One Month Until Trade Deadline. What Happens Then?
July 31st is the MLB Trade deadline and there are going to be some questions for the Tampa Bay Rays in the next four weeks. What a difference 4 weeks makes. Oh how we know. The Rays went from 4.5 games up to 3 games back in that time frame and with the poor quality of play the next 28 games are of the utmost importance to Tampa.
Tampa faces the Boston Red Sox 5 times, the Minnesota Twins 4 times, the New York Yankees 5 times, and the Detroit Tigers 4 times. Sandwiched in between those games are three against Baltimore and seven against the Cleveland Indians in a home and away series. At this point, don’t consider Baltimore or Cleveland pushovers after watching the Rays bat .086 against the worst pitching staff in baseball this past weekend.
So with LF Carl Crawford heading towards free agency at the conclusion of the season likely to garner upwards of a 100 million dollar contract, at what point do the Rays trade him? 8 games back? 12 games back? Just one month ago, this discussion would have been out of the question, but now with the Rays losing 19 of their last 31 games and a very tough schedule looming, the trade talk has to be brought into the realm of possibility now.
I believe the bar would be anything over 8 games back in the wildcard race. Currently, the Rays are 1 game in back of the Red Sox and 2.5 games ahead of the LA Angels. A trade that far out of the race is the only possibility for the Rays. A trade would allow Tampa to determine where Crawford might go, if he leaves via free agency, Tampa might have to face him 18 times a year if he were in New York or Boston.
Will Crawford be the only Ray to exit? Will Tampa hold a fire sale of a few players? Who might also be on the block?
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CF B.J. Upton. Manager Joe Maddon certainly didn’t come rushing to defend Upton after yesterday’s dugout brushup with 3B Evan Longoria. Upton has long drawn Maddon’s ire during his time with the Rays and he is one of my least favorite players. Upton had appeared to be regaining some control at the plate a few weeks ago, but in his last 6 games, Upton struck out 7 times in 21 AB’s, posting a meager .143 BA. Upton is back to .223 on the season, nearly 40 points under his career average. The St. Pete Times reported this morning that OF Gabe Kapler has been rehabbing in Port Charlotte with the clubs single A affiliate, the Stone Crabs. Kapler has been playing center field. Hmmm. Perhaps the Rays aren’t waiting until July 31st to give Upton a change of scenery.
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1B Carlos Pena. Another one of the Rays which is underachieving this season. He’s long been known as a streaky player who doesn’t hit for average, but power. Earlier this month Pena illustrated that with a 6 game home run streak which set a Tampa Bay record. Pena isn’t even batting his weight, a feat you try to achieve in Little League, at .201 coupled with 83 strike outs in 259 at bats. Pena’s best season with Tampa and his career was in 2007 when he batted .282, drove in 121 runs and launched 46 homeruns. His numbers have declined every year since then. I don’t know what sort of interest he would draw on the trade market, but if the phone rings and the Rays are 8 games back, you better answer it.
I hope that Carl Crawford and Pena get to finish the season with the Rays because that will mean that Tampa is in the running for atleast a wildcard spot, but based on the last month, you never know.
Speaking of the last month, Jason Collette, author of The Dock of the Rays site wrote a great piece this morning about the 30 reasons why the Rays have stunk it up in the last 30 games. It’s a great read.
Rays lose 5th straight series, frustrations mount
Well. Well. Well. As the announcers on FSN try to put a positive spin on today’s loss, which is the 5th consecutive series loss the Tampa Bay Rays have had, there is one positive note. Someone has called BJ Upton out.
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In the top of the 5th inning when the Rays returned to the dugout, 3B Evan Longoria said something to the perpetual underachieving CF BJ Upton about his hustle on a play which resulted in a triple for Arizona. Upton finished the Arizona series 0-9 while his 22 year old brother who plays for Arizona went 5-8. Hey Arizona, leave Justin and take BJ when you leave the Trop. In Manager Joe Maddon’s presser after the game, he also called out Upton and his lack of hustle on the ball. During the exchange, with Longoria in the dugout, Upton had to be restrained by Willie Aybar. I’d have just let the two go at it, Upton is a lazy, arrogant player who reads too many fantasy baseball magazines about how wonderful he is, Longoria delivers, one only has to look at his stellar play in the 6th turning a double play. He ran down Upton on the 3rd base line and then in full stride, turned and fired a bullet to second base.
Wade Davis had a decent outing, managing 7.1 innings tossing 104 pitches and 71% of them went for strikes while collecting 5 K’s. Davis might have secured himself a few more starts before the All-Star break, but he has to be on a short leash. However, as the Rays faced the worst pitching staff in baseball, they managed a .086 BA. 7 hits in 3 days. 2 hits today and a shutout on Friday. Tampa was 5/25 with runners in scoring position for the series. The Rays couldn’t capitalize on 7 walks today either by Arizona pitching. Not to mention a 7-11 record in interleague play this season.
In my opinion, these next 9 games will shape the Rays year. A week ago, Tampa was tied for 1st place, and now a week later, they are in third and things appear to be unraveling. Monday is an off day for the Rays and it’s a damn good thing. 5 games with Boston and 4 with Minnesota. This is going to be a daunting task for a team which can’t seem to hit it’s way out of a wet paper bag currently. Tampa is 3-7 in their last 10 games, and they desperately need a 7 or 8 game win streak just to hang in there and regain confidence. If Tampa goes 3-6 in the next 9, they might never recover for the rest of the season while Carlos Pena and Carl Crawford are traded for the July 31st trade deadline.
Rays Price first to 11
Tampa Bay Rays P David Price recorded his 11th win Saturday one day after the Rays were no hit for the third time in 331 days. The win makes Price the first AL pitcher to win 11 games in the 2010 season. Price came into Saturday’s game having won 3 of his last 5 starts but even though he won many of those games, Price struggled at times to find the strike zone. In those three wins Price recorded, he benefited from great run support, Saturday was another story though.
Price pitched 8 strong innings, throwing 113 pitches, 77 of which were strikes. Price allowed 2 earned runs but struck out 11. It was nice to see Price’s strong outing as Tampa needs to return to a level of normalcy and he helped avoid the Rays losing their 5th consecutive series in a row.
Want to toss a no hitter? Play a team from Florida. Three of the past five no hitters have been thrown against the Rays and one this season tossed against the Florida Marlins. The last was Friday night as the Rays faced their former teammate Edwin Jackson. During the 2007 season, I nicknamed Jackson, Ed-2 win Jackson as he went 5-15. In 2008, Jackson was more respectable as he went 14-11. The Rays are now in the MLB record book, albeit not a record I’m proud of. The three no hitters thrown against the Rays were within a span of 140 games, or 331 games. Lets hope this is one string Tampa can break soon. I’ve watched enough no hitters.
Thankfully, this is the final game of the failed experiment of interleague play. It’s the rubber game of the Diamondbacks series and hopefully the Rays can pull off another victory. The Rays are rolling out Wade “my days my be numbered” Davis to face Arizona pitcher Rodrigo Lopez (3-6 4.59) Davis failed to record a win in the month of June, 0-4 7.32 era, and has only 2 wins in his last 9 decisions. Davis started the season 3-1 with a 2.79 era but the wheels have fallen off as of late.
Rays rally for win,problems linger, here come Matt Joyce
The Tampa Bay Rays finally rallied for a 5-3 home win today, bringing their home record to 2 games above .500 for the season. The Rays jumped out on top in the bottom of the first, when underachieving CF BJ Upton hit a homerun. Bonus. Why Rays Manager Joe Maddon decided to let Upton hit in the leadoff spot is beyond me. We’ve seen Upton, we’ve seen Bartlett, Jaso and any other variety of batters hit in the leadoff spot, but why isn’t Carl Crawford tried in the leadoff spot? Really.
Matt Garza was acceptable as a pitcher this afternoon, but once again he let too many leadoff hitters on base. But, once again, the Rays left too many men on base. Tampa finished the day 1-12 at bat with runners in scoring position and left 7 runners on base. This meltdown for the Rays began with several members of the starting staff having pitching meltdowns but now the slump is starting to creep into the batting order as well. This was a painful game to watch early on in the game as Tampa left 7 men on base in the early innings, then the phantom “balk” call on Garza in the top of the 7th which led to Maddon’s ejection. 2 consecutive days of balks by the Rays.
Tampa now faces Arizona tomorrow night. In this spiral of loses, any and all wins the team can accumulate at this point will be critical come September, especially after losing the last 4 series they have played.
Tampa has now optioned Dioner Navarro to Durham and have recalled OF Matt Joyce. Hmm… sounds something similar to what I wrote in this space earlier in the week. How much further behind Joyce is Hellickson? Just sayin…….
Long Ball Trounces Tampa
The Tampa Bay Rays are in a freefall. On Tuesday night, manager Joe Maddon had an uncharacteristic outburst in the dugout. On Wednesday prior to taking the field, 1B Carlos Pena held a players only meeting. Neither event fueled the Rays as they dropped their 8th of their last 11 games last night. Tampa has now lost 4 series in a row and are facing a possible sweep by the San Diego Padres.
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James Shields was dealt his 6th straight loss and gave up 4 earned runs after 7 innings pitched. Shields surrendered three home runs as well. This afternoon, the Rays will have Matt Garza (7-5 4.16) on the mound. Garza was shelled on his last outing and left after 1.1 innings as Florida jumped on him early for 7 earned runs.
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Rays 3B Evan Longoria is in a slump right along with the rest of the Rays. Longo has 4 hits in his last 31 at bats and last night was 0-3 with runners in scoring position. Tampa left 8 runners on base last night and was 0-8 at the plate with those runners in scoring position. Tampa’s team batting average has now fallen to .257 which is 19th best in the majors.
Tampa needs to find some semblance of a game soon. After today the Rays play 3 games against Arizona to wrap up interleague play and then play 9 games, 4 with Minnesota sandwiched by 5 with Boston. This could get ugly.
