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Art Deco · 10-26-2023, 06:18 PM

Record: 50-33 (17-10 for the month)
Tied for first place in AL East, percentage points ahead of Baltimore

A decent month for the Rays who end the month right where they began it, virtually tied with Baltimore which also went 17-10 in June. Their .602 winning percentage is second in MLB behind only the Dodgers, who are 51-30. They really eked out the wins this month as 12 of the 17 victories came by one or two runs as the two slow-starting facets of the team, the offense and the starting pitching, continued to have some difficulty. It seemed the typical game would see the starter give up 3-4 runs by the 5th, the pen would shut down the opponent the rest of the way, and the offense would scare up just enough runs to win. Here's how it played out:

This month's only injury of note was to Junior Caminero, who had taken over the 2B job and was hitting well. He sprained an ankle on the 25th and will miss the first half of June and this opened the door for Tetsuhisa Hirata to take the job back for a few weeks. Otherwise we had a couple of pitchers to return from injury in DL Hall and Ryan Pepiot and if some starters don't get their act together soon (looking at you, Matt Brash) one or both of them could join the rotation.

Where things stand in MLB:

McClanahan has come back to Earth some but still ranks among the leaders in several pitching categories including an AL-best 2.9 pitcher WAR.

These numbers bear out what I mentioned in the open as the offensive struggles continued and the starting pitching has been highly mediocre with almost a 2-run difference between the rotation and the pen. As a result we're now playing over our Pythagorean record by 2 games as we've been grinding out the wins (Matthew Peguero is tied for the AL saves lead with 26).

A lot of disappointment here with three of the biggest bats we were counting on (Marsh, Alcantara, Casas) combining for -0.3 WAR. Ouch. And that's with Alcantara heating up over the second half of June. It was disappointing to see Caminero go down after becoming one of our few consistent hitters. Short of major trades (and selling low) we're just going to have to hope that the underachievers positively regress to the mean.

After an excellent debut month with us Ramirez was lousy in June and all of the non-McClanahan rotation has ERAs well above 4. Brash in particular is problematic because he doesn't have the stamina to go much more than 5 on a good day and if he's ineffective he's forcing us to really cover a lot of innings with the bullpen.

Kim and Diaz are possible starting help on the farm, but neither distinguished themselves in brief runs with the big club earlier this year so it's more likely a Hall or Pepiot replaces Brash in the rotation in the first instance. Durham is playing amazing baseball (53-25) with several big-league experienced bats like Thomas Saggese and Joe Quelch raking as well as this guy:

Vasquez is a bit old for a prospect but he can hit, rated 50 contact and 55 power. The only problem is that he plays SS/3B with Carson Williams and Elly De La Cruz two of the guys who actually are hitting for us.

10-26-2023, 06:18 PM	#106
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 7,902	June 2028 Record: 50-33 (17-10 for the month) Tied for first place in AL East, percentage points ahead of Baltimore A decent month for the Rays who end the month right where they began it, virtually tied with Baltimore which also went 17-10 in June. Their .602 winning percentage is second in MLB behind only the Dodgers, who are 51-30. They really eked out the wins this month as 12 of the 17 victories came by one or two runs as the two slow-starting facets of the team, the offense and the starting pitching, continued to have some difficulty. It seemed the typical game would see the starter give up 3-4 runs by the 5th, the pen would shut down the opponent the rest of the way, and the offense would scare up just enough runs to win. Here's how it played out: This month's only injury of note was to Junior Caminero, who had taken over the 2B job and was hitting well. He sprained an ankle on the 25th and will miss the first half of June and this opened the door for Tetsuhisa Hirata to take the job back for a few weeks. Otherwise we had a couple of pitchers to return from injury in DL Hall and Ryan Pepiot and if some starters don't get their act together soon (looking at you, Matt Brash) one or both of them could join the rotation. Where things stand in MLB: McClanahan has come back to Earth some but still ranks among the leaders in several pitching categories including an AL-best 2.9 pitcher WAR. These numbers bear out what I mentioned in the open as the offensive struggles continued and the starting pitching has been highly mediocre with almost a 2-run difference between the rotation and the pen. As a result we're now playing over our Pythagorean record by 2 games as we've been grinding out the wins (Matthew Peguero is tied for the AL saves lead with 26). A lot of disappointment here with three of the biggest bats we were counting on (Marsh, Alcantara, Casas) combining for -0.3 WAR. Ouch. And that's with Alcantara heating up over the second half of June. It was disappointing to see Caminero go down after becoming one of our few consistent hitters. Short of major trades (and selling low) we're just going to have to hope that the underachievers positively regress to the mean. After an excellent debut month with us Ramirez was lousy in June and all of the non-McClanahan rotation has ERAs well above 4. Brash in particular is problematic because he doesn't have the stamina to go much more than 5 on a good day and if he's ineffective he's forcing us to really cover a lot of innings with the bullpen. Kim and Diaz are possible starting help on the farm, but neither distinguished themselves in brief runs with the big club earlier this year so it's more likely a Hall or Pepiot replaces Brash in the rotation in the first instance. Durham is playing amazing baseball (53-25) with several big-league experienced bats like Thomas Saggese and Joe Quelch raking as well as this guy: Vasquez is a bit old for a prospect but he can hit, rated 50 contact and 55 power. The only problem is that he plays SS/3B with Carson Williams and Elly De La Cruz two of the guys who actually are hitting for us.