In a Rays win, the little things mean a lot
By WILL SAMMON / THE ATHLETIC
Who says the Tampa Bay Rays’ fundamental style of small ball is boring?
Consider these three scenes from their 3-1 win over the Cleveland Guardians in Game 2 of the American League Championship Series.
Freddy Peralta, who turned around his season after landing with the Rays in a trade from the New York Mets, demonstratively reacting after each successful inning while Mets team owner Steve Cohen, of all people, was in the Tropicana Field crowd.
Chandler Simpson and Victor Mesa Jr. running the bases on madness and instinct at the Guardians’ expense.
Junior Caminero, Tampa Bay’s star player, wagging his finger at the opposition after snagging a liner.
The Rays knotted the series, 1-1, because they did things their way. They pitched well. They made contact. They played defense. They ran hard. They pounced on mistakes.
The Rays’ style is not always fit for a highlight reel. Their brand, however, is worth studying, especially in a series against a team that bears such a close resemblance.
Game 3 was slated for Thursday afternoon in Cleveland, with Game 4 set for Friday at 6 p.m. These three scenes from Game 2 epitomize Tampa Bay’s winning ways.
A fired-up pitcher
Peralta silenced any remaining detractors who were skeptical about his turnaround with the Rays. If the series reaches enough games, the Rays should feel confident deploying Peralta again — he is at the top of his game.
Moments after the game, Cohen walked down a flight of stairs toward the exit in one of his usual outfits: Mets cap, Mets quarter zip. He agreed with the sentiment of those around him: Peralta sure pitched well. Cohen is friendly with a Rays team owner and maintains a house in Boca Raton, Florida, so he decided to take in the game. It was quite a coincidence for him to show up for Peralta’s longest and best postseason start.
Peralta did not pitch well with the Mets, who failed to help him rediscover his form. The Rays sent three prospects to New York at the trade deadline for him, anyway, believing he could thrive with Tampa Bay. They were right.
Peralta threw six scoreless innings, holding the Rays to four hits and two walks while striking out six. His outing showcased everything Tampa Bay helped him unlock, such as a high-90s heater with which he bullies batters upstairs and a befuddling changeup he is throwing more than ever.
Seventy-one of Peralta’s 99 pitches on Tuesday were four-seam fastballs. He is known as Fastball Freddy, but he has not thrown that high of a percentage of fastballs in a game since he was a reliever in 2020. His average for the regular season checked in at 53%. Why the uptick? Simple.
“That was probably the best that it’s been,” the Rays’ pitching coach, Kyle Snyder, said.
Chaos on the bases
Back when Chandler Simpson was a prospect at Georgia Tech, scouts working in the South used to joke that on the traditional 20-to-80 grading scale, he possessed 90 speed.
“I heard all about when they were doing my draft profile, the 90 speed and 10 on the power scale,” Simpson said with a laugh. “I’m glad I’m living up to it, I guess.”
The Rays are pleased, too.
As soon as Simpson saw the ball soar high into the air on a bounce from his chopper in the fourth inning on Tuesday, he said he knew there was little chance shortstop Brayan Rocchio would throw him out. No offense to Rocchio. Simpson had done this too many times. As he expected, Simpson beat the throw to first base. Then came chaos.
Victor Mesa Jr., who was occupying first base, ran to second on the play and kept going once he realized no one was covering third. Guardians third baseman José Ramírez had taken a step toward Simpson’s chopper and then watched the play.
Mesa, a cerebral player, broke for third base before the ball even landed in first baseman Nathaniel Lowe’s glove.
A ball then went through Ramírez’s legs for a run, and Liam Hicks added a two-run single. Make a mistake, the Rays will likely capitalize. Make more mistakes, the Rays will likely keep capitalizing.
Defensive bravado
For a host of Guardians batters, the Rays positioned third baseman Junior Caminero on the infield grass and nearly parallel to the mound. So many of Cleveland’s batters are threats to bunt or make soft contact. Steven Kwan is one.
So Caminero was in when Kwan entered the batter’s box with one out in the fifth inning. On the third pitch, Kwan hit an 83-mph liner. Caminero leaped to his left and hauled it in. Then he looked toward Kwan and offered him his best Dikembe Mutombo finger-wagging impression.
“After, when they got to third base, they told me, hey, if I hit it a little bit harder it goes by you,” Caminero said. “I said, yeah, try to hit harder, I won’t catch it. If you don’t hit harder, we catch it.”
Defensive positioning matters so much to the Rays, too. Their scouts observed the Guardians’ division series against the Chicago White Sox and some were assigned to Cleveland well before that, too. Another instance of advance work paying off happened when shortstop Taylor Walls played Travis Bazzana perfectly up the middle to snatch a liner timed at 107.1 mph off the bat.
Caminero’s defense, in particular, holds significance for the Rays. Through the first two months of the season, he had the lowest fielding run value among third basemen, according to Baseball Savant. From June on, however, he ranked inside the top 10.
