Quietly Winning In Tampa Bay
Seeking a cure for anonymity
Welcome to Warning Track Power, an independent newsletter of baseball stories and analysis grounded in front office and scouting experiences and the personalities encountered along the way.
The Tampa Bay Rays have slugged and spun their way to a 31-11 record. At home, they are 19-3. And yet at home, they still perform before a mostly empty seating bowl, even with an average reported attendance that’s nearly 4,700 greater than last year.
What Tropicana Field lacks in ambiance, aesthetics, and natural light, it certainly makes up for in home cooking. The Rays, as you may have forgotten, began the season with 13 consecutive wins. Well, 10 of those games were played at the Trop.
On the surface, it looks like Tampa has unlocked a real home-field advantage. They’re only 12-8 on the road and, overall, just 5-5 in their last 10 games.
At one point this season, the Rays were 20-3. They were also once 27-6, a record that feels disappointing after 20-3. It underscores their outstanding start. How many teams would be disappointed winning seven out of 10 games?
The Rays’ early season success puts them in the company of the 1984 Tigers, a World Series-winning team that many can remember, as well as the 1902 Pirates, 1912 Giants, and 1939 Yankees.
Are the 2023 Rays any more recognizable than the ’39 Yanks. If you saw Joe DiMaggio and Lou Gehrig walking down the street, I’d bet you’d know them (and be scared out of your mind). Could you say the same for any member of the current vintage from Tampa? Winning three out of every four games is hard enough. Imagine doing so while remaining relatively anonymous.
At Warning Track Power, we don’t want to imagine, nor do we want our friends in Tampa to remain hidden inside of a dome. So for the next two weeks, I’m going to follow the Rays — closely watching all of their games — to provide a better understanding of who this team really is.
By Memorial Day, we will know.
Today, Tampa begins a three-game series in New York against the Mets. Justin Verlander will be greeting them from 60-feet, six-inches away in the top of the first inning.
Following their stay at Citi Field, the Rays return home to play 10 straight games against likely playoff teams: the Brewers, the Blue Jays, and the Dodgers.
The next two weeks provide balance to what April gifted the Rays. In the first month of the season, Tampa Bay played Detroit, Washington, Oakland, Boston, Toronto, Cincinnati, the White Sox, Houston, and the White Sox again. They won all but two of those series. Can you guess which teams took two out of three games from them?
Exactly. The Jays and the Astros.
That opening month of 23-6 is amazing — but not unbelievable given the schedule.
Taking the ball for the Rays tonight is Jalen Beeks. He’s already appeared in 15 games this year, starting three of them, yet logging only 20 total innings. Those numbers give you a sense of how Tampa deploys the lefty.
Beeks is an opener and a bullpen arm. The plan is for him to throw two or three innings, then turn the ball over to Yonny Chirinos. The Mets, meanwhile, will let Verlander go until he can’t go any further.
In 2015, I was scouting for Tampa and Beeks was in the Red Sox organization, which selected him in the 12th round of the 2014 Draft out of the University of Arkansas. I saw Beeks start for the Greenville Drive against the Charleston RiverDogs in A-ball’s version of the Red Sox/Yankees rivalry. There were impressive players on the field that series, including Rafael Devers, Joan Moncada, Michael Kopech, and Jorge Mateo.
When I submitted my reports to Tampa, Beeks was not among those I had ticketed for the big leagues. I missed. In a strange way, that’s part of the fun of scouting, part of what drives a scout.
During my year working for the Rays, I wasn’t able to unlock any of the organization’s secrets. I may have identified a couple ingredients that go into the special sauce, but certainly not enough to make it at home.
I enjoy following Tampa. I met people there whom I will always root for. I think it’s amazing how consistently they are able to do so much while spending so little. Part of that formula involves identifying players on the fringe and tapping into one tool — one skill — that creates Major League value.
In July 2018, the Rays (wisely) ignored my report and traded pending free-agent Nate Eovaldi to Boston for Beeks.
Tonight he begins a 13-game stretch for Tampa that will reveal who they really are.
WTP offers free and paid versions. Sign up now and never miss a word.