 20-year-old minor league shortstop Ian Lewis in return. Well I pulled the trigger on this, Lacy is too good a pitching prospect to pass up. Miami kind of misused him, bringing him up and down to MLB from AA (and A+ the year before) and used him in relief. He'll be a starter for me, probably starting the year at Durham. Trading Perez is another long-term gamble, and I may get burned here, but you gotta give something to get something. Gray had to go off the 40-man so he was included, and Lewis is a decent prospect himself. March 17: Happy St. Patrick's Day! It's gonna be tough to send Tork down as he hit his 5th HR of the spring. Everything's going along relatively smoothly so far with a couple of exceptions in the bullpen. First, Gio Gallegos seems to give up runs in every outing and has a 10.50 ERA. Probably nothing but I'd like to see a couple of clean innings from him before the season starts. Feeling better that I picked up Will Smith to close instead of relying on Gallegos. The other issue is Nick Anderson. He sat out a week with a tired arm, came back, and in his second outing back he gave up a 2-run HR then the PbP said the trainer took a look at his elbow but he was OK to stay in. These are ominous signs. I'll give him a couple more innings in spring but it's becoming a matter of concern. March 19: Well, the exhibition games are over, even though we don't play for another week and a half. This is probably because we're using the 2019 schedule and Seattle and Oakland are playing early games in Japan so OOTP thinks the coming week is regular season for everyone. No serious injuries, although I'm still concerned about Anderson. He pitched in the final preseason game but not all that well. March 20: Designated P Zack Britton for assignment; released P James Paxton. I had both of them up on my spring roster but it wouldn't let me send Britton back to Durham so waivers he goes. At least I still have one Zack Britton in the organization. Looking at the projected Durham roster it didn't seem there was a place for Paxton as he'd eat up innings I'd rather have guys with a future pitch. He wasn't very impressive (and got hurt) since picking him up so it looks like he might be done, although someone will probably sign him. March 22: It's MLB opening day but only for Oakland and Seattle. The Jays signed Mitch Haniger to a 1-year, $5.3M deal. He had 23 HR and 87 RBI with Arizona last year but it came with a .221 average. Not sure what the Jays plans are for him as it seems to be they should be in the market for pitching. OOTP's preseason predictions call for us to win 97 games, 11 better than the second-place Yankees. Here's hoping they're right. Among free agents still out there, both of the New York closers remain untouched with Edwin Diaz wanting a 1-year, $18M deal and Aroldis Chapman wanting 1 year at $15M. Keeping this in the back of my mind in case Anderson continues to have health/effectiveness issues. And opening day in Japan saw the defending AL Champion Mariners beat Oakland 11-5. The only HR came from Jarred Kelenic, who along with Mike Brosseau had 3 RBI. Touki Toussaint went 5 2/3 allowing 4 hits and 2 runs for the win, but he walked 7. Jesus Luzardo was torched for 7 runs in 1.1 innings. March 23: Oakland beat Seattle 5-4 in the second of their two games in Japan with David Fletcher homering and driving in four. Ramon Laureano and Matt Chapman also went deep for the A's. Although he didn't get the win Jameson Tallion, who missed the entire 2022 season due to injury (and whom I forgot Oakland even had), went 6 7 2 2 3 10. Laureano's HR off Colin Poche in the 8th was the game-winner. March 25: Scratch Diaz off the free agent list as who else but the Dodgers (who seem to be programmed to sign ALL the closers), gave him his 1-year, $18M deal or something close to that. Also among the long list of players put on waivers to start the season was Austin Adams, whom the Reds waived. The way Gallegos has been pitching this spring last year's trade might not turn out to be the greatest for either team. March 29: Aaaannnnd there goes Chapman, signing a 1-year, $16.6M deal with the Cubs, who interestingly released their closer of last season, Blake Treinen, a couple days before. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-18-2020 at 06:29 PM.

07-18-2020, 06:34 PM	#93
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	Opening Day 2023, March 30-April 2: vs Houston (4) Here's the opening day roster, without any real surprises like last year when Ronaldo surprisingly grabbed the 2nd catcher spot and didn't let go of it: C: K.Ruiz, R.Hernandez 1B: Bohm 2B: Brujan SS: Wander 3B: Devers IF: Bannon OF: Meadows, Marsh, Kepler, Yusniel Diaz, Kirilloff DH: Beer SP: Syndergaard, Glasnow, Paddack, Fried, Ryan RP: W.Smith, Alvarado, N.Anderson, Gallegos, Barlow, Ashby, D.Jimenez, McClanahan Neither Kirilloff nor Beer tore it up in spring training; that would be Torkelson instead. But Tork isn't on the 40-man and hasn't played above AA so he'll start at Durham for now. Not really sure how much Kirilloff is going to play, although against certain righties Beer could spell Bohm at 1B and Kirilloff can DH. Also Kepler's on a short leash. Let the games begin! Game 1: (I'm not going to post the recap part of the box score for every game, but Opening Day is always special) Bohms away! Getting a shot at the 1B job, Alec Bohm went deep twice and drove in 5 to pace a 10-4 opening day win. The pitching matchup was a classic that played out many times in the NL East, with Max Scherzer against Noah Syndergaard. But a duel it wasn't as the Rays didn't waste time getting to Scherzer with Wander taking him deep in the 1st for the first of his 2 HRs and then Bohm in the 2nd to make it 2-0. And then came the fourth as the Rays put up 7, with Bohm blasting a 3-run shot that chased Scherzer and Vidal Brujan adding a 3-run homer of his own off Framber Valdez to make it 9-0 and effectively end the game. Thor, meanwhile, was rolling along (he got the side in order in the first on 5 pitches) and was at 5 3 0 0 0 7 before he ran into some trouble in the 6th, giving up a Yordan Alvarez triple and then a George Springer HR to make it 10-3. But he stuck around for the seventh and got a pair of Ks, going 7 7 3 3 1 10 in his Rays debut. Speaking of Rays debuts, Seth Beer was on base three times with a HBP, a walk, and his first major league hit, an improbable infield single. Everyone in the lineup had at least one hit except Austin Meadows, who had a rough 0-3 with all his outs being strikeouts, although he did draw a walk. Rafael Devers was 1-5 in his Rays debut as his 4th inning double got the 7-run rally started. Dany Jimenez and Aaron Ashby didn't look particularly sharp in their two innings of relief, with Jimenez giving up 3 runs and a hit and Ashby allowing 2 hits. Elsewhere around the AL East, the Yankees beat Baltimore 3-1 behind a dominating performance from Gerrit Cole (8 2 1 1 0 10) and a HR from Aaron Hicks. With Chapman gone, it looks like David Bednar is their closer as he picked up the save. The Jays fell 2-1 to Detroit; Nate Pearson threw 6 2/3 shutout innings but Simeon Woods Richardson gave up a couple runs in the 8th while Matt Manning was an impressive 7.2 6 1 1 1 8 for the Tigers. Boston lost 6-4 at Seattle, so it's the Rays and Yanks both off to 1-0 starts. Blake Snell won his Mets debut, going 6.1 3 3 3 2 5, and Kiermaier was 1-4 with an RBI. Francisco Lindor was 5-5 with a HR and 2 RBI in his Phillies debut as they beat Atlanta 4-3. Also looking through the various teams' opening day rosters, I see that Tommy Romero is listed as the Rockies' #4 starter, so I guess he's not getting returned unless things go poorly. Game 2: It was Tyler Glasnow vs Lance McCullers Jr but neither of them fared very well. But Shane McClanahan most definitely did as the Rays pulled out a 6-4 win to go 2-0 on the young season. Glasnow was wild and (somewhat hittable) over his 3.2 innings, walking 5 and striking out 7. He gave up a 2-run HR to George Springer and a solo shot to Yasmani Grandal in the 2nd after the Rays had grabbed a 2-0 lead in the first on a Meadows sac fly and a Keibert single after Devers had doubled. Then after giving up another run in the 3rd after the Rays had jumped back ahead 4-3 on a Brujan RBI single, stolen base and Wander RBI single, Glasnow got into more trouble in the 4th after walking Jesus Sanchez and then hitting Yordan Alvarez with lefty Kyle Tucker due up. Enter McClanahan, who got Tucker to fly out and then did Shane McClanahan things, going 3 1 0 0 0 6 over the middle innings. This was long enough to have Brandon Marsh go deep in the 6th to give the Rays a 5-4 lead, and then after McClanahan gave up a 2-out single to Tucker in the 7th, Scott Barlow came on in his Rays debut and although he allowed a Correa single, he struck out Springer to end the threat. Then Alec Bohm hit his third homer in two days to give the Rays an insurance run in the bottom of the 7th. Alvarado came on in the 8th and got into immediate trouble by walking Grandal and giving up a single to JD Martinez but he struck out Sanchez and got Jose Altuve to hit into a double play. Will Smith then came on and had a 1-2-3 ninth, striking out Tucker to end the game. McClanahan deservedly got the win while Brujan and Wander each had 3 hits and an RBI while Seth Beer was 2-3 with a walk, now hitting .600 with a .750 OBP. Game 3: Well it finally happened: Chris Paddack lost a game as a Tampa Bay Ray. He wasn't terrible by any means as the Rays allowed 4 runs just as they did in both Games 1 and 2. The difference this time was Forrest Whitley, who settled down after a Wander HR (his 3rd already) in the 1st inning to go 7.2 4 1 1 3 6. Paddack shut the Astros down through 3, including striking out the side in the 3rd, but gave up a Yordan Alvarez HR in the 4th to tie it, and then he gave up a couple more longballs in the 5th, George Springer's 3rd and a 2-run shot by Jose Altuve and we had our 4-1 final score. The Rays only managed 5 hits on the night, with Max Kepler getting 2 of them and doubles by Bohm and Keibert being the others. Bohm was thrown out at the plate in the 2nd trying to score on a Kepler single and that was the closest they came to scoring the rest of the game. The Yankees beat Baltimore again so they're 2-0 and a half game up. Paddack was great outside the HRs, going 7 5 4 4 0 6, Aaron Ashby and Gio Gallegos combined for 2 scoreless innings of relief. Game 4: Man, we'll be glad to see the last of George Springer for a while. The Houston CF was 3-4 with his 4th HR in 4 games and 5 RBI. But his heroics weren't enough for the Astros today as the Rays took a much-closer-than-it-should-have-been 8-7 win to take 3 of the first 4 against a very tough opponent, the one OOTP projects to win 100 games to the Rays' 97 as the two top teams in the AL. Max Fried got the nod and he was shaky early, allowing 2 runs and 6 hits through 3 innings but he settled down from there, and left with a 6.1 8 2 2 3 3 line which was good enough for his first win of the season. That's because Rafael Devers drove in Brujan who had stolen second to tie it at 1 in the first, and then after Seth Beer was hit by another pitch and Alex Kirilloff walked in his MLB debut (he was 0-3 on the day), Ronaldo Hernandez launched a 3-run blast to deep LCF, continuing his 2022 trend of maximizing his occasional starts. Marsh then walked, stole second, and ended up scoring on a Devers fielder's choice to make it 5-1. Brujan later tripled in Hernandez in the 6th and Devers had a 2-run double in the eighth to make it 8-3 capping his 4-5 day with 4 RBI. So with it 8-3 in the 9th, Dany Jimenez got the call and gave up 3 hits and committed an error to make it 8-4, and then with two on and the tying run on deck Will Smith came on for the save and after getting out #2 served up a 3-run shot to Springer to make it 8-7. Smith then whiffed Carlos Correa to end the game and get a shaky save #2. Nick Anderson made his season debut when Fried put a couple on in the 7th and got a pop up and whiff to end that inning, so far so good then with him. Scott Barlow gave up a run in the 8th in his lone inning as the new-look bullpen has been a bit rocky to start the season but the Astros are a tough team to pitch against. Austin Meadows still can't buy a hit, now 0-12 in the first 4 games but as you can tell by only averaging 3 ABs per game he's been drawing some walks at least. The Rays move into first after the Yankees lost a wild 12-10 game to Baltimore and the Blue Jays hit 9 (!) HRs today to get their first win of the year. Elsewhere Tommy Romero gave up 5 runs (3 earned) and 6 hits in 3 innings to the light-hitting Marlins in his Rockies debut so there's still hope of a return. Team record: 3-1. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-19-2020 at 01:19 PM.

07-18-2020, 10:59 PM	#94
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 3-5, 2023 vs Colorado (3) Game 1: Alec Motherf*in' Bohm, man. The newly christened Rays everyday first baseman slugged two more HRs today to give him 5 in 5 games to lead the Rays to a 5-1 win over Colorado and to send the team to 4-1. The game was a scoreless duel between Joe Ryan and Ljay Newsome, whom I'd never heard of but noticed that in 117 minor league innings last year he walked a grand total of 2 batters, not a misprint or typo. But why yes, of course he walked Wander in the first inning. Anyway it was 0-0 until the bottom of the 5th when Bohm went deep to left and then in the sixth after Rafael Devers hit his first Rays HR (a 2-run job) to make it 3-0, Bohm went oppo this time off Newsome and it was 4-0. Finally in the 8th Bohm doubled in Keibert who had doubled as well. Meanwhile Ryan was dealing and keeping the ball in the park, going 7 2 0 0 3 8. Alvarado got a double play from Ryan's leadoff walk in the 8th to pitch a scoreless inning, and Aaron Ashby lost the shutout by allowing a Nolan Arenado shot in the 9th but struck out 2 otherwise. In some side notes, the 5 HR from Bohm in 19 AB so far equal the 5 he hit all of last year in the 141 AB he had in a reserve role, and Austin Meadows continues to look for his first hit (0-16). The Yankees won to keep pace 1/2 game back and Luke Heyer in his Seattle debut DHing tonight hit 2 solo HRs, because of course he did. Game 2: Another day, another 5-1 win over the Rockies, which just happens to be the team's record now. Syndergaard was on the hill and he did his usual thing, going 8 7 1 1 1 10. He was aided by the Rockies' misadventures on the basepaths as Keibert Ruiz threw out two attempted base stealers and Meadows gunned down Nolan Arenado at 3rd base after he tried to stretch a double into a triple. Speaking of Meadows, he was 0-4 again today to go 0-20 so far this season but it didn't matter as Wander had a bases clearing double and Brujan had an RBI single and an RBI double to account for the scoring. One bit of bad news, though, Gio Gallegos came on to pitch the 9th and after getting two out had to leave with a torn triceps, which will put him out for about 4 1/2 months. Gallegos had put two men on so when Jose Alvarado got Ryan McMahon swinging to end the game, Alvarado picked up a save. Austin Franklin will be the likely callup in Gallegos' place. Trevor Bauer pitched his best game for the Yankees possibly ever, going 8 4 0 0 1 7 in a 1-0 win over Detroit to keep the Yankees 1/2 game back at 4-1. April 5: Placed P Giovanny Gallegos on the 60-day IL with torn triceps, recalled P Austin Franklin from AAA Durham.** The expected move. Gallegos going on the 60-day opens a 40-man in case someone enticing gets waived or I want to acquire someone. Game 3: Tyler Glasnow was dominant until he was forced to leave (more on that in a moment), going 7.2 1 1 1 1 10 in an 8-1 romp over the Rockies. The only hit he allowed was a 3rd inning leadoff double to Nolan Arenado who moved to 3rd on a fly ball and scored on a groundout. Otherwise he was untouchable, and as he had a low pitch count (80) through 7 I brought him out for the 8th which turned out to be a mistake as two batters in he had to leave. It's only a tired arm, but the report says "substantial 1-2 weeks" so he'll go on the DL. We'll need a fifth starter in a week or so against the White Sox, Clarke Schmidt will probably get the call although a reliever will come up in the short term. Speaking of recalled relievers, Austin Franklin made his MLB debut and retired all 4 hitters to finish the game, whiffing two of them. Offensively, the big stories were the first MLB HR for Seth Beer, a 2-run shot that broke a 1-1 tie and put the Rays ahead to stay, and Austin Meadows' first hit of the year, which also left the yard in the 5th. Elsewhere, Wander had another 3-hit game (now hitting a cool .452 in 31 AB) and Brandon Marsh did quite well, going 2-3 with a walk, 2 RBI, and a stolen base. The Rockies' keystone combo today was Joey Wendle and Freddy Galvis. They went 0-6. Matt Manning outdueled Gerrit Cole in a 3-2 Tigers win over the Yankees so the Rays are now 1 1/2 at 6-1. Team record: 6-1. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-19-2020 at 01:18 PM.

07-19-2020, 12:49 PM	#95
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 7-9 at San Francisco (3) April 7: Placed P Tyler Glasnow (tired arm) on the 15-day IL, recalled P Drew Strotman from AAA Durham. Strotman gets the call for now, although as mentioned earlier Schmidt will probably start in Chicago. Game 1: It was a date in San Francisco with our old friend Ryan Yarbrough, who hasn't had that much success with the Giants but pitched very well in his opening start this year. And pitch well did Yarbrough for the first 6 innings, holding the Rays to 1 hit and 1 walk while the Giants scored twice against Chris Paddack, who was looking like a tough-luck loser after a good 6 5 2 2 2 6 outing. But the Rays exploded in the 7th off Yarbrough. Devers singled, and after a Meadows fielder's choice, Keibert singled, Bohm singled to load the bases, and Yarbrough then walked Yusniel Diaz forcing a run. Brandon Marsh then ripped a 2-run double to put the Rays ahead, and pinch-hitter Rylan Bannon followed with his first Rays hit, a 2-run double to make it 5-2 and Devers, batting for the second time in the inning, had a sac fly to make it 6-2. Alvarado and Barlow threw scoreless innings while a Meadows (now 1 for 27) ground out made it 7-2 in the 9th. With a 5-run lead Dany Jimenez came in and crapped the bed, loading the bases with nobody out. With lefties due up, closer Will Smith came in and promptly gave up two hits, allowing all of Jimenez's runners to score, but he got the final 3 outs for another shaky save, #3, as the Rays go to 7-1 with the 7-5 win. Paddack hung around long enough for the win to resume his winning Rays ways. The Yankees were idle so the lead is up to 2 1/2. Game 2: The Rays are obviously still on Eastern Time as they sleepwalked through another 5 innings and just like yesterday they were down 2-0. Wander doubled in Brandon Marsh in the 6th to get the Rays on the board and they broke through for good in the 8th when Ronaldo Hernandez led off with a single, Marsh singled, a Keibert Ruiz fly ball sent pinch-runner Yusniel Diaz to 3rd, and then Brujan singled in Diaz, Wander singled to load the bases, and Austin Meadows (moved back into the 3rd spot to try and get him going) delivered a sac fly to put the Rays ahead 3-2. In his second appearance of the season, Nick Anderson had a perfect 8th with a K, and then Will Smith delivered another shaky but less shaky than previous appearances save as he worked around a Mikie Mahtook double to get #4 in 4 tries and the Rays won their sixth straight to go to 8-1. Aaron Ashby picked up his first Rays win as he had finished the 7th in relief of Austin Franklin who was impressive again, striking out 3 in 1 1/3 scoreless. Max Fried started and had another bend-but-don't-break line of 5 5 2 2 3 2. Yankees won so the lead is still 2 1/2. Game 3: Well today it only took them until the fourth to score, when Alex Kirilloff got his first MLB hit, an RBI single, and Vidal Brujan walked with the bases loaded to give the Rays an early 2-0 lead. Javy Baez got one right back with a HR off Joe Ryan but through 6 innings that was the only baserunner Ryan had allowed as he took a 2-1 lead into the bottom of the 7th. But Luis Guillorme (7 HR all of last year) took Ryan deep leading off the inning to tie it, and although he got the next out, he gave up a single and double to put runners on 2nd and 3rd. Enter Jose Alvarado, and for once Jose didn't have it, giving up a pair of hits to allow the two runners to score and put the Giants up 4-2. From there the offense could get nothing going, only managing a single hit over the last 3 1/3 against the San Francisco pen, and their six-game winning streak came to an abrupt end at 4-2 as the offense managed only 5 hits on the day. Ryan of course took the loss and ended up with 4 runs against his ledger on 4 hits with 0 walks and 8 Ks. Shane McClanahan pitched a nice 8th inning fanning a pair, while Kirilloff had a nice day with 2 walks in addition to that RBI single. The Orioles pounded the Yankees and Corey Kluber 8-1 so the lead remains 2 1/2. Team record: 8-2. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-19-2020 at 03:09 PM.

07-19-2020, 04:46 PM	#96
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 10-12, 2023: at Chicago White Sox (3) Game 1: Noah Syndergaard was on the mound again looking to go 3-0 and he did with relative ease as the Rays pounded the White Sox 12-5. Thor was 7 5 3 3 0 6 with his only run of trouble coming in the 6th when he gave up an Adam Engel single, a Luis Gonzalez RBI double, and then a 2-run HR to Eloy Jimenez, outside of that sequence has largely untouchable. Drew Strotman made his MLB debut and pitched the final 2 innings. After striking out the first batter he faced he got through the eighth but hit a man in the 9th ahead of Jimenez who hit his 2nd 2-run HR of the game. The offense came alive in the 4th on solo HRs from Vidal Brujan and Austin Meadows (who had a double later for his first multi-hit game of the season, he'll be fine thanks for asking) and then they tacked on 4 more in the 5th capped by a 2-run double from Rafael Devers. The White Sox said "we'll make a game of this" when they got those runs in the sixth to halve the lead but then the Rays' Seth said "hold my Beer" as the rookie drilled a pinch-hit 2-run blast deep into the RF stands for his 2nd HR to make it 8-3, and then his teammates added 4 more in the 9th, including a Wander HR. Brujan, Alec Bohm and Yusniel Diaz all had 3 hits among the team's 17 as they improve to 9-2. The Yankees beat Houston, a team now off to a rough 3-8 start (including the 1-3 against us) so we're still up 2 1/2. April 11: Optioned P Drew Strotman to AAA Durham, recalled P Clarke Schmidt from AAA Durham. Today may be Schmidt's only start as there are a couple of off days sprinkled in over the next 7-10 days so by the time they need a 5th starter again Glasnow may be ready to come off the IL. Game 2: Some days you kind of have everything going against you, having to start a rookie pitcher against one of the league's best. And it turned out just like predicted, with Clarke Schmidt struggling (4 7 4 3 2 2) and trailing 5-1 after 5 innings with lone run coming on an Austin Meadows RBI double in the 1st. But then the strength of the offense can change the game, and with one swing Rafael Devers did that, launching a 3-run HR off Giolito in the 6th to cut it to 5-4. With the game now close, Shane McClanahan came on for Austin Franklin (who came on for Schmidt and allowed a run in his 1.2 IP) and of course he did his middle relief thing (2.1 1 0 0 0 1) and then the Rays went to work in the 7th off the hapless Tyler Johnson who was left in to face 7 batters, none of whom he retired. Max Kepler led things off tying the game with his 1st HR of the year, Wander and Devers singled in runs, Meadows walked with the bases loaded and it was now 8-5 Rays. Devers drove in a run in the 9th with a fielder's choice and with the game 9-5, things were turned over to Aaron Ashby with a couple of lefties due up after Eloy Jimenez, who had an RBI double off Schmidt earlier and whom we couldn't seem to get out. Well Ashby got Jimenez to fly out but then he put two men on around the 2nd out, and up stepped Jose Peraza, normally a singles hitter. Well Peraza took Ashby deep to CF and like that it was 9-8. With a couple of righties due up Nick Anderson got the call, but the White Sox sent up lefty pinch-hitter Blake Rutherford and he doubled. The next pinch hitter was righty Domingo Santana, but Anderson whiffed him to mercifully end the game and the Rays held on to a 9-8 win. Devers had 5 RBI on the day to give him a team-leading 14, and Vidal Brujan was 1-3 with 2 walks, scoring 4 times. Wander had 2 hits as the team made the most of the 9 they got along with 5 walks. McClanahan got his second win and Anderson his first save as they go to 10-2. The Yankees were destroyed 16-0 by Houston (with Gerrit Cole starting!) and the division lead is now a season-high 3 1/2 games. Also on the same day Devers drove in 5, Abraham Toro had 2 HR and drove in 5 for Boston. Game 3: Austin Meadows is finally heating up from his slow start and he made the White Sox pay today with a 2-run double in the 1st and a 3-run HR in the 7th to pace the Rays to an 8-2 win over the White Sox. I didn't call this an easy win, because after a first inning in which the Rays got 3 and the White Sox 2 (on HRs from Nick Madrigal and of course Eloy Jimenez), the game stayed that way through the sixth inning. But Vidal Brujan and Wander Franco hit consecutive doubles to start the top of the 7th to make it 4-2, and then after a walk to Rafael Devers, Meadows went yard to break it open and suddenly he's tied with Devers for the team RBI lead at 14 even though his average is still at .196. Chris Paddack did his best Joe Ryan impression in the 1st inning but was untouchable after that, going 8 4 2 2 0 9 on only 102 pitches. Scott Barlow had a 1-2-3 ninth as for once a reliever didn't give up a bunch of runs with a big lead. At 11-2 the Rays are up 4 1/2 on the Yankees (who lost) and the Orioles (who won) and are the only team above .500 in the division. Team record: 11-2. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-20-2020 at 08:40 AM.

07-20-2020, 12:15 PM	#97
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 14-16, 2023: at Toronto (3) Durham finally got its season underway last night (no idea why OOTP scheduled AAA to start two weeks after MLB and one week after AA and lower began), and they beat arch-rivals Gwinnett 2-1 on back-to-back HRs by Spencer Torkleson and Triston Casas and behind a great AAA debut from Shane Baz, who went 7 5 1 1 0 6. Game 1: If you were going to predict the first time the Rays would be shut out this season, I doubt you'd have picked a game in Toronto, and I doubt even more that the starting pitcher that you'd pick would be Rick Porcello, but that's what happened as the Jays beat the Rays 5-0. The game was effectively decided in the bottom of the 3rd when Justin Ellison hit a 2-out grand slam off Max Fried, who was returning to the scene of his Game 4 crime in last year's playoffs when he let a big early lead get away to put the Rays' playoff elimination in motion. It turned out that was all that Fried gave up over 6 innings and the case can be made that his 6 6 4 4 1 3 performance was the best of his 3 starts to date. Porcello and a pair of relievers didn't exactly dominate as the Rays had 7 hits and drew 6 walks but they couldn't get the hits when they counted, especially in the 7th when Devers grounded out with the bases loaded and 2 out. Seth Beer was 0-4 with a couple of strikeouts and his average is down to .147 although his OBP is .310. Also Alec Bohm's name hasn't been mentioned much lately as he cooled off after his ridiculous start, although he's still getting hits here and there. The Yankees won so the lead is down to 3 1/2. Quick Durham update: In Game 2 of their season Asa Lacy made his Rays organization debut and was brilliant, going 6 5 0 0 2 9. Tristan Casas had another HR and drove in 3, although Nick Frasso and Tony Cingrani allowed 6 runs to Gwinnett in the 7th, turning a potential 4-0 win into a 6-4 loss. Game 2: It was Joe Ryan against Nate Pearson and one of them gave up 4 runs in 5 innings on 2 HRs. It wasn't Joe Ryan though. Sure, he gave up his obligatory HR in the 2nd to Ray-for-a-month Mitch Haniger, but aside from that and an unearned Jays run in the first off two errors (one his own) Ryan went 6 2 2 1 3 8 in a 6-2 win over the Jays. After mentioning him yesterday, Alec Bohm got back on the HR board with #6 for the first Rays run in the 2nd but the big hero today was Ronaldo Hernandez, who hit a 2-run off Pearson in the 5th to put the Rays up to stay. Ronaldo was 3-3 with a walk and he's 8 for 15 with 2 HR and 5 RBI in his limited appearances this year (he actually has 2 more RBI than Keibert Ruiz, which is kind of quirky since Ruiz has been hitting). Max Kepler added a 2-run HR off Amir Garrett for the final Rays runs, and the bullpen actually got through 3 innings clean although there were some moments. After Nick Anderson's perfect 7th when it was 4-2, Scott Barlow came on in the 8th and put 2 on with 2 out and lefty Reese McGuire due up so Alvarado was summoned and responded with the strikeout. With it 6-2, Alvarado didn't come out for the 9th and Aaron Ashby pitched around a hit to finish things off. The Yankees lost but Boston won to improve to 8-7 so they are now in 2nd, 4 games back. Another Durham update: I don't plan on giving these every game, but there are so many top-notch power prospects on the team that there always seems something to report. Today they bashed 6 HRs in a 14-9 win over Gwinnett (the bullpen sucks, it was a 14-4 game). Nick Schnell was 3-5 with a HR and 5 RBI, Tork went deep again and Hunter Bishop hit his first AAA HR. April 16: Signed P Brandon Workman to a minor league contract; assigned him to AAA Durham. Well there's some help for the lousy Durham bullpen. Workman was waived by Texas and released last week; his numbers still look pretty decent so there's always a chance he can help the big club as well. Game 3: The Rays clocked the Jays 10-3 today and the Porcello-led shutout of them seems like it was weeks ago now. Thor was in command, going to 4-0 on an 8 4 3 3 1 5 line with the only Jays runs coming courtesy of a Haniger (again) 2-run shot and a Bo Bichette solo shot in the 8th when he was running out of gas. Marsh and Meadows doubled in the 1st then they added 3 more in the third with a Yusniel Diaz double the key hit. Haniger's blast cut it to 4-2 where it stood until the 6th when Seth Beer, who had to come on to play 1B after Alec Bohm suffered an oblique strain (6 days out, probably headed to the IL), hit HR #3 to make it 5-2. Beer has had his struggles but for a guy hitting .154 his OPS is .725 thanks to drawing walks and hitting with power when he does hit. He'll likely be the everyday 1B for the next 7-10 days. As they do so often, they blew it open late with 5 runs in the 8th and 9th with the highlight being a Marsh 3-run HR, giving him 4 RBI on the day. Meadows had 3 hits and is up to .241 now and Rylan Bannon was 2-3 with a walk and an RBI as Vidal Brujan got a day off. Even Dany Jimenez, who had struggled mightily with an ERA near 20 coming in, had a scoreless 9th. Those surprising Red Sox won again to stay 4 back and they're being led by none other than Abe Toro, hitting .350/444/717 with 5 HR and 15 RBI, vastly outproducing Devers so far. Great trade! (at least we got Triston Casas in the deal too, he might be coming up for Bohm). We'll be seeing Toro and the Sox next weekend at home following a 3-game set with Baltimore after a day off tomorrow. Elsewhere around MLB the Pirates lost today (in 10 innings, had to be painful) and they are 0-15 to start the season. Look out 1988 Orioles! Durham update: As long as these guys keep blasting homers, I'll keep updating. Torkelson and Casas each hit their third in 4 games, and Nick Schnell hit #2 giving him 8 RBI now in those 4 games. Unfortunately Durham lost 8-4 as Slade Cecconi was torched for 6 runs in 1.2 innings in his Rays org debut. Team record 13-3. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-20-2020 at 08:49 PM.

07-20-2020, 05:46 PM	#98
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 18-20, 2023 vs Baltimore (3) April 17: Optioned P Clarke Schmidt to AAA Durham, recalled P Drew Strotman from AAA Durham. Not sure why I didn't send Schmidt down earlier, when the fifth starting spot comes up Saturday the 22nd Glasnow will be due off the IL and he's already over the tired arm. As for Alec Bohm, I've decided not to IL him since he only has 4 days left and we can play shorthanded for the time being. I'm giving some thought to sending Strotman down Thursday for the 3rd game of this series and calling Andrew Vaughn up for a game against the lefty Caleb Smith, then sending him back down for Glasnow. Game 1: This looked like the typical Rays game with Chris Paddack on the mound, getting 3 runs on 5 hits in the first to go up 3-0. But Paddack has been slowly morphing into Joe Ryan lately with the HRs and after Baltimore hit 3 off him through the first 4 innings it was 5-3 Orioles. But you just knew the Rays would chip away and take the lead, and after they got one back in the 4th they took the lead in the 6th on RBI singles from Brujan and Devers, and then in the 7th we had a Beer blast into dead center to make it 7-5. 3 more in the 8th gave us another 10-run game, and everyone in the lineup had at least 2 hits except Brujan and Marsh who each had one, and everyone drove in at least one run except Kirilloff and Marsh. Paddack, meanwhile, as is his custom hung around long enough to get the win after settling down past the 4th. His final line was 6.2 9 5 5 1 4 and he did get into a bit of trouble in the 7th that Nick Anderson got him out of with a big strikeout of Adley Rutschman. Alvarado pitched a perfect 8th while it was still 7-5, and even though the 3 8th inning runs took away the save situation Will Smith hadn't pitched in forever, and got nicked for a run in the 9th but the Rays go to 14-3 with the 10-6 win. Boston lost yesterday while the Rays were idle and lost again to the Yankees today, putting New York in second, 4 1/2 behind. Abe Toro hit #6 in a losing cause, just waiting for him to wreak vengeance this weekend. Also the Pirates are now 0-16 after losing 2-1 to Detroit despite being up 1-0 in the 8th, allowing single runs in the 8th and 9th to lose. Ouch. Game 2: The calendar says April 19 but those who watched this game could be forgiven if they thought it was February 2 as today's game was Groundhog Day given its similarity to yesterday. Once again a Rays starter got into early HR trouble; today it was Max Fried who served up longballs to Austin Hays and Byron Buxton and in the middle of the fifth Baltimore was ahead 3-0 behind Grayson Rodriguez. But Brandon Marsh led off the bottom of the 5th with a HR of his own, and that must have gotten the Orioles thinking "here we go again", and there they went. Rafael Devers, tired of the Toro talk, hit a 2-run shot to tie it up, and after the red-hot Austin Meadows (regression can be fun sometimes) doubled, Keibert Ruiz hit his first of the season and suddenly an inning that started 3-0 Orioles was 5-3 Rays. And in the 6th Alex Kirilloff hit his first major league round-tripper into the RF stands to make it 6-3. Fried, meanwhile, when he wasn't giving up HRs was whiffing Orioles left and right as he ended the day with 11 Ks which was 3 more than he had in his first 3 starts combined. He hung around for 5 2/3, enough to get the win, but as you could imagine his pitch count got high and Scott Barlow came on and was nasty, finishing the 6th for Fried and whiffing 2 in the 7th in a perfect 1 1/3. Jose Alvarado got a hold with a perfect 8th, and then the Rays tacked on 2 more in the bottom of the inning on a Wander HR. With it now 8-3, Will Smith sat back down in the pen and Drew Strotman pitched a scoreless 9th as he bids adieu to the big club for now. Meanwhile Meadows had 3 more hits and now sits at 284/370/522 as if the first 10 games or so never happened. Devers also had 3 hits as Max Kepler was the only Ray not to hit safely but he did reach via walk. The Rays improve to an MLB-best 15-3 as they get off to a hot start for the third year running, and with Boston beating the Yankees the lead is already up to 5 1/2. (Yes, Toro was 1-2 with an RBI to improve to 371-6-17, thanks for asking). And Pittsburgh. Oh Pittsburgh. They led Detroit 2-1 going into the bottom of the 9th and Kody Clemens hit a 2-run HR off their prize young pitcher, Brennan Malone, who is apparently their closer (there's a CL next to his name) although the position is currently theoretical. They're now 0-17, 4 games away the tying the 1988 Orioles for worst start ever. And in a real oddity, the Kansas City Royals started 0-6 but now have won 12 straight to go to 12-6 and are in first in the AL Central. Strange times. April 20: Optioned P Drew Strotman to AAA Durham, recalled IF Andrew Vaughn from AAA Durham. As alluded to earlier, Vaughn's going to get his MLB cup of coffee, starting today against the lefty Caleb Smith at DH. A heralded prospect out of college when drafted by the White Sox in 2019, Vaughn's kind of stagnated, showing only doubles power although he does have good on-base ability. The problem is he's barely a 1B, really a DH, so he needs to hit with some serious power (like Seth Beer does). The main thing he has to offer is his right-handedness in a team and organization overloaded with lefty hitters. He's toiling away for a second season at Durham now so we'll give him this cameo for a couple of games before Glasnow comes off the DL Saturday to start. Game 3: Joe Ryan can usually survive a HR or two as long as they're solo shots, but he can't survive walks and that's what killed him and the Rays today as they dug too big a hole to climb out of. Brandon Marsh's 2-run opposite field HR off Caleb Smith gave the Rays a brief 2-0 lead after 3, but Ryan gave up a 2-run HR to Renato Nunez to tie the game in the 4th and a 3-run shot to Austin Hays to fall behind 5-2 in the 5th. Austin Franklin came on in the 6th and had his worst Rays outing allowing 2 runs, and Dany Jimenez's struggles continue as he gave up an eighth run in the seventh. They did try to come back from the 8-2 deficit, and it started with Andrew Vaughn's first major league HR off Smith to make it 8-3, and then they rallied for a couple of runs in the 8th to cut it to 8-5 when Alex Kirilloff, who was 3-3 with a walk mostly against a lefty, had an RBI single. But with the bases loaded and one out, Ronaldo Hernandez hit a short fly ball to right, and Marsh grounded out to 1st to end the threat and they could only manage a Brujan walk in the 9th off Drew Pomeranz. Ryan ended up 5 6 5 5 4 7, just too many baserunners for his style of pitching. In his debut Vaughn struck out his first 2 times against Smith but in addition to the HR he drew a walk in that 8th inning rally. With the 3-hit game today Kirilloff is suddenly up to .320 (albeit in 25 AB so your average can really jump). Wander and Brujan were a combined 0-7 at the top of the lineup which didn't help. The Red Sox were idle so the lead shrinks to 5 ahead of a 3-game series with them, Kansas City beat the Yankees for their 13th straight win, and Pittsburgh didn't lose today (they were off). Team record: 15-4. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-20-2020 at 08:49 PM.

07-20-2020, 10:09 PM	#99
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 21-23, 2023 vs Boston (3) Game 1: Round 1 goes to the Rays and Rafael Devers (3-5, 2 RBI) over the Red Sox and Abraham Toro (0-3), although in Toro's defense he had to hit against Noah Syndergaard and Devers got Justin Dunn and Bryan Mata (more on Mata shortly). The final was 11-4 Rays and it was a very strange game in which the Rays scored 11 runs and had only one extra-base hit, a Devers double which led off an inning. Xander Bogaerts shocked the Trop crowd with a long and loud HR off Thor in the 2nd to put Boston up, but in the 3rd the Rays got 3 runs off Dunn when Kepler led off, Kirilloff and Marsh walked, Brujan and Devers delivered RBI singles and Meadows had an RBI fielder's choice. But Boston got 2 runs right back in the top of the 4th as Thor allowed a single and then walked two to load the bases, giving up a Posey sac fly then Jackie Bradley Jr. singled after 7 consecutive foul balls to tie the game. Then came the bottom of the fourth, which had to be seen to be believed. Beer singled, Kepler and Marsh walked to load the bases, Brujan singled in a pair and then Bryan Mata came on and was wild as anyone I've ever seen. He went walk, walk, bases loaded walk, bases loaded walk, wild pitch to score a run, wild pitch to score a run, RBI single by Keibert, HBP, walk to re-load, bases loaded walk, then mercifully a Marsh GIDP to end the inning with 8 runs scored. I was yelling at the computer to pull Mata but the AI left him in and he pitched another 1 2/3 (perhaps the Boston pen was tired). Syndergaard came out after 6 having thrown 112 pitches but he went to 5-0 in his 5 starts, Austin Franklin allowed an unearned run in the 8th and had to leave with an abdominal strain so Scott Barlow finished up with another 3 Ks in 4 batters outing. It was a truly bizarre game, and the lead grows to 6. Elsewhere, the Royals crushed the Yankees to make it 14 straight (KC is in town next). And the Pirates won! And how did they ever win! Luckily for them they played the awful Giants and scored a run in the bottom of the 9th to win 1-0. The 88 Orioles remain safe in history. April 22: Activated P Tyler Glasnow from the 15-day IL, optioned IF Andrew Vaughn to AAA Durham. Game 2: If you thought Devers made a statement against his old team in yesterday's game, just wait until you see the encore. The 3B was 5-for-5 today with a 3-run HR and 4 RBI in total in the Rays' 10-4 win. His RBI single in the 4th put the Rays in front to stay at 2-1 and then his 3-run HR in the 5th broke it open making it 7-1 as he improves to .362 with an AL-high 23 RBI. Austin Meadows drove in 3 with a RBI groundout and a 2-run double in the 6th, the same inning in which Vidal Brujan hit his 3rd HR this season. All of this run support was more than enough for the returning Tyler Glasnow, out 2 weeks with a tired arm. His arm didn't look tired as he whiffed two in the first, although he had a brief bout of wildness walking three straight batters to force in a run in the 2nd. But that was all he allowed as he went 6 2 1 1 3 8 in a brilliant outing. Shane McClanahan, who hadn't pitched in quite a well and was held in reserve to back up Glasnow in case he struggled, came on in the 7th and struck out a pair but then faltered in his second inning, allowing a 3-run HR to Marcell Ozuna and walking two batters after that. Aaron Ashby had to come on and bail him out which he did to the tune of 5 up, 5 down with 3 Ks to finish off the game. The lead is now 6 1/2 as Baltimore moves ahead of Boston into 2nd. Meanwhile, KC won yet again to make it 15 straight and they've called up none other than Xavier Edwards, who hit his first MLB HR today. Also having a big day for the Royals was former Ray Brandon Lowe, who also homered and drove in 3. So we'll be seeing these guys in a couple of days and we may have to defend our AL-record winning streak from last year. Also in the NL the Cubs improved to 16-4 but lost newly-signed closer Aroldis Chapman to a bone spur in his elbow, the surgery will knock him out until late August/early September. Game 3: Chris Paddack was on his game and went to 4-1 with 7 shutout innings in a 5-1 Rays win over Boston to sweep the series and improve to 18-4. Paddack was 7 5 0 0 1 6 and was never really threatened, although Jose Alvarado had a rare rough outing in relief of him in the 8th, giving up a walk and 2 hits for a Boston run, the first run charged against him this season. Nick Anderson bailed him out with a strikeout and fly ball, and Will Smith pitched a perfect ninth although he lost the save opportunity when the Rays scored 2 in the 8th to go up by 4. With lefty Chris Sale on the mound for Boston and it being a Sunday afternoon, the irregulars got into the lineup, with Rylan Bannon doing his best Wander impersonation by going 2-4 with a double as Franco got his first game off and Brujan slid over to SS, Ronaldo Hernandez kept doing Ronaldo Hernandez things, homering off Sale in the 3rd to kick off the scoring, and Yusniel Diaz was the one who cost Smith a save with his 2-run double in the 8th giving the Rays a cushion. The Rays' other runs scored on an Alec Bohm sac fly and a Sale wild pitch after Brandon Marsh had tripled. Baltimore lost but the Yankees finally snapped KC's winning streak behind Gerrit Cole, so the lead is now 7 1/2 games. (Sad) Durham update: Remember how they won 2 of their first 3 and were hitting HRs like they were going out of style and Baz and Lacy had pitched great games? Seems like 100 years ago as Durham is now 3-8, Tork is hiting .186 & still sitting on 3 HR, Casas is at .143 with the same 3 HR, and Baz was rocked in his last two starts (including 8 ER in 3 IP today) with his ERA now at 9.00 and Lacy was hit hard in his second start while Clarke Schmidt has had a couple of terrible outings since his demotion. The only one still hitting is Nick Schnell, who homered today in Durham's 12-3 loss and is 318/380/568 with 3 HR and 9 RBI. Team record: 18-4. This was not that surprising but good to see: Last edited by Art Deco; 07-21-2020 at 12:43 PM.

07-21-2020, 01:21 PM	#100
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,078	April 24-26, 2023 vs Kansas City (3) Game 1: The Rays haven't had to face much adversity so far this season, but facing a team that's won 15 of 16 and losing your starting pitcher to (minor) injury in the 4th inning and still winning is a measure of something. The Rays edged KC 4-3 behind 6 1/3 good innings of relief as Max Fried had to depart early with a mild calf strain. He'll be fine to make his next start and he was continuing his strikeout ways with 5 through 3 2/3 before leaving. At that point he had yielded a HR to the prior batter, Juan Pablo Martinez, which gave the Royals a brief 1-0 lead. Keibert (who had 3 hits) singled in Wander, who had led off the 4th with a double, to tie it and in the bottom of the 5th Max Kepler doubled in a run and Vidal Brujan's groundout scored Alex Kirilloff to make it 3-1. The struggling Dany Jimenez had come on in long relief of Fried and was dazzling through the 5th (striking out 5 in 3.1 overall) but may have been left in a bit long when he gave up a 2-run HR to Lewis Brinson in the top of the 6th to tie it. But after Austin Meadows (in another mini-slump) walked to lead off the bottom of the inning, Alec Bohm singled him home with 2 out for what proved to be the winning run. Scott Barlow got two outs in the 7th against his old mates before allowing a single, bringing up the lefty-hitting Martinez. Alvarado came on and whiffed him, then got into some trouble of his own in the 8th, walking Xavier Edwards to lead off the inning (Edwards was 0-1 with 3 walks against Rays pitching) and allowing a single but like yesterday Nick Anderson came in and bailed him out with a fly ball and a pair of strikeouts. Will Smith finally got a save situation and nailed it, throwing a perfect 9th and striking out Anthony Alford to end the game for save #5. The Rays didn't have it easy against KC starter Daniel Tillo, who went all 8 innings and put up an 8 8 4 3 1 3 line, no mean feat against this lineup. They go to 19-4 and with Baltimore and the Yankees losing the lead is already an eye-popping 8 1/2 games. Durham update: After posting yesterday as to how bad things were going, figured I'd mention they pulled out a 7-6 win in the bottom of the 9th when Triston Casas (who had been in a huge slump) got his 4th hit of the game to drive in the winning run, this after he tied the game in the 7th with a solo HR. And Spencer Torkelson had a pair of HRs earlier in the game. Asa Lacy was mediocre, though, going 5 5 4 4 3 3. Game 2: No sooner do I hint that Austin Meadows is slumping again than he heats up, and it was his heroics today that ensured an 8-6 win for the Rays. He had a 2-run double in the 5th to provide some breathing room in a game that the Rays only led 4-3, and his 2-run HR in the 8th turned out to be a big deal when the Royals got 2 runs in the 9th off the Rays "B" bullpen. Joe Ryan had a mediocre start, going 5 7 3 3 1 6 (but amazingly allowing 0 HRs), and with Anderson/Alvarado/Smith all tired, the "other guys" in the bullpen had to navigate a 6-3 lead through the final 4 innings. Aaron Ashby struck out 4 of the 5 batters he faced, but the fifth was former Ray Brandon Lowe who took him deep to make it 6-4. Austin Franklin got the final 2 outs of the 7th without incident, and although he put a couple of runners on, Shane McClanahan got a pair of Ks to get through the 8th. After Meadows expanded the lead to 8-4, I left McClanahan in to see if he could finish it out but he immediately put two men on so Scott Barlow was summoned for the save. Barlow gave up a walk to load the bases and allowed a hit to score both of McClanahan's runners but he got Lowe to fly out with the tying runs on to end the game. Earlier, Vidal Brujan led off the 1st inning with HR #4 off another former Ray, Lucas Sims, who was opening for Jake Junis, whom the Rays treated like a pinata with 5 runs and 7 hits off him in 2 2/3. Brujan ended up 3-4 with that HR, 2 RBI and a SB, and Alec Bohm had a 2-run HR off Junis in the 4th, his team-leading 7th. We go to 20-4 and with Syndergaard going tomorrow hopefully the bullpen can get some rest. The Os and the Yankees both won so the big lead doesn't get any bigger. Game 3: What a pleasure it is to have a true ace, a #1 starter you can rely on. Noah Syndergaard is one of those guys and with only Nick Anderson and Will Smith fully rested in the pen we needed innings from Thor. And innings he gave us, pitching a complete game in a 4-2 win over the Royals, sweeping the series and making it 6 wins in a row. Syndergaard went 9 6 2 2 1 9 and the pitch count was up there at 126, but he got better as the game went on and put an exclamation point on it by striking out the final two batters in the 9th. He now goes to 6-0 with an even 3.00 ERA. The Rays got all the offense they would need in the first inning when Rafael Devers hit a 2-run HR and then two batters later Alec Bohm, heating up again, hit #8. Bohm added a double later and a big sac fly to get an insurance run in the 8th. Devers (with 3, now hitting .355) and Bohm combined for half of the team's 10 hits. With Syndergaard's CG and a day off tomorrow, the bullpen will be fully rested for a 3-game series in Boston starting Friday. The Yankees won to take sole possession of 2nd, 8 1/2 behind. Team record: 21-4. With 25 games under our belt, let's see how the Rays stack up: The big improvement over last year is on the run prevention side of things. Obviously being #1 ERA and runs allowed is big. The bullpen is good like last year but the starters have been so much better, primarily due to trading the inconsistency of Snell and McKay for the consistency of Thor and Paddack. (Snell is having a nice year so far with the Mets, but I trust Syndergaard to keep it going). But the other major improvement is in team defense. We're first in the league in turning batted balls into outs, and the +3.9 zone rating is a far cry from last year's negative numbers. I'm not sure how or to whom to attribute the difference, but I will note that Devers is slightly better than Toro at 3B, and Alec Bohm is a 75 defender at 1B although I've always been under the impression that 1B defense only has a slight impact either way. Otherwise, it's pretty much the same team in the field. Let's hope this keeps up. Like last year we're #1 or close to it in all the important offensive categories but notice that we're only 7th in HRs as while there's power up and down the lineup this is not a team that relies on the longball by any stretch which is what makes them relatively impervious to being shut down on a given night. Walks are down a bit with Toro and the likes of Gallo and Bell gone but Devers replaces the walks with hits and this team also doesn't strike out, averaging less than 6 per game which is an outrageous number in this era of the strikeout. Also the base stealing is down a bit this year but when you're up 8-2 you're not going to run as much. So the numbers under the hood support the great record, even if we are 3 games above the Pythagorean record as no team is a true .840 team. But this could be a true .733 team or at least .700 if the key performers stay healthy. Last edited by Art Deco; 07-21-2020 at 05:04 PM.