Sep 14
From Walkoff Walks’ archives, comes this little gem about the Rays newest catcher, Gregg Zaun, whose name appeared in the Mitchell Report.
In the Mitchell Report, Kirk Radomski provided the authorities a check from Zaun’s bank account for $500 that was used to buy steroids. Zaun’s excuse? He claims he gave a semi-blank check to Jason Grimsley, and it was Grimsley that then sent the check to Radomski. No really. That’s Zaun’s conspiracy theory. He’s Super Cereal.
Can you imagine if Alex Rodriguez had tried that excuse? Walkoff Walk has more on Zaun’s “explanation.”
The Rays have a $2 million option on Zaun for 2010, with a $500K buyout.
Zaun Breaks Silence on Mitchell Report, Buttered Popcorn [Walkoff Walk]
Aug 24
The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: David Price. Other than the 3 walks, Price once again showed that he can be a very good big league pitcher on a consistent basis. He worked deep (7 innings) and allowed just 3 hits…Pat Burrell. He continues to be Pat the Good. 2 more hits and a walk. He is not carrying the team yet, but he is no longer dragging them down either.
THE BAD: K Parade. 15 strikeouts by Rays hitters. The Rays are second in the AL in strikeouts. Yep. They are just one out. But when a batter is retired without putting the ball in play, runners don’t have a chance to advance, which leads to…Coming Up Empty. The Rays went 3-up, 3-down in 4 different innings. And in the other 5 innings they were 0-8 with runners in scoring position…It’s Not The Heat. We keep harping on walks, but you can’t ignore them. Price only walked 3, but 2 of them came around to score, including the leadoff walk in the 3rd.
THE TELLING: The Rays finished the homestand at 6-3. Before the series, we suggested the Rays needed 7 wins to thrust themselves back in the thick of the race. And as this team has done all season, they played just well enough to tease and to not fall off the pace….The Rays now trail Boston in the Wild Card standings by 3 games and are 2 behind the Rangers…CoolStandings.com gives the Rays a 15.2% shot at making the playoffs. Meanwhile Baseball Prospectus says it is 25.2% and their PECOTA version is only 11.3%.
SUNBURST PLAYER OF THE GAME: David Price. (Scott Kazmir and Carlos Pena took home the honors on Friday and Splayaturday)
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- Joe Henderson wonders if the Rays have what it takes, and wonders if they can be consistent enough to make the playoffs. [Tampa Tribune]
- John Romano has the visual evidence of the Rays in their “Ring of Fire” attire for the upcoming roadtrip. [St. Pete Times]
- Joe Smith writes about the decision to have David Price start the season in the minors and what it means for Price and the Rays now. Also, Smith looks at what Gregg Zaun has meant for the pitching staff since he arrived. [St. Pete Times]
- Apparently Joe Maddon has already been able to put the perfect game by Mark Buehrle out his mind as he referred to yesterday’s performance by Scott Feldman as “the best pitched game against [The Rays] all year.” [St. Pete Times]
- Joey Johnston says the key to the Rays playoff hopes is Jason Bartlett. [Tampa Tribune]
- Larry Williams is the only one of 10 mayoral candidates in St. Pete that has committed to doing whatever it takes to keep the Rays in St. Pete, saying the Rays are good for the local economy. [St. Pete Times]
- Area fashion experts weighed in on Joe Maddon’s new look. [St. Pete Times]
- LeVon Washington will attend Chipola College in north Florida and reenter the draft next June. [Rays Report]
Aug 21
The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: Top O’ The Order To Ya. The bats are heating up. the top 5 batters in the lineup combine for 10 hits…Ben Zobrist. Zorilla is getting back into the swing of things with his second home run in as many nights.
THE BAD: It’s Not The Heat. We always say it. It is not the home run that kills you, it is the walk(s) before the home run. Last night the O’s hit a 3-run HR and a grand slam. Of the 5 players on base, 4 reached via walk…Fox Sports/Sun Sports. Stop with Batting Stance Guy. It was fun for about 3 seconds on YouTube. Now it is just some 35-year old dude doing poor imitations of Orioles hitters in his parents’ backyard. Just stop it. We imitated big leaguers also, when we were 8. For the love of everything Tampa Bay Rays, just STOP.
THE TELLING: Carlos Pena got the night off.
SUNBURST PLAYER OF THE GAME: Ben Zobrist
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- Jayson Stark seems convinced that the Rays can’t win without a closer. [ESPN]
- There is a very obvious flaw to Jayson Stark’s thinking, but we won’t say it. Trop It Like It’s Hot, already did. [Trop It Like It's Hot]
- Seems a bit strange to devote a column to how James Shields leads the league in lack of run support on the day after the Rays scored 7 runs in a James Shields start. [Tampa Tribune]
- Raymond went for a ride on a Manta Ray, sorta, but not really. Pic included…Somebody queue the alarmists! Raymond was in Orlando! [Orlando Sentinel]
- Gregg Zaun spoke to the Baltimore Sun about joining the Rays and leaving Baltimore. [Baltimore Sun]
- Josh Q. Public makes a case for Jeff Niemann as Rookie of the Year. [Josh Q. Public]
- The Top 177 Devil Rays ever, continued. [Bugs and Cranks]
Aug 17
Time to bring back the GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: Gregg Zaun. The Zaunbie Nation is growing with every swing of his bat. This time it was a grand slam that broke a 1-1 tie with 2 outs in the 8th. Could the stirrups be this year’s Rayshawk? We can hope, can’t we?…Carl Crawford. He was only 1-4 yesterday but he was 7-12 in the series…Jason Bartlett. 3 more hits on Sunday and Barty continues to shine in the leadoff spot.
THE BAD: Matt Garza. How in the world he only allowed 1 run is a testament to his stuff, as Garza was on the brink of disaster in 4 of the 5 innings he pitched. He allowed at least 2 baserunners in each of those 4 innings, once loading the bases with no outs and once allowing the first two to get on base. Both times he got out of the situation. But in the end, all of the close calls raised his pitch count and he was out after only 5 innings.
THE TELLING: Gregg Zaun is short. He is listed at 5-10, but do you think he is only 5 inches shorter than Ben Zobrist (above)?…The Rays have 11 games remaining with the Orioles including 8 of the final 19…After this 3-game set, the Rays have a 23 game stretch in which 20 games are against AL playoff contenders Rangers, Tigers, Red Sox and Yankees. Texas now leads the wild card race by a half-game over the Red Sox. The Rays trail by 3.5.
SUNBURST PLAYER OF THE GAME: Gregg Zaun (Carl Crawford took the honors on both Friday and Saturday)
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- Tonight at midnight is the deadline to sign 2009 draft picks (non college seniors). As of now, the Rays have signed 11 of their top 15 picks. They have yet to reach agreements with their top pick LeVon Washington, second pick Kenny Diekroeger, their 10th and 15th picks.
- The Rays have not been shy about singing their draft picks, going well-over the bonus amounts recommended by the commissioner’s office. [St. Pete Times]
- Reid Brignac has been recalled from Durham and took the roster spot of Jeff Bennett who was sent down. This leaves the Rays with the normal complement of 12 pitchers. [Rays Report]
- Chad Bradford is ready to be activated, but is waiting on Pat Burrell. [Tampa Tribune]
- The Rays sent minor leaguer Rhyne Hughes to Baltimore to complete the Gregg Zaun deal. [The Heater]
- David Chalk presents the facts about Gregg Zaun. [Bugs and Cranks]
- Pat Burrell missed the last two games with a recurrence of the neck injury that sidelined him earlier this year. This one is not as bad and he is hoping to be back in the lineup on Tuesday. [Rays Report]
- Akinori Iwamura felt fine after his first rehab game but Fernando Perez has minor neck injury that has interrupted his rehab assignment. [The Heater]
- Around the Majors argues that trading BJ Upton now would be a mistake. [Around the Majors]
- Letitia Stein has an interesting piece on the eating habits of the Rays, one of the healthier big league clubs. [St. Pete Times]
Aug 14
In this piece by Marc Topkin, we learn that Gregg Zaun wants to catch well into his mid-40s (he is 38 now). But the most disappointing news to us is learning that MLB now has a new rule that says catchers can no longer get custom paint jobs on their catching helmets.
With at least three previous teams, Zaun had his helmet customized much the way a hockey goalie would.
Now compare that to his new helmet with the Rays…
Pretty boring. Apparently the rule changed while Zaun was playing for Baltimore so his helmet at the time was grandfathered in. But now that he is with the Rays, it will just be the plain blue.
Ugh. It’s like Bud Selig just told us Santa Claus wasn’t coming this year because the Rays suck.
Aug 10
The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: Jason Bartlett. Little guy seems to like his new leadoff home. He was on base 3 more times on Sunday with 2 singles and a walk…Dioner Navarro. Navi provided all the offense with a 2-run home run.
THE BAD: Scott Kazmir. 28 pitches in the first inning, and it was all down hill from there. The Scott Kazmir we thought we had left behind, reared its ugly head on Sunday…Leaving Automatic Runs On Base. They did it again. Bases loaded with less than 2 outs should be at least 1 run every time. And yet the Rays seem to fail to score in that situation on a nightly basis. Yesterday it happened in the first when Pat Burrell lined into a double-play…Jeff Bennett. The shine came off that new acquisition quick. He was charged with 4 runs in 2.2 innings, but also gave up a 5th when he walked in a batter with the bases loaded, a run charged to Kazmir.
THE TELLING: According to CoolStandings.com the Rays now have a 32.4% shot at making the playoffs. The Red Sox are at 46.7%. BaseballProspectus says it is 13.3%, but if you remove the projected stats (using just real data), the number jumps to 44.6%, which is actually ahead of the Red Sox 39.0%.
SUNBURST PLAYER OF THE GAME: Dioner Navarro
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- BJ Upton batted 9th yesterday and to say he didn’t take it well would be an understatement: “It’s almost like a kick in the face.” [St. Pete Times]
- It sounds as though Gregg Zaun is going to get the bulk of the playing time against right-handed pitchers. [Tampa Tribune]
- Joe Maddon explains why it is too simplistic to say strikeouts are no worse than any other type of out and says that strikeouts in certain situations are “annoying” [Tampa Tribune]
- Joe Maddon wants his players to check their egos at the door. [St. Pete Times]
Aug 08
The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: Jeff Niemann. He came a little unhinged in the 7th, but that was only after retiring 17 of 18 batters prior to the 7th. He struck out 5 and walked only 1 and was failed by the bullpen…Pat Burrell. He was only 1-5, but the 1 was a massive upper-deck home run and one of the other 4 was an RBI groundout…Red Sox Fail. A-Rod hit a walk-off HR in the 312th inning last night and the Yankees have now taken the first 2 games of that series. And while the Red Sox still lead the Wild Card, most in Red Sox Nation think their season is over.
THE BAD: The Bullpen. Grant Balfour faced 2 batters, giving up a single and hitting a batter. Brian Shouse faced 2 batters. 1 singled. And JP Howell. Well, Howell grooved a pitch. The Dude usually abides. But last night he did not.
THE TELLING: The chance of winning the division is almost all but gone with the Rays now 7 games behind the Yankees. The Rays remain 2.5 behind the Red Sox and 1.5 behind the Rangers in the Wild Card.
SUNBURST PLAYER OF THE GAME: Carl Crawford.
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- Michel Hernandez was designated for assignment to make room for the addition of Gregg Zaun. [The Heater]
- If you haven’t seen Gregg Zaun’s website yet, please do so. This is going to be fun. [GreggZaun.com]
- Marc Topkin has some quotes from Andrew Friedman on the acquisition of Gregg Zaun, saying Zaun will play “a fair amount.” That is good, because it sounds like Zaun was an unhappy camper in Baltimore after Matt Weiters was called up and took most of Zaun’s playing time. [The Heater]
- Joe Maddon said that bringing in Gregg Zaun was not intended to “light a fire” under Dioner Navarro…Also, Pat Burrell will continue to be the most-days DH. [Tampa Tribune]
- Last year the Rays received Chad Bradford from the O’s for a Player to be Named Later. Well, the “player” turned out to just be $20K cash. Peter Schmuck says that this time the O’s will receive a prospect from the Rays. [Baltimore Sun]
- The Rays also picked up RJ Swindle off waivers from the Brewers. Best we can tell, he is the next coming of Casey Fossum, but he does have a minor league option. To make room, the Rays designated John Meloan for assignment. [St. Pete Times]
- Rays Revolutionary says 36 more wins for the Rays should get them to the playoffs. [Rays Revolutionary]
- Dock of the Rays takes a look at some of Andy Sonnanstine’s trends and what can be expected down the road. [Dock of the Rays]
- The On Deck Circle takes a closer look at Ben Zobrist’s breakout season and whether or not he can keep it up. [The On Deck Circle]
