Tampa Bay Rays news and links: One Brad traded

Today, at 8:00 PM, is the deadline to tender contracts to players. Three of the bigger questions for the Rays were the bullpen (several players with semi-interesting tender decisions), Adeiny Hechavarria, and Brad Miller, and yesterday the Rays answered one of those questions when they traded Brad Boxberger for pitching prospect Curtis Taylor.

You can read about Taylor here. Rays Radio had a good explanation of the trade, and what it does or doesn’t mean about how the Rays viewed Boxberger and the rest of their bullpen.

There hasn’t been a lot of smoke around Hechavarria, so I expect him to be tendered.

And at this point, both Marc Topkin and Jerry Crasnick say that Miller is likely to be tendered a contract as well.

Business of Baseball

Yesterday, Stuart Sternberg reiterated, that the Rays are looking to pay $150 million of the cost on a proposed new stadium, but that that number could go up based on several factors.

I said to treat that statement and that number as a negotiation opening. That’s exactly what Hillsborough County Administrator Mike Merrill is doing, according to Steve Contorno of the Tampa Bay Times. Merrill is happy that Sternberg is supportive of a location in Hillsborough county, but says that the Rays contribution will have to go up.

Physics of Baseball

Hold the phone, I’ve been thinking about this one wrong, and I don’t imagine I’m the only one. David Kagan explains that the gyroball is real, and there is such a thing as late break.

Here’s the deal: the angle of spin on a pitch with relation to that pitch’s motion changes as the trajectory of the ball changes. That means that THE DIRECTION OF THE MAGNUS FORCE CHANGES OVER TIME.

This is the type of article that reminds me to be grateful for The Hardball Times.

Other Links

• So, you can draw whatever conclusions you want from Chris Archer’s list of pitchers.

• Dylan Svoboda writes that this offseason has been really slow because everyone is waiting for Shohei Ohtani to sign and Giancarlo Stanton to be traded before making their other offseason moves.
• Taking a different slant on the Ohtani sweepstakes, Eno Sarris tried to figure which teams are best at keeping their players healthy. It’s unclear how much of this is a team skill, but in all of his different definitions, the Rays are middle of the pack.
• Jarrett Seidler dove into the intricacies and the moral questions of the international signing rules. A good read, and not just about what the Braves did wrong.