Check out more from Jacob Wheatley-Schaller at his sports betting blog, Vegas Watch.
Today is June 9, and the Tampa Bay Rays are 37-26. The team that had never won more than 70 games, and had never been more than five games over .500, looks to be a legitimate contender. They’ve taken a lot of people by surprise, and made the few who saw this coming a lot of money; they’ve been the second most profitable team thus far, behind only the Marlins. It’s been an incredible turnaround for a team that lost 96 games last year and didn’t sign any big-name free agents in the offseason.
So, how have they done it? They’ve done it by completely turning around two areas of the club that aren’t always that noticeable. The first of these is their defense. According to Baseball Prospectus’ Defensive Efficiency—as well as just about anyone who saw them play—the Rays had the worst defense in baseball in 2007, and it wasn’t particularly close; they converted just 66.2 percent of balls in play into outs.
In the offseason, they completely switched up their defense. They finally moved Upton to centerfield, traded a terrible defender (Brendan Harris) for a very good one (Bartlett), moved Iwamura from third to second, and (eventually) called up Evan Longoria from AAA. The results have been really incredible.
This year, they are tied with the Braves for the highest Defensive Efficiency in the league, converting 71.8 percent of BIP into outs. Considering how many balls a team fields over the course of a season, that 5.6 percent jump is really insane. Matthews Carruth at The Hardball Times recently estimated that Tampa’s defense is on pace to be 200 runs better than last year, a 20-win improvement in the field alone.
The Rays’ bullpen last year was also incredibly bad, with a 6.16 ERA. Like the defense, it’s been an entirely different story this season, as they’ve had one of the best pens in baseball. This is another change that could easily go overlooked. They’ve been led by a relative unknown in J.P. Howell and a guy that most people had completely given up on, Troy Percival. Percival didn’t throw a pitch in the majors in 2006, and didn’t make his 2007 debut with the Cardinals until June 29. He was very good in limited work, with a 1.80 ERA in 40 innings. The Rays then signed him relatively cheaply, and he was excellent before recently going to the DL with a 2.95 ERA in the closer’s role.
Tampa tried Howell out in the rotation last year, and although his K/BB ratio was solid, he allowed eight home runs in 51 innings, contributing to a disastrous 7.59 ERA. After being moved to the bullpen in the offseason, he’s cut his HR rate in half this year and his ERA is down to 3.38.
Teams like the Mets and Tigers made headlines last winter by acquiring big names and giving them huge sums of cash. But the team that’s seen the most improvement stayed under the radar, making internal improvements that have them in position to make one of the biggest turnaround in baseball history.
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