Oct 06
Click on above images to be taken to full standings, box scores or schedule…
THE GOOD: Split against 2 tough lefties. It is no secret that the Rays do not handle lefties well. During the season, the Rays were only 25-24 against lefties. Prior to the series, if you were to tell us that the Rays would split games 2 and 3 against the lefties and be up 2 games to 1 we would have signed immediately and said let’s go to game 4…BJ Upton. After starting the series 0-8 and swinging scared for 3 months, Upton appears more confident and less tentative. His triple at the end of game 2 and the easy swing on his 2-run home run yesterday were classic Upton that we have not seen in a while.
THE BAD: Letting Ken Griffey Jr tag up in the 4th inning. With the bases loaded and no outs, a fly ball to BJ Upton in center scores a run and advanced the runner from second. Upton’s throw went to the cutoff off man allowing Griffey to tag up from first. Upton could have easily thrown through to 2nd. If he does, Griffey likely does not score on the double…Carlos Pena to end the game. With the 2 outs in the 9th, Pena was the tying run and Pena seemed to just miss 2 pitches right down the middle. It is not often that Pena is late on a fastball, but he seemed just a fraction late on each pitch…Evan Longoria is 1-7 since he was seen with the “0 for 4″ girl at the USF game…Momentum is only as good as tomorrow’s starting pitcher and the White Sox have now won 4 straight elimination games and have 17-game winner Gavin Floyd on the mound tonight. The good news is that outside of last Monday’s makeup game against the Tigers, Floyd has given up at least 4 runs in 4 of his last 5 starts.
THE TELLING: According to CoolStandings.com the Rays still have a 79.6% chance of winning the ALDS…If the Red Sox would have won last night and eliminated the Angels, tonight’s game time would have been moved to 8pm…Based on Back of the Napkin calculations, the Yankees have spent $1.38 billion (with a B) in player salaries since they last won a World Series. The Rays have spent a total of about $405 million trying to win their first.
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- YES! They’re baaaccckkkkkk on the bandwagon. [
Mets Rays Geek]
- Dioner Navarro won’t admit that he is playing in a considerable amount of discomfort. [Tampa Tribune]
- Troy Percival pitched an inning in an instructional league game on Saturday and “felt pretty good”. He will throw again today and still hopes to return in the ALCS. [St. Pete Times]
- The Rays’ bullpen was thankful for the day off. [MLB]
- Buster Olney compares JP Howell to a left-handed version of Greg Maddux, noting that very few left handers utilize a two-seam fastball the way Maddux does. [ESPN]
In the ’90s, Maddux popularized the use of two-seam fastballs against left-handed hitters, particularly as a pitch to finish off hitters with two strikes. He throws the ball at the hip of the batter, so far inside that the batter often gives up on it. But at the last second, the ball veers back over the inside corner, and such movement often freezes the hitter as the pitch becomes strike three…But rarely do you see a left-hander who employs a similar pitch against right-handed hitters…”
- With the Rays still 1 game from the ALCS, John Romano does not want Rays fans panicking. [St. Pete Times]
- Might the Twins be ready to trade Delmon Young already? [MLB Trade Rumors]
May 11
Last night, Scott Kazmir, shutout the Angels for 6 innings, and earned his 36th career win. Still only 24, Kazmir has already made 99 career starts and is now the Tampa Bay Rays all-time winningest pitcher, having surpassed Victor Zambrano, for whom he was traded from the Mets Organization.
The Professor laid out the reasons that Kid K will be the next 300-game winner in the original post.
To add a couple of thoughts…
- Keep in mind that even though the Rays have an incredibly young rotation, Kazmir is the youngest of the group.
- Also, it amazes me that so many people think we have seen the end of 300-game winners considering there are only three pitchers with 350 wins since 1920 and two of those pitchers (Greg Maddux and Roger Clemens) were active just last year.
Jun 11
Al Reyes, Andy Sonnanstine, BJ Upton, Buster Olney, Carl Crawford, Chad Orvella, David Price, Elijah Dukes, Greg Maddux, James Shields, Josh Wilson, Rocco Baldelli, Tim Corcoran, Ty Wigginton Cork Gaines
Devil Rays 9, Marlins 4. It is all about winning series. Find a way to win 2 of 3 every time out. The win yesterday gave the Rays their second straight series win and both were highly improbable. After losing the opening game of each series with bullpen melt-downs of historic proportions, the Rays bounced back to win the final two games of both match-ups (Did you realize that the Rays are two nuclear melt-downs away from an 8-game winning streak?).
Yesterday it was Andy Sonnanstine to the rescue with his first major league win. Sonny will never be an ace and some nights he will get knocked around pretty good, but he is very capable of performances like Sunday. We just need to wait and see how often we see a performance like Sunday’s. If that turns out to be the rule more than the exception, Sonny will be a legitimate #3 or #4 starter in the Rays rotation for years to come. Still, at this point, just the fact that he is capable of a start like this is an indication that he is a far better option than Jae Seo or Casey Fossum ever were.
Before Sonnanstine was promoted, we heard that it was difficult to compare Sonnanstine to any major leaguers because of the accuracy and the movement of the pitches and the different arm angles. The most common name we head was a poor-man’s Greg Maddux. After his first start, we thought Paul Byrd was a more accurate representation. That is to say that he is a crafty right hander. Rare indeed. But Sonny throws much harder than Byrd, who rarely breaks 85 nowadays. So is there another player we can come up with? Well, we were watching the Marlins broadcast of yesterday’s game and the announcers tossed out a third name which we had not thought of before. Orlando Hernandez…We like it. El Duque is the only other pitcher that we have ever seen that uses as many different arm angles. Also, it seems as if El Duque has never thrown a straight pitch in his life. So, if Hernandez is 58 years old as rumored, is Andy Sonnanstine the second coming? Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez…Andy “The Duke” Sonnastine? Only time will tell, but we must admit The Duke is fun to watch pitch.
DEVIL RAYS WEBTOPIA…
- Andy Sonnanstine set a Devil Rays team record with 7 straight strike outs on Sunday.
- The Devil Rays had no choice but to shake up the bullpen, if for anything just to send a message to the rest of the team. On Sunday Chad Orvella and Tim Corcoran were optioned back to Durham.
- Buster Olney gives us a Q&A with James Shields. The interview is hidden behind the walls of ESPN’s “Insider”.
- Rocco Baldelli participated in an extended spring training game on Saturday. He is likely to play in four more before the team decides whether to activate Baldelli or send him on a rehab assignment.
- OK, maybe not the best reliever, but is Josh Wilson the second best?
- Maybe not, but we do like THIS SUGGESTION of making the rest of the staff watch the video of Josh Wilson’s performance. Maybe Joe Maddon could lock them in a room with the one inning on loop.
- Al Reyes and James Shields have much better chances to make the All-Star roster as pitchers than BJ Upton or Carl Crawford do as position players.
- Josh Vitters is NOT as good as Alex Rodriguez was in high school. So to compare the choice of David Price over Vitters as the same decision the Mariners made when they picked A-Rod over Darren Dreifort is ridiculous.
- According to Scott Kendrick the Devil Rays made a mistake by drafting the college pitcher over the high school hitter. He notes that the best #1 overall picks have been high school position players, pointing out the lack of a success among pitchers selected at the top of the draft. So, according to Kendrick, college pitchers should NEVER be drafted or David Price had a better chance of a solid major league career if he was drafted #2 or even in the 36th round. Neither makes sense. Mr. Kendrick…what we have here is what smart people call a “very small sample size”. Some pitchers succeed. A lot don’t. Whether or not a pitcher is going to be great has nothing to do with where he is drafted. It depends on the player and the team that drafts him. Maybe the position player is “safer” but hitters don’t win championships. Pitchers do.
- Based on the Rays drafting history only 2 or 3 of the 50 players selected will ever appear in a major league game.
- The Washington Nationals are reportedly pursuing Elijah Dukes.
- MLB Trade Rumors indicates that the Twins may be interested in acquiring Ty Wigginton. With the emergence of both BJ Upton, and Carlos Pena, this move makes sense.
- Off day today with an intriguing match-up tomorrow as the Padres come to town and will send out Greg Maddux against Scott Kazmir.
