They won last 8 out of 10. They swept Sox in a 3 game series. May be it is real. may be not. But I am impressed.

They have young pitching, hitting and looks like bullpen too. I felt their overall bullpen is better than SOX. Except for Paps and Okajima, our bullpen is very scary (Timlin, Lopez and even Delcarmen).

They don't have experience but they are playing excellent ball. Damn! Scott Kazmir is not even playing yet.

Do you guys think they can win ALEast or get wild card? Is it possible? Yankees don't have pitching. Our bullpen is weak. If they can do it, this is the best year for them.


What do you guys think?

I don't expect their bullpen performance to be maintained through the entire season. Plus, their lineup is somewhat less than impressive overall. They will win more games than usual, but 3rd place at around .500 is their best case scenario, in my opinion.

Plus Kazmir is coming back. And I think their bullpen, normally their Achilles heal, really could be solid.

Remember the rumor that they were going to sign Bonds to DH? Scary & intriguing.

Can they do win?

I do know do win do Red Sox do.

Can they do win not? Yes!

They have a pretty good lineup (not great) mixed with a very good rotation. BP arms are unpredictable and the Rays could have a fluky year in which their BP continues to out-perform. I doubt they'll win the east, but with the Yankees (whom I'm not counting out by any means) having A-Rod and Posada missing an extended period of time while Hughes (now DL), Kennedy, and Mussina get hammered every start put the Rays in an intriguing position in the AL East. Combined that with the fact that Detroit has no SP or RP while Cleveland overall doesn’t look that good tells me that they have a shot at sneaking into the post-season.

I would be very interested to see what their new owner does if they are in contention come late July. If there is a #1 available, Kazmir becomes more attractive when looked at as a #2, and their #3 isnt bad either.

Keep in mind that the entire team salary this season is 43,422,997 (ESPN: breakdown)

The numbers support that:

Lineup:
Player - pos. - avg. - obp
Iwamura - 2b - .210 - .310
Crawford - LF -.86 - .381
B.J. Upton - CF .293 - .385
C. Pena - 1B - .196 - .381
Longoria - 3b - .273 - .388
Gomes - DH - .245 - .349
Hinske - RF - .288 - .409
Riggans - C - .255 - .256
Bartlett - SS - .211 - .245

As of 4/30 Tampa ranks: 15th in avg. (.256), 13th in runs (130) 14th in HR (28).

However, in pitching they rank (in all MLB)
-6th in ERA (3.68)
-4th in BAA (.239)
-2nd in total bases allowed (321)
-4th in WHIP (1.26)

I never thought such a thing would happen. When I go to MLB Today's scores on espn, I check out Tampa Game first when Sox lose. I don't even look at what happened to Yankees game. What a turn of events. I think Cashman is history by the mid season if the yankees stay in the cellar of AL EAST.

Yeah, if the Yankees stay in the cellar; but they'll be getting A-Rod and Posada back soon (that's a huge chink of offenive potential) and they'll pick up a few pieces somehow.

I still fear the Skanks far more than the Rays.

THIS season.

That would be fantastic. Not because he is necessarily an elite GM -- but at least the guy has a realistic vision of what the future of that team is. And the future isn't now. It wasn't going to be now if they had traded for Santana. And it isn't going to be now if they can Cashman, and bring in someone to make a bunch of panic moves on Hank's behalf.

If the Yankees want to change course and go all in on this season, I say bring it on. I'm already not afraid of them this year. Go ahead, make it so I don't have to be afraid of them in '09 and 2010, either. Because I'll tell you right now, I am afraid of them in the next couple of years. Maybe I'm giving too much credit to the kids in diapers, and not enough credit to the guys in adult diapers, but the '08 team is flawed, badly flawed, and the only reason I think anyone is afraid of them is because we assume that there is some magical force that allows guys like Aaron Small and Shawn Chacon and Tanyon f**king Sturtze to forget their well-established track records of incompetence.



See above.

The shock of the division right now is Baltimore -- I thought for sure they were, while headed in the right direction long-term, headed for 100 losses this season. But my thoughts on the AL East before the season were:

1 Boston
2 Tampa Bay
3 Toronto
4 New York
5 Baltimore

I forgot that Toronto is cursed. Clearly they will not finish in third place. I'll concede that to the currently last place Yankees. But I think Tampa Bay is more for real than the Yankees are.

This is going to be one hell of a division in 2010, that's all I can say.

With all due respect to the much improved Rays, the Yankees are still the team to worry about. Haven't most of us been guilty of counting them out too early a few times this decade already? They certainly have flaws, but they also have the means to fix some of them.

That's exactly how I feel.

I'm ready to see the Yankees actually fail to be a contender and let that doubt be validated in my mind in future seasons, but as for 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007... each season I thought they'd collapse, and they managed to finish first in all but one of those.

And 2006 was a disaster, where WE collapsed.

I want to see a Yankee collapse before I'll freely speculate that they'll "collapse" again, in future regular seasons.

The playoffs are a different matter, of course, where I've now come to sort of expect them to collapse.

If they traded for Santana, they would have Santana, Ching Ming Wang and Pettite as top 3 on their rotation. I think that would have been pretty good. Why do think the trade would not be have been good?

I hope they fire Cashman.

Among other things, Cashman didn't want a $225M payroll. He was actually doing the work of ownership and trying to operate the business with a design to slice payroll after the 2008 season ended and several large contracts came to an end. Sure, he overestimated the immediate worth of the two kid pitchers. And yes, Santana would look nice in pinstripes.

2008 may be a transition year for the Yankees and Cashman may end up as the scapegoat. Or maybe there's another plot twist on the horizon. Right now, they have to start hitting the baseball out of the infield and scoring runs. They're on pace to score 670 runs this season.

Because I'm not sure Pettitte is a top-3 guy anymore. Because I fully expect Mike Mussina to revert to form as the occasionally brilliant but more frequently awful pitcher that he has been for the last several years. Because there's still no #5 in that mix.

Because that lineup still includes about 4 dozen guys who are best suited to DHing at this stage in their careers. Too many injury risks. Too many guys with chronic injury problems. Below average range all the way across the outfield. Below average (and sinking fast, it seems) range at SS.

Because they would have been trading away the organizational depth to get Santana that could otherwise help them address these issues either internally or via trade.

They could hang around with Santana. Maybe even make it 5 games into the ALDS before their season would end. But I don't think they would legitimately contend for a World Series title - which is the goal, particularly in NY, is it not?

That's been my position since the offseason, and I'm stubbornly sticking to it. Worst thing that happens is I'm completely wrong. I just think the Yankees weren't going to be THE team in 2008 regardless. And they're in better shape for '09 and '10 for not having tried to go for it all this year.

And if that doesn't work for Hank, and he wants them to dump some kids and take on more bad contracts and aging players, I'm all for it. They have a lot of bad contracts coming off the books after this year. They could really use a new set of overpaid underachievers to fill the roster and limit their flexibility to make smart baseball decisions.

Every time the Yankees start the season like this, and they done it twice before in recent years, I start remembering how I felt in 1965 when the original dynasty came tumbling to the ground. Mickey Mantle finally hit under .300 and became a liability in CF. Roger Maris had a broken thumb that nobody knew about and he lost virtually all of his power. Tony Kubek had retired after the 1964 season. Whitey Ford's left arm went dead due to circulation problems. Jim Bouton's arm went dead from overuse. And suddenly they were a sixth-place team.

1982 is a more recent precedent that fits the Steinbrenner meddling theory. They let Reggie go and everything went south in a hurry. They went from great to lousy in one season. Can it happen in this era with all the money at the Yanks' disposal? I don't know. But it has happened before. All great teams have a certain shelf life. The Yanks have been very good for 12 years now. That's a long time.

You and Rominer have it nailed.

Cashman did the right thing with Hughes, Joba (whom I'm finding it hard to hate), and Kennedy (although I think he's a potential bust right now, as opposed to the Santana Trade Talk Period).

2008 may be a non-Yankee contention year, but they'll be better in '09 and '10 for this decision; I still think that Hughes is the real deal (although I of course now think that BP may have been right when they red-lit him for "brittleness") and I think Chamberlain is destined for Mariano's spot.

Cashman was on espn radio the other day and insisted that the long term plan is still to make Chamberlain a starter, just not as fast as Hank wants them to.

Yeah, that might be his current bluster, but Papelbon transformed us from a really good team to a scary-good team, in a way, much as Mariano has for the Yankees since his debut as closer.

They're going to need his replacement one day in the not-too-distant future.

I don't get how keeping Kennedy+Melky+some B grade prospect over Johan Santana makes them better for the future. Kennedy has looked awful and while he will get better, he has the ceiling of a #4 starter. Melky isn't anything special either. Johan is one of the best pitchers in the game right now, never mind the fact he's left handed. He's also only 29 years old and has many strong years ahead of him. I guess one can argue the money they get to save from a contract like Johan, but aren’t pitchers of his caliber the type of guys you want to give out the big contracts too? Never mind the fact that their the Yankees and can afford just about everything, they have Jason Giambi, Mike Mussina, Bobby Abreu, Kyle Farnsworth, Latroy Hawkins,and Andy Pettitte coming off the books (I think around the 80mil range). Chances are the Yankees are going to use that money on a big name pitcher (C.C Sabathia) and will probably strongly pursue a starting 1B (Texiera).

I remember the deal being either Kennedy + Melky + Hughes + a top prospect or Kennedy + Wang + top prospect. Considering how much the Yanks would have to pay Santana I thought that was too much talent to give up. If the Twins would have accepted your proposal the Yanks would have been foolish to turn it down.

As for Santana, I think Mets are going to end up regretting that contract in a few years. Despite pitching in a weaker league he's striking out less than one per inning for the first time since 2001 and his HR's are way up.

It's especially scary considerig that not only did he switch to a weaker league, but he went from the Metrodome to Shea. Does anyone know if the Mets new stadium is supposed to be more hitter friendly than Shea is?

That was what the twins wanted at first, but after they didn't get what they wanted from the Red Sox, they came back looking for a deal with Kennedy or Hughes and Cabrera in it.

"He says they are now willing to substitute Jeff Marquez for Ian Kennedy. So the Yankees would have to give up Phil Hughes, Melky Cabrera, and Marquez"

Then I heard they wouldn't even give up Kennedy and Cabrera.

We must have heard different things, I heard the Twins would have "settled" for Kennedy + Wang + either Tabata or Jackson -- this was their last proposal, right before they traded him to the Mets. If either Cabrera or Kennedy was the deal breaker Cashman should be fired, even though I think the Mets signed him for too many years.

Just a quickie about the Rays from watch some of their game with the A's last night after I caught all I could find and record on the Lester no-no. No TV for me for it but ESPN was pretty good in showing highlights of it. The Rays:

1. They got 5 1/3 innings of 1 run relief work from 4 guys, and the one was given up by Percival when he had the 2 run lead at the end. Pretty good relieving on the road, most of it in extras.

2. The 2 run lead happened when Longoria absolutely destroyed a Chad Gaudin pitch. Maybe that was the first I'd seen him, and trying to think of who he swings the bat like. Maybe Chipper Jones? To use Manny language, looks like he could be a bad man, and he's heating up.

p.s., Iwamura acts like a little dick, but I don't know what people say about my favorite second baseman though.

Incredible blurb from the AP article on the Rays game today.... it's only been 105 years.

Yeah, and... who won the Series that season, hmmm?

Tampa won't be in first OR second at the end of the season, they will battle it out for 3rd. They have yet to have an extended west coast swing, 8 of their wins have come against the O's, and they haven't really played a tough schedule yet. Don't get me wrong, they are playing great ball, but I don't think that it will last when their schedule strenghtens.

-Percival Dl'd.
And I think that's the first somehwat major injury other than the beginning of the year Kazmir shelving. It will be interesting to see how that affects their BP. I wonder how deep that BP is. I know they've done some nice patchwork in the offseason with it, but I don't think there's much behind the guys that are there now...

To complement what you said, they've also had 31 home games so far vs. just 23 on the road. Their home road splits aren't as bad as Boston's, but they do have a losing record on the road. Boston has had 26 home games, 30 road. The worm is turning soon.

The worm may very well turn this week, with the surprisingly good White Sox getting 4 games against our new divisional overlords. I figure that even with this year's Red Sox team on the road, a 2-2 split in Baltimore should be doable.

After a dismal west coast swing (as usual) I hope that we do not have to settle for just a "split" in Baltimore. I am expecting that we will have regained the East lead by Monday. As it was stated, the Rays are playing ggood ball, but they have had a lot of things going in their favor.

Hey, Teddy Ballgame, nice moniker, welcome. How'd you get that one when this board has been around so long?

Besides the Red Sox and the Rays, strange things are happening, like the Giants sweeping three in AZ and going 6 - 3 on their road trip. I'm ready for the Red Sox starting to play some winning ball.

While I agree with much of what you put, I was just curious as to what team you thought would be the solid second place team? I honestly think the Rays have as good a chance as any. As you said, eight of their wins have been against the O's, that should pretty much tell you the O's aren't contending for second place any time soon (and the O's lack of depth will start to show as the season wears on). The Yankees are in retool mode right now. More than ever I doubt Cashman makes any major moves to try and salvage this season - his eyes seem to be on next season forward. The Yanks won't be in the cellar at season's end, but I doubt they make enough moves to get higher than third place, and if they DO put it together are at best going to be in a battle with the Rays. The Jays have a pretty good team but they always seem to fall apart - the Jays will probably battle the Rays for second place for much of the season, while neither of them will catch a deeper Boston team once the Sox hit their stride.

Believe it, folks. The Rays have had some decent players for a while now, and I was honestly surprised they dwelled in the cellar for so long. While there's no way they win the East (and on that note, the WC - I think the WC comes from a division with a weaker bottom half than the East for the top teams to feast on) the Rays are legit and are going to give the league fits.

As much as I hate the Yankees, and as poorly as they are playing, they still have a great offense that is capable of producing tons of runs. I think that the Yankees will, in fact, finish in second in the East and the Rays will finish in 3rd. The Rays are still quite young, and when the schedue strenghtens I feel they will slide, and slide quickly. I predicted, at the beginning of the season, that the O's would be one of the 3 worst teams in the league, and I still think that this will happen as well. My prediction is"
Sox
Yanks
Rays
Jays
O's
With the Sox being the only playoff team out of the East. Remember the 13.5 game lead we had last season, the Yankees got within 2 by the end of the season...I am not expecting them to get that close to us this season, I still think that they have enough fire power to get to second.

With the Rays in first place leading up to this week's showdown, it's worth noting that they've currently got a .500 road record, and have only 5 more home games than road games. They are first in the majors in ESPN's power index (with the Sox second) and 6th in the majors in Pythagorean record (with the Sox 5th). They're tied for the best record in baseball (with the Sox 4th). Also, the AL East currently has the Wild Card by 4 games. The PECOTA-adjusted playoff odds report heading into today has them with an 82% chance to make the playoffs (with the Sox at 87%).

So.. are the Rays for real? Are they going to make the playoffs? It seems fair to say the East runner-up will have the best shot at the Wild Card, so can the Rays hold off the Sox and/or the Yankees?

I'm betting that it's going to be an exciting summer, with the Sox and Rays making the playoffs in some order. I hate the team, but it's good to see another team enter the fray - especially if it can come at the expense of the Yankees.

I can't believe that you just cited ESPN's power index as evidence of anything.

That said, since it appears that the TB bullpen is not, in fact, going to come back down to earth, the only thing left that seems to have the potential to bring the Rays crashing down in Aug/Sep is the possibility of young players not pacing themselves enough over the course of 162 games, and some guys breaking down and slumping to the finish line. Given that Maddon seems to actually not be a moron in the Don Zimmer mode, that seems unlikely as well. There doesn't seem to be much doubt that the Rays are "for real" now, but I'm not sure that means that they are going to make the playoffs. The Red Sox still look to be the most well-rounded team in the AL East (once healthy, if that ever happens), and the Yankees may very well be able to slug their way into the playoffs, just like they have done every other season in recent memory. I'm not totally buying into the Rays' road record just yet, as that recent spike is largely due to Interleague play, and beating crappy NL teams on the road is a tad different than beating the top competition in the AL on the road.

Is winning percentage and opponents' winning percentage a bad indicator of a team's strength?

Hopefully the Rays success will foster their move out of the horrid dome they currently inhabit. I have heard that MLB has a standing order for the Rays to leave Tropicana Field by 2010...can anyone confirm or deny that? It will be a happy day when the Twinkie Dome and the Trop are no longer venues for MLB. (In fairness to Toronto they seem to need a dome up there, and who watches Canadian baseball anyway, eh?)

Is there something wrong with this lifelong Sawx fan actually enjoying this whole Tampa Bay thing? I mean, I hate to see Boston 3.5 back, but, I mean, Tampa Bay is in first. In July!

He's still available, and for cheap. They've got to be considering him, right?

If they had Bonds anchoring the middle of their lineup & then went after CC they could be a scary team.

CC
Kazmir
Sheilds
Garza

plus that lineup...

They's be made for the playoffs.

The rational half of my brain says that this is a great thing for baseball as a whole, especially if it's the Yankees that miss the playoffs because of this.

The irrational half... ok ok, the irrational 94% of my brain says that you should die in a fire

After this weekend's four-game series in Tampa with KC, the Rays will have played 50 of their first 88 games at home, where they are 33-13 thus far.

Things change a bit in September. Here's their sked for the first part of the month, when the pennant race will be in full bloom:

Sept. 2 NY Yankees
Sept. 3 NY Yankees
Sept. 4 NY Yankees
Sept. 5 @ Toronto
Sept. 6 @ Toronto
Sept. 7 @ Toronto
Sept. 8 @ Boston
Sept. 9 @ Boston
Sept. 10 @ Boston
Sept. 12 @ NY Yankees
Sept. 13 @ NY Yankees
Sept. 14 @ NY Yankees
Sept. 15 Boston
Sept. 16 Boston
Sept. 17 Boston

That's when we find out what David Ortiz has been talking about the past few days, something about veteran teams knowing what to do when the heat is on. Hey, maybe the Rays go all the way. Stranger things have happened.

They haven't paid their dues. They have crappy fan support. They have some success against Boston and they play our theme song after the game last night in Tampa? And that's knowing they probably wouldn't still have a team there without all the money they get from Boston and New York both in terms of revenue sharing and ticket sales when we're there or the Yankees are there. I hope they go back to last place. **** them. So, I guess that means I disagree with you.

Timmyb, you are a cum-dumpster for the 2 following reasons....

1. Enjoying Tampa sweeping us and being 3 1/2 up in the division.

2. Spelling Sox "Sawx"

The most telltale indicator of a great sports rivalry is when fans hate the other team with a real passion. So I think the Rays have arrived. They pissed off the Yanks in spring training and now they've done the same to Boston. Plus, they are in first place.

Red Sox fans seem to hate the Rays more than Yankee fans, at least for the time being. That probably goes back to the beanball battles earlier in this decade when the Rays still sucked.

The biggest difference in Tampa has been the new GM and his baseball ops staff. They are making smart trades and drafting well. The Garza-Delmon Young trade seems to have worked out for both the Rays and the Twins. Where would Tampa be without Garza?

Everyone talks of Tampa's No. 1 picks and how they have risen from the bottom because they picked first in the draft every summer. But when you count up the No. 1s in their starting lineup, it's only Longoria and Upton. Everyone else came through trades or lower in the draft. Crawford was probably a first-rounder. I'll have to look it up.

edit -- second round, 1999 draft for crawford, who was heading to nebraska on a grid scholarship or UCLA on a hoop ride. that's what scared most baseball teams away. who chooses baseball over football or hoops in this day and age?

If that's the case, the Rays arrived a long time ago. They arrived when Wade Boggs got it in his balding head that he should go into the HOF as a Devil Ray. They arrived again during all those beanball games. They arrived again when they hired Joe "The Worst Announcer In Baseball" Magrane to be their color commentator.

They arrived again when they had that one fan (the only one in the ballpark) who would just sit there and yell "Johnny. Johnny Damon. Demon. Demon Johnny. Johnny Demon. Johnny. Johnny boy. Cut your hair Johnny. Johnny boy. Johnny Damon," for like an hour.

They arrived again when they got Scott Kazmir, who just looks like someone I want to beat up and I don't know why. He just has this half-retarded, half-arrogant look on his face all the time. I want to break his nose.

They definitely arrived when Joe Maddon decided that it was appropriate for him to start yelling into the Red Sox dugout during a mound visit, and all that followed.

I hate that team. But really, it's not new.

Tampa Bay having arrived, in a baseball sense, is good for baseball in that they're in the AL East. It is good for baseball to have the division be more than just Sox and Yankees. And it's especially good for baseball that a low revenue, low payroll team can compete in that division.

Beyond that, though, I can't help but think that it would be better yet for baseball if the rising young team was the Kansas City Royals or Pittsburgh Pirates, or some other low payroll perennial cellar dwellar in a city where the fans had actually spent more than 5 minutes giving a sh*t prior to last week. When the Marlins won in '03, that was good for baseball, too, in that a David beat a Goliath. But neither Marlins championship was especially "good for baseball" otherwise, for the same reason. Nobody there cares. So why should "baseball" care?

That said: Tampa Bay is for real. A lot has to go right for them - or a lot has to continue to go wrong for the Red Sox - for them to be the last team standing in the AL East (IMO, obviously). But they're a viable team now, with an even better long term outlook.

You should have your own blog. That's good stuff. And true, too.

I think the Rays will probably make the playoffs either as a division winner or wild card with the Sox winning either one but keeping the Yankees out of the playoffs.

I hate being stuck watching them. Tonight, for instance, Joe Magrane announced that the Yankees have to sweep or their season is over. Joe !? I know that you are excited that the team is winning, but can you please act like you know what it's like to win.

I also found it humorous to see the tracker at the top of the screen talking about postseason tickets.