How About Those DEVIL RAYS!

Wed. 9 San Francisco W 4-3
Thu. 10 San Francisco W 5-2
Fri. 11 Colorado W 8-7
Sat. 12 Colorado W 10-7
Sun. 13 Colorado W 3-2
Tue. 15 at San Diego W 5-2
Wed. 16 at San Diego W 9-6
Thu. 17 at San Diego W 4-1
Fri. 18 at Arizona W 6-2
Sat. 19 at Arizona W 11-4
Sun. 20 at Arizona W 2-1

Waxing the NL West isn't much of an accomplishment right now, though beating Randy Johnson is a nice feather for the cap. Colorado's awful, Arizona's not much better, San Diego's got all sorts of problems, and the Giants are the Giants. Yeah, yeah, a win's a win, I know, but some perspective is necessary in situations like this.

Despite all the youthful spunk they possess in LF and CF, there's plenty to be po-faced about - the right side of the infield is 72 years old, 3 of their everyday hitters this year (Huff, Hall, Lugo) are at their physical peak & underperforming (Huff's just now starting to do his thing), and saying the DRay pitching staff is improved from last year's is damning by faint praise. The 2K4 Rays are really just a duct-taped version of last year's team, bolstered by folks no one else wanted, scraping by with "rambunctious moxie" and "fear of getting verbally rogered by Pinella", and making another dubious run towards a PR bonanza. (Please don't give the D-Rays Minnie Minoso's phone number.)

Didn't the Royals feast on the AL Central in a fashion similar to Tampa Bay's recent treatment of the Left Coast?

Victor Zambrano has been pitching quite well in the streak.

37-36

baseball does indeed have a long history of irrelevant stats.

I'd love to see TB go all Cinderella and win the wild card.

carl crawford has 17 triples? what's the record on that, i wonder?

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/3B_season.shtml

My bet would've been Wahoo Sam Crawford, but he has the career mark (309!).

Most in the expansion era (1961-) is 21, Willie Wilson (1985) and Lance Johnson (1996). If Carl C exceeds them, it'll be the most since 1949.

After watching the Devil Rays lose for the 10th time after blowing a lead in the eighth inning, Devil Rays manager Lou Piniella said he plans to have a reliever start Wednesday, then turn to Casey Fossum, who is scheduled to start. Reporters laughed. But Piniella insisted he's serious.

"I've made up my mind and that's what we're going to do," he said. "People are going to think I'm crazy, but we're just going to try it. Starting (Wednesday), I'll bring in whatever reliever I feel like starting the game with, and I'll bring my starter in in the third inning and we'll play nine innings of baseball that way.

"I'm serious."

The change of heart for Piniella came later Tuesday night when he sat down to weigh the pros and cons of starting a reliever. When he saw some items on the con side that disturbed him, Piniella decided to stick with his pitching rotation the way he has had it all along.

"I've got some young kids in the rotation that I thought about," Piniella said of changing his mind. "We're trying to develop a ball club as well as win baseball games here, so we just decided to stay the conventional way and that's it.

"It sounds intriguing. It may work, or it may not work, but we'll let somebody else try it first."

Will Carroll on today's Prospectus:

"Lou backed down. I was excited to see Lou Piniella blow off the orthodoxy and alter the pitching plan. It’s something that I’ve seen discussed in the minors--using a reliever to start in order to get the “starter” deeper into games, hoping to teach him how to finish games out without amping up pitch counts. Of course, Piniella would be tossing out his worst relievers, not his flame throwers from the back of the pen, which makes me think that this is more bull than brilliance. Still, I’d like to see someone desperate or crazy enough to challenge the by-the-book thinking prevalent in baseball."

As a 19-year old rookie (he just turned 20 a couple days ago), Delmon compiled the following #s at single A Charleston:

.320/.386/.536 (.922 OPS) w/ 25 HRs, 21 SBs, 115 RBIs

If you're (25+ games out of the WC) Tampa's GM, do you call him up?

Well they didn't and Delmon was unhappy about it:

Rookie Delmon Young Calls D-Rays' Brass "Cheap"

http://devilrays.mostvaluablenetwork.com/rays-prospects/saw-it-with-my-own-eyes/

Regular minor league umpires are on strike this season. Fill-ins umps - most of them with college or high school experience - have been working in their place. Minor league teams are not releasing the names of the replacements.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/14443378.htm

Also, chest != legs!!!

i mean, it's the sort of idiotic thing that merits suspension, in my mind, but i have no doubt that the punishment will be swift, thoughtless and excessive.

I saw the video, and this is definitely not the case. Young talked to the ump, took a moment, walked toward his dugout, and then turned around and chucked the bat in a straight line about fifteen feet at the ump and hit the ump clean in the midsection. It's not like he was tossing his bat toward his dugout and it accidentally hit the ump in the feet. It was definitely intentional. It wasn't the hardest thrown bat of all time, but it was still pretty fucked up.

I personally would suspend him at least twice as much as what Robby Alomar got.

His service time doesn't begin until he's in the majors, and Tampa is real miserly when it comes to service time. To top that off, they already have Gathright, Gomes, Huff, Hollins, and Baldelli to play the outfield, with Upton as a potential candidate in CF as well. Which is to say that there's no rush, and I imagine they have no intention of bringing Young up any time soon despite the fact that he would probably be their second best hitter already.

That was a shitty strike call, tho. In his defense. Cough.

3rd in AL pitching VORP is James Shields (behind Haren, Lackey).

HI DERE BJ UPTON

(hopefully) BUY DERE TY WIGGINGTONG

NOT A REAL TEAM ACCORDING TO TRACER HAND, ESQ.

BJ Upton is just awesome. I wish he was staying at 2B though, for selfish fantasy league reasons. :(

annnnd say hello to your first team to be eliminated from postseason contention.

also: "Baseball Prospectus reports that the Rays have already decided to shut Baldelli down for the year, and that Baldelli might even be contemplating retirement." u_u

b-b-but they just won a series against the new york yankers...

good old rocco.

If you can tune into the D-Ray broadcast of tonight's tilt against the O's, you'll see Carl Crawford trying to leap over the 1B coach trying to get @ the 1B ump after said ump totally blew a call (according to the announcers, the 2nd blown call to go against TBA tonight).

2nd by the 1B umpire, BTW.

Pete (Tampa): Why do my Rays have so many outfielders? WHY? Shouldn't our surplus be traded?

Rob Neyer: (12:22 PM ET ) Frankly, the Rays' mismanagement of the organizational talent borders on the criminal. A year ago, TWO years ago, it was obvious they had too many outfielders, and should trade some for pitching depth. Now, I do like a lot of their young pitchers, but the fact is that they've got the worst ERA in the majors, by a lot.

http://www.draysbay.com/story/2007/9/20/144345/782

http://draysbay.com/images/admin/raysunifronth.jpg.gif
http://draysbay.com/images/admin/rayslogos.jpg.gif

I guess anything's an improvement, but I dunno about that little yellow lens flare thing - looks like somebody went crazy with a copy of "101 Essential Photoshop Plugins '98."

I'm pretty sure I could make something better than that in an hour, and I have no design background whatsoever.

i do - and i agree with you.
it is better than what they have now tho.

gonna be a hellish season of doubleheaders/rainouts/sitting in the clubhouse waiting/playing till 2am just to get the game in

jesus

Rays will play 47 of first 59 at home, then 69 of last 103 on road

Hey UFAs, do you hate your family? Sign up with the Rays and you don't have to see them for a couple of months.