In a column from Rays beat writer Marc Topkin, general manager Erik Neander provided several quotes that shed light on how Tampa Bay will approach the upcoming trade deadline (link). Most notably, Neander indicated the club will be looking at potential upgrades to both its offense and relief corps, and that they will be open to dealing for “rental” acquisitions. Specifically, Neander said that the Rays have the flexibility to make “more of a baseball decision than a pure budget constraint type of decision” in regard to potential upgrades.
Tampa Bay currently sits just one game out of the last AL Wild Card spot and could be well-poised to make a move given the treasure trove of prospects that the team possesses (the club currently boasts 10 prospects included on various top 100 lists from around the game). That the notoriously stingy club–which this year rolled out a 30th-ranked payroll–would be willing to open the coffers for a player on an expiring contract is an eyebrow-raising development.
Tampa Bay has managed a 56-44 record despite a middling offense–a feat aided in large part by a stellar 3.45 team ERA. Offensively, Neander and senior VP Chaim Bloom could look to upgrade at the second base position, where they’ve received a 49 wRC+ from 2018 linchpin Joey Wendle. And despite the bullpen’s solid cumulative performance, it stands to reason that most teams within earshot of contention look for bullpen help as the trade deadline nears–as Topkin points out, the club could benefit from the acquisition of a “full-inning” lefty, in part to help lighten the load of struggling rookie southpaw Colin Poche.
Are there ANY Rays fans on this site?
My second favorite team
Me too
I’m a yankees fan, so it’s difficult to root for the rays when they’re competitive within the division. That being said, the rays are consistently one of the most unique, progressive organizations in the sport, and I do begrudgingly enjoy watching them piece together success with disparate parts and experimental strategies on a shoestring budget. It’s a shame they don’t have a bigger following; they’re a truly fascinating organization.
Of course.
I am also a fan of the Rays. My favorite teams are Cardinals, Phillies, Rangers and Rays.
How is that even possible?
30 logos taped to a dart board. 4 darts in hand.
Well done JBell.
My favorite team is the one that wins the game.
Lol, what is a Rays fan?
I’m a season ticket holder, and I’m a huge Tampa Bay rays fan
Well your a rare breed LOL. Jokes aside though the rays are a really great team to watch. I’m a dodgers fan at heart but I have to say the most fascinating team to watch in the MLB is definitely the rays with all they have done.
Yea who roots for the rays
They’re in my top 25.
I’ve seen plenty of Ray’s fans complaining about their team on this site!
No wonder they want to split time in Montreal
Yankee – I’m a huge Rays fan but I only come to this site every few weeks. There are much better sites for Rays information than this one, which always manages to include a glaring mistake in every article, proving the author is just making stuff up to generate readers. Take this article for example. He says the Rays might be in the market to upgrade Wendle at 2B, when the Rays second baseman is Brandon Lowe. You know, the guy signed to a 6 year contract in the offseason and on pace for rookie of the year. He’s injured right now and Wendle is filling in, but Lowe is expected back for the next series.
Ray’s have some of the, if not the, worst fans in baseball. It is such a shame a team as good as they usually are getting no fan support. Can you imagine how good their teams would be if the had better revenue with as good as their front office is?
Of course we do. The fans are Yankee and Redsox fans first then a Ray’s fan. Its the area. Bandwagon fans by the bandwagons. Real fans are out there but so hard to begin to talk real baseball without having to start with Stadium this and fans that cheap etc etc. Great well run innovative organization. They will win and fans will come out. There will be no Montreal. The Mayor of St. Pete needs to let them go. They’re population draw within a 30min drive radius is like 20%. No other MLB team is less than 50%. But ya hey it’s fun to bah the Ray’s I guess. My comfort is I know once this team is consistently winning. Those idiots will be on the bandwagon.
Totally agree.I moved here from Atlanta. I was here when the Ray’s began.I automatically became a Ray’s fan. I am not even a Braves fan now. If you live in the Tampa Bay area and have a Florida tag on your car or reside here. You should be a Ray’s fan.
If the organization would unload LT and original Rays voice DeWayne Staats, plus current Rays so called color man Brian Anderson, 2 of the worst in the game believe the local viewership would increase. Staats is one of the very worst around the game in many areas.. Pouts, so called “homer”, sees everything way it should be in Tampa’s way and virtually every Rays colorman, except for short term Kevin Kennedy was nothing but a repeater of this garbage.
It’s sickening to watch them, even when the team was garbage Rays broadcasters would put this sort out. How does that increase viewership? With ignorance?
Staats goes down in my book as the modern day Mel Proctor from years gone by Orioles, only those Oriole teams were generally good year in and out, but still same see no evil approach with Johnny Lowenstein as Proctor’s sidekick.
Lol really you just bashed Staats. Sure maybe Anderson but he’s grown on me and good compliment to Dwayne. But cmon. Dwayne is the only lead caster we’ve had. He’s unique in a good way a true fan and does a damn fine job. Matter of he said she said but I firmly disagree with you except for Kennedy who I really liked when he was on. The radio with Wills and Friedman are great too. your just tripping on non sense in my opinion. Again people will come out when they are consistently contending. You think there is a ton of casual hockey played on Tampa bay lol. But the lightning fill out. Bandwagon town. I hate to admit but always will be. Winners will be supported. Middling clubs will always be a second thought in this boujee area.
Also their TV ratings are usually upper 1/3 in the league if I’m not mistaken. So again why the hate for Dwayne….DeWayne
A big problem is that the Tampa Bay Rays don’t actually play in Tampa. I don’t know how much attendance would increase if they moved across the bay but I’d imagine it would be pretty significant. It’s a long drive to a pretty crappy area.
LETS GO RAYS !!!!!
Would love to see them go for a Stroman, Syndergaard, or even Bumgarner.
And Jose Abreu would hit tanks at the Trop
Abreu would be a great move for them. They should have gotten Encarnacion when they had the chance. They already pay part of his salary. Their 1b’s have been shaky for a few weeks.
Part of his salary? Yup, Rays are paying 5 mil for Eddie to hit bombs against them the rest of the way. In fact, the Rays are paying more of his salary than the Yanks are LMAO!!!
The rays are creative and innovative because they refuse use finances as a train to not be competitive. They sold last year and fleeced the Pirates. Always interested what they are doing.
To much fleecing could just as easily make teams avoid dealing with them all together. Agree with what you said.
Honest question…do you get the feeling, from quotes provided by upper management, that the Rays are hungry to win? It feels like a no. I am probably wrong. But it’s just a feeling, like it’s hoping for the best and nothing more.
There’s no motivation for them to win, Reaper. They’re so far down the Revenue Sharing pole that even if they do win, and generate more local revenue, they lose equal dollars from Revenue Sharing.
So their profit comes ONL:Y from keeping the payroll down. And no incentive to increase it, in order to generate that local revenue That’s why the RS formula has to change during the next CBA negotiations.
The players know it; you think there isn’t any talk in the clubhouse about not picking up EE, or even Cashner for that matter? So the owner doesn’t care, the player figures, well, I don’t either. Especially those on guaranteed money. You’ll note KK got hurt again tonight; I was wondering when he’d be taking his annual summer vacation. And now, there’s the Montreal nonsense.
And it dribbles down to the field. Poor baserunning, basic lackadaisical play (not EVERY player; some guys just aren’t built that way), and a general feeling of waiting for the roof to cave in (or more specifically, the lights to go out).
Between the tragedy of Vinnie (undercapitalized to the max, and remember, there was no RS back then) and the greediness of Stuie, MLB has done no favor to the fans in Tampa. It’ll take 5 years to rebuild the brand, and it’s going to cost a ton to get there. I doubt anybody wants to do it.
Why though Bob is it going to cost a ton. All this ownership group has shown is that you can push and contend in arguably the toughest division in baseball with much less than the large market teams are spending. The whole system is skewed. Needs to be blown up and reworked. Hate on Pujols for his contract and others but they earned that money that they couldn’t get when they were in their prime. The Rays owners are businessmen with a passion for baseball.
I think the system will be blown up, through expansion/realignment. They simply can’t compete against 3 other teams that own their own parks and control all their revenue in a de jure way (NY, Boston, Toronto) and one who does the same in a de facto way (Baltimore). In the meantime, the Rays pay rent and have to share all their ancillary revenue with, it seems, a thousand people. A baseball economist (the guy from Amherst College) noted that the only way for the Rays to match the Yanks and Sox revenue is to draw 8 million fans; it’s just not the fannies in the seats, it’s the profit you generate from the fannies.
Even with that, they have to change the ownership structure; provide private financing for a stadium (so they can control the “hot dog money”) and establish their own regional sports network
The cost of both those things, along with the cost of the team, is about 2 billion. And you have to spend that realizing that you’re never going to make the money that MOST other owners make, primarily because you have to rebuild trust with the fans. Jeter (Miami) is in the same boat, but he at least already has a park and gets some of that extra money, tho not much.
Stuie’s crying poor mouth just isn’t cutting it anymore. It’s bugging the union; it’s bugging the other owners. A 60M payroll is a sacrilege, and a violation of a public trust, even more so when the team is close to contention.
Bob I get all of that. As someone who’s visited Tropicana Field about a dozen times I do understand the dynamic and the dilemma. I’m was more focused on the messaging, which I believe causes a ripple effect you mentioned.
That stadium and the location kills them. I’ve made that drive and spoken to fans asking about the state of the franchise and the ballpark situation. They desperately need one in Tampa, not St Petes. I believe they can turn it around but not where they are now. The brand rebuild begins there, and that idea appears nowhere in-sight.
it’s amazing how this team always seems to be last in payroll and still finds a way to compete every year
Well that photo is just adorable
Die Hard Rays Fan. Right here….
What a joke of a franchise.
I still remember newspaper columnists commenting back in the 1980’s “what a shame Florida doesn’t get MLB baseball with all these fans down here!” LOL!
Move the Rays to any one of four or five cities, and the fans would pack the stadium. No real room on the East Coast unless they became a regional draw in the Carolinas. like the panthers of the NFL.
But I could see them in places like san Antonia, Oklahoma City, Memphis, Sacramento and even Las Vegas and especially the latter. Not sure if it’s still true, but wasn’t so long ago I read that Las Vegas was the fastest growing city in the country.
Raiders and Rays star in the Neon City? Hey, why not? Tampa doesn’t deserve them, and that silver pineapple needs to be torn down, like, yesterday.