Organizational Rankings: #3 – Tampa Bay
And now, for the American League East.
On future talent, the Rays are the only organization that the Rangers envy, as they boast the same ridiculous depth of position player talent and then add in a better crop of young arms. It’s easy to get lost in the never ending sea of talent in Tampa Bay, as they have stars-in-the-making everywhere you look. And they’re not sitting around waiting for these kids to develop before making a run; this team is really good right now.
They had seven players post +3 WAR or better seasons last year, and that doesn’t include Carlos Pena or B.J. Upton. Evan Longoria is the most valuable commodity in the game, a franchise player being paid like a middle reliever. They are getting so much value from cost controlled players that they could afford to spend 23 percent of the budget on Pat Burrell and Rafael Soriano.
In any other division, they’d be monstrous favorites. But they don’t play in any other division, they play in the AL Beast. So, to make the playoffs, they have to climb over one of the only two teams who rank ahead of them on this series. When your parents told you that life was not always fair, this is what they meant.
But just because the task is a challenge, don’t write off the Rays. They aren’t that far behind the Big Two in terms of true talent, and with two playoff spots up for grabs between the three teams, there is a good chance you’ll be seeing Tampa Bay in October. The simulations run by the guys over at RLYW had the Rays making the playoffs 46 percent of the time.
This is a roster that can win this year, even with the extra hurdle of having to beat out Boston or New York. While they’ll have to make some changes at years end, likely replacing the likes of Carl Crawford and Carlos Pena, they have another wave of premium young talent coming, and they shouldn’t see too steep of a drop-off. Their payroll limitations will always be a hindrance, but the management staff is adept at finding value.
It’s a good team with a great young core and a top notch front office that is setup well for the present and future. They have a couple of behemoths to topple, yes, but they have have the ability to do so.
22
Why not the Mariners?
Why not stop being a jackass?
Forgot that FanGraphs saves lives! Grow up!
Liberty, take your own advice plz. Thx
Grow up!
Boy, that irony sure is decadent.
Obviously people will disagree with the rankings, and that’s the nature of the beast, but how about showing some respect for the effort put forth here? The amount of organization, collaboration, and preparation required to pull this series off should return leeway. I did not participate in the rankings or write-ups, but the work put in deserves appreciation.
To say that every person on earth isn’t entitled to infinite amounts of perfection, as well as pandering, comforting reassurance — all at no cost — means you’re biased against all people, and I find that indefensible at a site like Fangraphs.
I was watching a Morning Joe commercial and they said “We can disagree without being disagreeable,” while I still love being a massive dick more than anything else in life, next to baseball and my favorite team, you don’t learn much by being a dick to people…unless you’re a dick to the right people. I read these articles to learn something about each organization, it’s been a while since I’ve paid attention to all of baseball, and I’ve progressed enough in baseball knowledge (by 2005) that the normal season previews just don’t do it for me anymore. I’m too cheap to buy the BP annual, and haven’t picked up the THT Annual(s) or the BA prospect handbook; so while this hasn’t been perfect, nothing ever is though, it has been somewhat informative and been a nice way for me to prepare myself for the upcoming season. I just wish that Dave and Co. would respond to the more sane and rational disagreements and answer some of the questions. While I’ve had strong disagreements, I’ve tried to keep them sane and rational, that may change in the next two rankings though…here’s to hoping that it doesn’t.
Agreed. If the Rays had the payroll of the upper tier teams they would be number 1 on this list easy.
Well, if they had a larger payroll, they wouldn’t have had a bunch of top 5 picks in the draft. So life evens out.
They actually spent quite a bit the year they signed Canseco and Greg Vaughn and traded for Vinny Castilla. I bet they were in the top half of total payrolls in 1999 and 2000 if not top 10, yet they ended up with pick #6 in 2000, #3 in 2001, and #2 in 2002.
How much of their performance is due to high draft picks and how much farther down would their talent level be without them?
I’m guessing they’d slide down in the draft for more payroll flexibility.
Do we need to go over, again, the rundown of A-list prospects and current contributors the Rays acquired outside the first round of the draft?
Welllll its not their fault their top picks didn’t fizzle out. Not to mention the trades and diamonds their scouts find in the draft.
Actually, a lot of their top picks DID fizzle out. They’ve just been able to find a lot of good players lower in the draft and via trades in recent years.
In one respect, that makes the “high draft picks” argument moot. In another, you could argue that they still got all those high draft picks and squandered them.
To PhilKid3, lets also not pretend that guys like Evan Longoria and David Price have helped, and will help, this organization quite a bit. I agree that the “top five pick” thing is overrated upon further review…but lets not down play the importance of it either.
Price, Longo, Jeff, and BJ are top picks and find players. I don’t know how that compares to other teams top picks though in the same time spand
Recent research at BP (wish I had a link) indicated that, in the AL East, the Rays have had the most unsuccessful drafts of all. The article is premised along the lines of a no-trade world. In it, the Rays amount to a 60-some win team. In other words: they’ve thrived off prudent trades and marginal signings.
So who is going to be number 1? Sox or Yanks?
I think I gotta go Yankees. The other teams in the AL East had to rely on Yankee mistakes and players getting old/injured to have an advantage, and now with the way they have replaced aging veterans like Matsui, Damon, and Abreu with good AND young stars like Sabathia, Burnett, Tiexiera, Swisher, and Granderson it’s hard to see them falling off any time soon.
The only thing you can’t buy is…market size. Yes to yankees.
I’ll be surprised if it’s not the Red Sox. They have more a more proven front office, from John Henry on down. They don’t have the Yankees payroll, but their own payroll is enormous and affords tremendous flexibility in roster construction. Most importantly, they have younger talent in the major leagues and better talent in the minors. They’re just in plain better position to win over the next several years.
“… younger talent in the major leagues …?” The average age of Boston’s projected lineup is 31.5; the same group for the Yankees averages at 31.1. Also, the Yankees have five players in their projected lineup who will be playing in their age-30 season or younger in 2010, while the Red Sox have two.
Moving to the rotation, the Red Sox – with Daisuke Matsuzaka included over Tim Wakefield – stands at 28.2, compared to New York’s 31.4. Bullpens being as interchangeable as they are, I see no point in calculating the average age of that projected aspect of the respective teams.
The Yankees’ are rightfully criticized in regards to the age of key contributors Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada, but Boston is relying on a 37-year-old center fielder and a 34-year-old short stop with one season of 600+ plate appearances in his career. Also, as Jeff Zimmerman showed us: http://bit.ly/9b5CXL, right fielders have accounted for the most trips to the DL of any non-pitcher over the past eight seasons, and the Red Sox employ a right fielder that has amassed 500+ PA’s in consecutive seasons just once, and 600+ PA’s just once.
Yes, the Yankees are old in very valuable areas (short stop and catcher; replacing Pettitte and Rivera are not as difficult as the MSM would like you to believe), but the Red Sox are not as young as public perception indicates.
Wait a minute, I’m confused. Are you suggesting that the Sox are relying on Cameron and Scutaro in the same way that the Yankees have relied and continue to rely on Jeter and Posada? I’m not sure why you chose those sets of two players to compare. If I did know any better, I’d have said it’s cherry picking season.
Not one mention of the coaching staff in the Rays ranking. Any thoughts?
There’s no reason to put negative votes for this comment.
Sure would be nice to see what this franchise could do if the idiot politicians around here ever figured out a plan for a new stadium and the local economy picked back up. Friedman and company are smart enough to make it work, but a $16 million mistake like Burrell sure hurts more than it would for most other teams.
Even with a new stadium though, I’m starting to get depressed about this area’s ability to adequately support the Rays. There just are not enough people here who give a crap about this team. There are still 2,000+ tickets available for Opening Day in a stadium where just over 37,000 is considered a sellout for pete’s sake! It’s almost as if it will take a prolonged run of bad years by the Red Sox and/or Yankees to get people to drop their allegiances to those two teams and become Rays fans. Unfortunately, as the #1 and #2 spots on this list get revealed, that’s not likely to happen any time soon.
Hey Bob, a fella I chat with who lives down by Tampa says that the club might get more revenue if they were parked on the other side of the bay – I’m up here in Queens NY, what’s your take?
It would certainly go up some, to what degree I have no idea. The Saturday and Sunday games have drawn well enough the last two years as people have more time to make the drive from Hillsborough — it’s been the weeknight crowds of 11,000 – 18,000 for teams in legit playoff contention that really kill the average. The locals in St. Pete should be most responsible for the weeknight attendance, and they have proven that they either can’t or won’t support the team enough on weeknights to make it work there. The Rays made a very reasonable proposal (not without flaws but still reasonable) to build a waterfront park on the site of Al Lopez field in downtown St. Pete with the Rays paying a rather large chunk and the locals couldn’t reject it fast enough.
If you were to pretend the Rays never existed and we were getting a new franchise in 2011 and you had to pick a place to put stadium, I could come up with 10 better spots in the area than in the ghetto of downtown St. Pete.
Again though, a large part of the problem is too many northern transplants in this area that refuse to support the local team. They’d rather buy MLB Extra Innings for $200 a year than watch the Rays for free every night. And it’s not just the Yankees and Red Sox either. I went to see Wade Davis’s first home start last year on a Sunday against Detroit, and the Trop was FILLED with Tigers fans. The place went crazy when the bullpen ended up blowing the game in the 9th after Davis threw a gem for 8 innings. Very depressing.
What do you think about a metro through St. Pete, Tampa and what little surrounds the area. Kinda like the one in Baltimore that use to shuttle fans from DC easily.
Maybe the market still needs more time to accept the team. After all, the Rays have only had two competitive teams in their entire existence. Let’s see how the market responds now that this team will likely be a perennial contender.
The Rays have over 36mil coming off the books next year (Pena, Crawford, Soriano, Burrell)…. yet you keep hearing “can they afford Crawford?” With the amount of money they get just from revenues sharing, at what point do we stop giving bonus points to teams that don’t want to spend money?
Don’t they have arb guys who are going to eat into that, though?
According to Cots, Butler, Garza, Upton and Zobrist will all be arb-eligible (plus some other minor guys), and blowing your money on a guy when you have a ML-ready replacement doesn’t seem to be the best allocation of resources for a team like the Rays.
You seem to have intimate knowledge of the Rays’ accounting sheets. Please share with us. How much money are they taking in profits every year?
Best I can find is the Forbes ranking from ’08, team revenue was $138M. Payroll was listed at $52M and operating expenses (assuming this includes all other costs) at $30M.
RE: Crawford, the Rays have absolutely no reason to expect their income to increase with their success. At the same time, their cost-controlled players are going to become more expensive and any player in arbitration will be seeing a substantial raise. That money coming off the books will be used to try to lock up players while they are affordable. Paying Carl Crawford fair money for his value simply would not be smart for a team that has to exist so far below an average payroll.
Good point, I’m pretty sure Crawford is looking for a 1 year deal.
Just because they could afford it next year doesn’t mean they want to outbid the Yankees and tie up huge amounts of money for the next 5-8 years (or whatever he ends up getting). There’s more to consider than just “being cheap”
I read some where that they Rays are way over what the want to be able to spend.
The Trop is such a pain to get to, if they would put up a damn metro train they could increase attendance for sure.
Don’t WANT to spend money? They have a really low revenue stream coming in, because Tampa/St. Pete appears to be a dead zone. They’re at $60-$70M, which is pretty damn respectable for one of the lowest-revenue teams.
Plus, they shouldn’t WANT to sign Crawford, or most anyone, to near-free agent rates. It’s a waste of money when you don’t have all that much to begin with and are really really good at finding deals other teams pass up. $15M to Crawford or $1M to Jennings and $14 to toss around elsewhere? It should be a no-brainer.
I’m all for it, I want to see how Sean Rodreguez developes this year. Oh though I would love to see Crawford sign a team friendly deal. Something like 3 Years 25- 30 mil range. Thats a little more than what they are paying Pat for his 2 year deal rates.
Agreed.
Letting Crawford go (or trading him at the deadline) makes a world of sense, financially and basebally.
Get ‘em, Sky!
I disagree with this ranking. The payroll situation of the Rays is just so bad, they have so little room for error in terms of drafting and developing quality young players.
They current talent, future talent and management situation make this team 3 easily; however, I think you are understating both the huge payroll gap they have compared to some of the other well balanced teams (like the Phillies and Cardinals) teams and the fact that they play in such a hard division.
Basically, if these rankings were an assessment of odds to make the playoffs over the next few years, I don’t see how the Rays would be in the top 5. I’m not really sure what other criteria should be used for “organizational health”, but these rankings seem more about how well FanGraphs thinks each team is constructed.
Dave posted a link on USS Mariner to a blowout projection for the 2010 season using the Diamond Mind season simulator with 5 different projection systems. Pretty interesting stuff:
http://www.rlyw.net/index.php/RLYW/comments/the_2010_diamond_mind_projection_blowout_-_american_league_edition
Even with the Red Sox and Yankees in the same division, the Rays still come out with the 3rd highest playoff percentage in the AL at 46.2% after only the Yankees (63.0%) and Red Sox (53.0%). Not the Rangers, Twins, Angels, Mariners, etc — the Rays. Those are also the only three teams they have winning over 100 games in any of the 1000 seasons simulated (at least I think that’s what the StdW column is supposed to mean).
With the young, productive talent already in place plus the next wave of talent on the way there’s not much reason to think that will change any time soon.
Good points. I guess I underrated their current talent.
The thing about the Rays’ current talent is that it’s not only good and deep, but it’s in place for a long time. Longoria’s contract is through 2015. Shields is there through 2014. Niemann and Price are club-controlled through 2014, Zobrist through 2013, and Garza and Upton through 2012. Add to that the fact that Jennings, Hellickson, Davis, Rodriguez, Brignac, and Joyce are all knocking on the door to the majors, and that’s a TON of cost-controlled talent that lines up at roughly the same time.
There may be a gap between this window and the next one if their low minors guys don’t develop into the same kind of ridiculous depth they’ve got now, but the current window should be open a good 3-4 years at least.
Yeah, Nick, it’s too bad there isn’t a separate post analyzing “current talent” for each team.
(ahem)
I’ve learned to skip everything you write since the great “DIO” disaster of February 2010.
Man, if only the Rays were in another division…they would be almost automatic for the playoffs. At least they have that insane Longoria deal!
Thanks for the TB insight, Bob.
Herein lies the problem:
St Petersburg is full of minorities and old people.
i.e. people who don’t like baseball and/or cant afford it.
But damn, will they fight tooth and nail to not allow the Rays to leave the Trop.
Crotchety bastards ruining it for the rest of us across the bay.
^^^now THAT’S a “jackass” comment.
“minorities” “don’t like baseball”?
blow me, you wortherlss confederate sack
Minorities are poorer than white people, thus less discretionary income to spend on baseball. Black people, as a whole like football and basketball much more than baseball.
The problem also lies in that Florida is experiencing one of the highest unemployment numbers in the nation. When your local economy is based on real estate transactions, construction, and tourism, and there is a lack of those three, people can afford to go to the games.
Living near St. Pete, I know quite a few people who would love to take their kids to a game, but will settle for a family-friendly sports bar or home because of the cost of seeing it in person.
Question about the new stadium: Are they still planning on building something near water and/or in the same design of the old kick ass concept with the retractable cloth shade for the fans? That stadium looked pretty awesome.
Yeah that got voted down by the a holes in St Pete.
Would have been ridiculously awesome.
No. That’s been scrapped altogether — citizens and politicians in St. Pete do not want it. The latest developments involve a volunteer group of business leaders from around the community that studied the issue for several months. They determined that three of the top five prospective sites for a new stadium are on the Tampa side of the bay, so officials from the City of St. Pete have refused to hear their recommendations at all. For now, politicians from the City of Tampa and Hillsborough County are laying low, as they don’t want to step on the toes of the St. Pete folks and the economic situation isn’t favorable anyway. There are two or more private groups that are putting together plans for a stadium at various sites in Tampa, but nothing concrete yet.
Bottom line, it will be a good six years or more before there’s a new stadium, whether it’s in Tampa or St. Pete. I can’t see the Sternburg group putting up with the Trop for much longer than the next few years, so unless something gets locked in soon I think they’ll either look to move out of town or sell to another group.
Sorry for spamming this metrotrain idea on this thread. But that could be a cheaper solution than to build a whole stadium while providing addition mass transit to the community. The old people wouldn’t have to drive as much!
Yeah that new Stadium concept just looked like a nice place to catch a ball game, you’re at the beach, looks like a sailboat outdoors nice shade to shield you from the brutal sun. Catch an afternoon game and go to the beach afterwords…seems like a good deal to me. I also heard something about a nightclub in the stadium too, also another great idea to get the younger crowd there more into baseball…I’m 23 and I’d definitely love to hang out at a nice ballpark catch a good ballgame, then around 10 or 11 hit the club. If they play their cards right playing in the AL East might actually HELP them, marquee teams with marquee names, combined with a great team of their own, should draw the crowds…if they can find a less depressing place to play that is.
I thought the “nightclub” was something they were doing at the Trop, and what they were talking about sounded lame as hell. Maybe they planned on putting a real club in if they got the new digs, though.
Ultimately I think the stadium will end up where the current landfill on the east side of Pinellas County is currently. It is closer to major traffic junctions such as I-275, and opens up some of the central Florida markets a bit.
The Rays remind me of the Orioles from ’66-’83. Please it there’s is a new park…put a retractable dome on it. You’d be doing you rotation and your opposing team’s rotation a big favor. 9 times a year my team’s rotation got screwed by the monsoon season rain delays when we played in Dolphins stadium.
I continue to be astounded by the awesomeness of the Barlett/Garza for Young/Harris trade. At the time, it looked like a pretty reasonable deal that could work for both sides. Now it looks like highway robbery.
If there goal is to increase attendence then they should put the statdium in East Tampa. Granted the traffic on I-4 would be the big varient but that way most of the greater Orlando area could be an hour to an hour and a-half away. They just put the stadium in a bad location for the big ben area, + the Rays were a joke untill about 5 years ago. Basball fans in Central Florida/Big Ben area cared less about them. A lot of this was the fact of all the transplants who are diehard fans of other teams. It will take a while for Tampa to have decent attendence if they ever do.