How The Rays Are Running Away With It
As of the time of writing, the Rays are 48-20 – by far the best record in all of baseball. Despite suffering some key injuries to the pitching staff, the boys from St. Pete have shown no signs of slowing down and already seem like the runaway favourite to win a historically competitive American League East. What is making them so good? What is making them so fun? It’s time to have a look at the 2023 Rays so far and take a look at some of the things that have made them so interesting and the making Tropicana Field ‘America’s Ballpark’ over the past few months.
Controlled Chaos
While not a particularly advanced metric by any means, one of my favourite quantifiers to illustrate how the Rays are so successful this season is to simply say – the team leads all of baseball in home runs (112) and stolen bases (87). That frightening combination of both elite power and speed means that this edition of the team can hurt you offensively in a variety of different ways. Whether it’s via small ball or the big fly, the Rays are ready for either.
The baserunning has been something that has caught many people’s attention this season from fans and analysts alike, and has been a big reason for Tampa’s success thus far. But it goes much deeper than just stolen bases, and it was a process that did not start in 2023.
It has been clear to anyone who’s been paying attention to the Rays over the past few seasons that Kevin Cash and company have always been looking for new and innovative ways to gain a competitive advantage over their opponents in aspects of the game that have yet to be fully explored. Last year there seemed to be a shift in organisational philosophy about baserunning. To many fans frustration, the 2022 Rays were running themselves ragged, always pushing to try and take the extra base and being as aggressive as possible when it came to putting pressure on opposing fielders to make good plays. This led to a lot of outs, the most in the major leagues in fact, and would end up costing the team runs and rallies that would leave the Rays line-up looking as if it lacked significant firepower.
The front office would have, no doubt, looked over the data collected from this running experiment and used it to fine-tune the approach coming into the current campaign, as while the 2023 Rays EBT% (Extra-Base Taken Percentage) is actually slightly higher than the previous season, the amount of outs on base has been cut significantly. Currently, the Rays have 19 OOB this season, which, extrapolated over a full 162 games would lead to around 46 OOB by the end of the year – a huge decrease over the 73 made a year ago. Through aggressive trial and error, the coaches and players have gained invaluable experience about themselves and their capabilities around the bases and have turned that into a far greater level of efficiency and now lead all of baseball in Fangraphs’ Baserunning value – having scored 9 more runs above league average through their running ability alone.
Data is nice, but something that can often be overlooked is the quality of the legs at their disposal. Over the past couple of months, Erik Neander’s squad has been blessed with the availability of some of the league’s fastest cheetahs. This is no accident, as Tampa have always valued athleticism as a vital attribute in their ballplayers. Jose Siri is the standout in this regard, scoring an eye-popping 29.9ft per second sprint speed – good for 99th percentile in the big leagues. He is accompanied by fellow lightning bolts in Wander Franco, Randy Arozarena, Josh Lowe and… Luke Raley?! That’s right, even the towering 6ft 4”, 235lbs Raley finds himself with the third-highest sprint speed on the team, and is registered as the fastest first baseman in the majors.
The Rays love getting players that can challenge defenders and that philosophy runs across their entire 26-man roster. Only Francisco Mejia, Yandy Diaz and Isaac Paredes run at a significantly lower pace than their positional average – and they challenge opposing fielders in their own way by their excellent ability to put the ball in play and limit strikeouts.
The last thing that needs to be mentioned are the rule changes. Prior to the start of the season, Major League Baseball implemented a number of new rules for 2023. Two of them play a significant part in baserunning. The first being the ‘two disengagement rule’. Nowadays, pitchers are only permitted to throw over to a base with the intent of catching a runner out a maximum of twice per plate appearance. Any subsequent disengagement must result in the runner being caught stealing or it will be ruled a balk – awarding said runner the next base along. This makes timing a pitcher up far easier, especially if you know that the probability of a pickoff throw is far less likely after two attempts. This can make leads more aggressive and jumps can be made slightly earlier. When you couple this with the other big rule change, larger bases, this makes stealing and taking extra bases far more accessible.
All of these factors have mixed together to make a perfect storm for the Rays, and now they are taking full advantage, bringing speed, excitement and electricity to every opportunity. Making for not just a fun watch, but a scary opponent.
Keeping It Real
This is a tired narrative, so it will be addressed now so it can be put to bed for the rest of the season. For anyone that doesn’t pay much attention to baseball Twitter (an enviable position, to be sure), the Rays have been the subject of ridicule by many despite their white-hot start. The main reason? ‘They haven’t played a real team yet.’
While it would be a spectacle if teams from the deepest depths of imagination made their way into the Trop in a Space Jam-esque baseball battle for the ages, this (despite all our wishes) hasn’t actually happened (yet). Regardless of your opinion on if Oakland’s product is lacking or not, they are still a major league team with major league players.
Facetiousness aside, many believed the 2023 Tampa Bay Rays to be something of a mirage. After starting the season with a record-tying 13-0 win streak, many said that this was largely down to the quality of the teams they faced – that being the Tigers, Nationals, A’s and Red Sox. Those teams were definitely struggling out of the gate, and while none of them are expected to be in playoff contention come September, rattling off thirteen in a row is always an impressive feat in a sport with as much variance as baseball. Luckily though, to the delight of those wishing for Tampa’s downfall, the month of May was expected to be where the Rays were to be exposed for a team purely capitalising on a weak schedule early in the season. “When they play a real team, a contender, they will be shown to be the mediocre team they are” they would say. This was not the case.
Despite playing teams like the Yankees, Dodgers, Blue Jays, Mets and the (at the time) National League’s best team – the Pirates, the Rays continued to march onwards and upwards. Going 17-12 in the month and would even improve their divisional lead over the second-place Orioles.
The pendulum has now swung to the other side – the former Devil Rays having now played too many contenders. They enter June 12th with the fifth-strongest schedule in the American League. Only the Rangers and Orioles have faced a stronger set of opponents and have come away with a winning record in the junior circuit.
Finally, let’s address how the team has actually fared against the ‘Real Teams’. When facing teams with a winning percentage above .500, the Rays have a record of 22-13, by far the best in the major leagues, so it’s clear that they can not only compete, but flat-out dominate the best teams in baseball. So whenever anyone tries to bring this up again, send them the link to this article and tell them that you’re an informed fan because you read RBLR!
Farming Wins
As exciting as the present is in St. Petersburg, the minor league systems are also firing on all cylinders right now and there has been a winning culture throughout every level of the organisation for quite a few years now. As a team that tends not to spend on big free agents, the best chance the Rays have of acquiring superstar players is by developing them from within. The current front office regime have produced a huge amount of great players over the years and it is hard not to get excited by a few of the names and numbers down on the farm right now. A couple of names that you need to know if you don’t already are:
- Kyle Manzardo – After rocketing up the minor leagues last season, Manzardo is currently the regular first baseman in AAA Durham and is shaping up to be an absolute monster against right-handed pitchers. He is currently hitting .310 with a .976 OPS against them and could maybe even see some major league appearances toward the end of the season.
- Junior Caminero – Currently the youngest player in AA, Caminero could see a Wander Franco-like ascent up the minor leagues to become a young stud in MLB. In just 36 games in High-A, Junior hit an eye-watering .356 with 11 home runs. A third baseman by trade, Caminero has shot up many top prospect lists over the past few months and is perhaps the most exciting prospect in the organisation.
- Carson Williams – Williams was the Rays’ first pick in the 2021 draft coming out of high school. He has been touted by many scouts to be a 5-tool player at shortstop, and is currently demonstrating why people may think so in High-A. Williams has a lot of power and athleticism but still is trying to work through some swing-and-miss in his game. If he can find a way to limit strikeouts, his ceiling is on Mars.
Getting To Know Your Author
Being from the United Kingdom, I was never blessed with baseball being part of my everyday culture. While soccer and cricket dominated the conversation across the country, I was thankfully whisked away by my father in 2009 to watch the Phillies and Yankees play in the World Series that year. From that moment on, I was hooked.
After deciding on the laughing stock-turned powerhouse in the Tampa Bay Rays as my new favourite obsession, I consider myself to be one of the luckiest baseball fans in the world. Since the 2010 season when I started watching in earnest, the Rays have been one of the best teams in the league. They trail only the Dodgers, Yankees and Cardinals in wins over the past thirteen seasons and have been to the playoffs seven times – including a run to the World Series in 2020. If that wasn’t enough, the Rays have time and time again found ways to deliver a unique and electrifying brand of baseball that, for better or for worse, has always pushed the envelope on what can take place on a diamond.
As a lover of fun and creativity, the Rays have repaid my many instances of late nights and heartbreak with countless happy memories and things to analyze, while, simultaneously, completely altering the way I view this outstanding sport. From ‘Game 162’ to ‘The Opener’, Brett Phillips’ Walk-Off to the 100-win season, those flappy boys have never failed to delight. Yet, here in 2023, this Rays team have given me the most fun I’ve had watching baseball to date.
For now, I will stop gushing about this team. There is still a long way to go in the season but all signs point to this potentially being the most successful season in Rays history, with the team currently on pace to smash the 100-win record set by the 2021 squad. So let’s sit back and enjoy the ride.
