A collection of good articles from the Tampa Bay Times

Writing about baseball on a consistent basis is not easy — and it’s a struggle we hobbyists keenly understand. Sometimes our website dips in its frequency of articles as we find ourselves unable to meet the standards of reaching the front page. Newspapers, however, have deadlines, and lack the luxury to simply not go live if the work is still in progress. So we understand, not every article in print will be great.

Nevertheless, our site has had two recent criticisms of the sole local newspaper, the Tampa Bay Times.

The first instance was in response to a dramatic and cliched article “Lamenting another uninspiring offseason of The Rays Way” - you can read our lampoon here.

The second instance was this morning, in response to an already once-edited article from Wednesday that called the Rays rotation overrated, but with little defense as to why. Once I’d quelled the Fire Joe Morgan tendencies within me, I broke down the confusing argument here.

These were egregious articles, and nothing new in the realm of sports journalism, but jarring because of where they appeared. At the end of the day, the Times has our respect, not only as the sole newspaper covering our favorite team, but for the moments they turn in sincerely great coverage.

Lest we seem only critical of the Times, I felt it was important to point out the good they’ve done, above and beyond the references in our “morning links” articles.

As such, here’s a collection of my favorite Rays pieces in the Times this Spring. If you have not read them, please do, and Go Rays.

Player profiles:

• Rays' Rasmus brothers credit dad's tough love for success - Roger Mooney
• Rule 5 draft could help Rays' Kevin Gadea fulfill big-league dream - Roger Mooney
• Meet new Rays reliever Hunter who broke his back for his son - Martin Fennelly
• Rays' Brad Miller accepts move to second as step toward winning championship - Roger Mooney

Analysis articles:

• Can Blake Snell save the Rays draft class of 2011? - Marc Topkin
• 10 Rays that Tampa Bay is most dependent on for improvement in 2017 - Marc Topkin
• Rays deal with rehabbing RHP Nathan Eovaldi makes sense - Marc Topkin
• Rays to install new, improved turf at Tropicana Field - Marc Topkin