Tampa Bay Rays arbitration estimates for 2018 are here

The Tampa Bay Rays don’t have many guaranteed contracts, but they do have a large group of arbitration eligible players.

Estimating how much those players will make will be an important factor in who the Rays trade away and how much they have to spend.

This is the seventh year that MLBTradeRumors.com and Matt Swartz’s algorithm has been released to estimate arbitration awards, and as it is considered the best public arbitration model, let’s take a look:

Arbitration Estimates:

Jake Odorizzi (4.042) - $6.5MM
Corey Dickerson (4.101) - $6.4MM
Alex Colome (3.118) - $5.5MM
Adeiny Hechavarria (5.060) - $5.0MM
Brad Miller (4.094) - $4.4MM
Steven Souza Jr (3.072) - $3.6MM
Dan Jennings (4.171) - $2.5MM
Brad Boxberger (4.109) - $1.9MM
Xavier Cedeno (4.060) - $1.4MM
Jesus Sucre (3.137) - $1.3MM
Chase Whitley (3.123) - $1.0MM
Shawn Tolleson (5.109) - $1.0MM
Matt Duffy (3.059) - $900K

If the Rays were to offer arbitration to all thirteen players they are estimated to pay $41.4MM. Along with the $35.5MM guaranteed owed to Evan Longoria, Wilson Ramos, Chris Archer, and Kevin Kiermaier and the $2MM team option on Nate Eovaldi the Rays are destined to execute, they would have a payroll totaling $83.0MM once you fill the roster with league minimum spots.

This year the Rays ended the season with roughly a $80MM payroll and Stu Sternberg has been on record saying next year’s payroll to start the season will be lower, so they will have to make a few decisions.

Some players will be traded and some might not even be tendered a contract, but you can expect moves either way. The front office has a lot of work to do this off-season and this gives us insight on how they’ll have to allocate what money they do have to spend.