Tampa Bay Rays News and Links: Is this the best we've ever seen from Evan Longoria?

Evan Longoria has been in the majors a long time now. It's been over a decade since he was originally drafted by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays with the 3rd overall pick in the 2006 draft. Longoria surged through the system and made his debut less than two years later and led the young Rays to the 2008 World Series while Longo picked up the American League Rookie of the Year award.

Since then, Longoria's production seemed to have peaked in 2012 and steadily his output has declined with his power seemingly to have disappeared. Now, with his sudden outburst of five home runs over his last four games, Longoria has 14 home runs. For context, the most he's ever had during the first half of a season was 18 in 2013 and that year he finished with 32 long balls.

Longoria currently has a .262 ISO which would his highest ever for the first half of a season...granted there is still a month's worth of games to play, but this is a very good sign from a player whom we thought big power days were over.

Over the last 7 days, Longoria slashed .464/.516/1.107

Since the start of May (141 PA), he has slashed .317/.376/.635 with 10 homers

Rays Links:

- Topkin previews tonight's matchup between the Diamondbacks and Rays

- Evan Longoria shows his leadership quality through his bat rather than vocally, also there's reason to believe that this may not just be another Longo hot streak

- Neil Solondz offers up his notes on the Rays victory

Ex-Rays News:

- What could have been if not for a brutal slide, Lee was hitting .265/.344/.377 in Triple-A

- Carl Crawford's time with the Los Angeles Dodgers is coming to an end as he'll become a free agent for the second time in his career...he may not have as many suitors as the first time though.

A reunion likely isn't in the cards

- The Boston Red Sox have placed Ryan Hanigan on the disabled list

Around the League:

- Madison Bumgarner is putting on an impressive display on the offensive side of the game and during batting practice yesterday, he put on quite a show.

- The Dodgers welcomed umpire extraordinaire, Joe West to L.A. by having his music play as the Dodgers came to bat

TRIVIA!

Apologies for the weekend delay on this, ran out of time to find a suitable question for Friday. So, it's happening today!

Thom Bonham is currently the trivia leader

Today's question,

Evan Longoria just made Rays history as he homered in every game of a four game series, thus homering in four straight games.

The latter has only happened in Rays history five times before as they've had five players homer in four straight games or more. Who are the five players to have done this?