Tampa Bay Rays: Kevin Cash and All His New Toys

The Tampa Bay Rays have had a lot of turnover following their 96-win season. How will the manager best utilize all of his new toys?

Twelve players from last year’s Tampa Bay Rays are no longer with the team. Of their top fourteen likely offensive players, three are new to the Rays this season.

Manager Kevin Cash is tasked with the job of getting to know each player and how they will fit in the Rays’ rotations and platoons. The Rays continue to find success by maximizing production out of each player. Let’s take a look at Cash’s newest options and how they fit in with the existing team.

Keep in mind, wRC+ is a metric that attempts to measure weighted runs created with a score of 100 being league average. Anything over 100 is gravy.

Outfield Defense

Tommy Pham was a big loss on the offensive side worth a 3.3 fWAR and 121 wRC+. He slashed .273/.369/.450 with 81 walks. According to Statcast, he ranked in the 82nd percentile in average exit velocity and hard-hit percentage. On the flipside, Pham ranked in the 2nd percentile in defensive outs above average (OAA). He has posted a career nine defensive runs saved with 11 of those coming in one season with St. Louis.

Austin Meadows hit the ball like an MVP last year but his OAA ranked in just the 20th percentile of the league. In his brief career, Meadows has posted a -15 defensive runs saved. The Rays aggressively addressed their outfield defense by adding two absolute defensive studs in Hunter Renfroe and Manuel Margot.

We already know about the legend of Kevin Kiermaier and his three gold gloves. Kiermaier will still be patrolling centerfield for the 2020 Rays. Hunter Renfroe is bringing his 22 defensive runs saved with him from San Diego. He ranked in the 90th percentile in OAA and tied for second in all of baseball with Cody Bellinger in defensive runs saved. Margot brings his own skillset to the Rays outfield with 27 career defensive runs saved, with six last season. Margot ranked in the 97th percentile in OAA. Together these three players combined for 41 defensive runs saved in 2019, which is more than any other outfield in the American League.

VS. Right-Handed Pitching

Austin Meadows leads the charge here with a 137 wRC+. It’s evident that Meadows is an everyday player. Brandon Lowe, who was quite bad against lefties, placed second on the team vs. RHP with a 133 wRC+ and a .269/.354/.514 slash. Hopefully, he replicates that production in his sophomore season with the Rays and perhaps improves against lefties. Meadows and Lowe are the only to players to post a wRC+ above 130 in their careers.

Ji-Man Choi comes close with a 127. Can you envision a platoon between Choi and Lowe or Martinez? Choi with .844 OPS against RHP and Martinez with .975 OPS against LHP. Here’s an article we wrote projecting their platoon production at first base and how it could easily be worth a 30+ homer season.

Willy Adames has hit a meager .205 against lefties, but when you consider that he led the league in defensive runs saved at one of the most demanding (if not the most) defensive positions in the game and he has a career 120 wRC+ against RHP… I think we’re all okay with his shortcomings against lefties.

Next up, here’s another reason to be excited about Jose Martinez. He has slashed .288/.350/.426 against RHP in his career. So yes, while he’s absolutely terminated lefties, he’s still well above average against righties.

Joey Wendle and Kevin Kiermaier finished tied at 103 wRC+. Comparing Kiermaier’s 103 against Margot’s team-worst 75 wRC+ against RHP sets up a really nice combination in center. Both are plus-plus-plus defensive centerfielders with KK being the better hitter against righties and Margot getting the advantage against lefties.

Names of note who scored below 100 wRC+

Yandy Diaz projects to be a major player for the Rays. If he’s going to provide the breakout season everyone is hoping for then he needs to outperform his 95 wRC+ against righties, whom he will face the majority of the time. For his career, Yandy is slugging just .402 against RHP.

Hunter Renfroe has slugged a solid .459 against RHP in his career but that’s about it. His on-base percentage is .271, that’s a little worse than Manuel Margot’s .286 career OBP against right-handed pitchers.

Kevin Cash certainly has a lot of toys to play with this season. It will be interesting to see how many different lineups the Rays roll out in 2020.

That’s a lot to manage… and we haven’t even discussed pitchers.