The playoff tree:
Rays team stats:
Impressive run prevention both in terms of pitching and defense, while the offense was good, albeit not great. We outplayed our Pythagorean record by a whopping 10 games, thanks in large part to a great bullpen as we were 33-15 in 1-run games. I'm certain a good deal of luck was involved, but there's nothing wrong with even a 105-win team.
Hitting stats:
What a season for Wander Franco in his first full year, living up to billing even if he didn't have massive power numbers. I'm expecting some of those doubles to become homers next season but he can keep doing what he did this year every year. Jarren Duran was an inspired acquisition as he played a 4-WAR pace over a full season. There were some disappointments. Brandon Lowe took a step back from his MVP season of last year but was still very good, but the real problem was the black hole at 1B where Ji-Man Choi and Oscar Colas were pretty awful. They each had a disappointing .671 OPS and I could be looking at either acquiring a first-sacker in the offseason or perhaps moving Austin Meadows there and bringing up one of our OF prospects (Josh Lowe, Hunter Bishop, Heliot Ramos). Also Joey Bart had almost as much WAR in about 1/3 of the playing time that Christian Vazquez got as the veteran catcher was great for the staff (he's 80-rated) but he seemed to have left his bat in Boston.
Pitching stats:
Not much to complain about here, other than the injury that robbed us of Brendan McKay. The playoff rotation will be Glasnow-Peacock-Chirinos-Ryan. I'm hopeful that Peacock arrests his late-season swoon while Ryan continues his late-season run.