Tampa Bay Rays news and links: Justin Williams was consistent

Mark Topkin wrote an article about the Rays needing to find consistency. That’s fine, easy copy, but it means I have to write some easy copy too.

Consistency is usually bogus. Baseball teams go up and down, naturally, over the course of a season. It happens to everyone. When we’re talking about how a team or a player just isn’t consistent, usually what we actually mean is that they’re not great.

If the Rays were a great team, we wouldn’t talk about inconsistency. Because they’re somewhere on the spectrum from below average to good, their peaks look good and make us expect better, while their troughs look bad, so we talk about inconsistency.

As I said, it’s fine. Topkin can be lazy sometimes, I can be lazy sometimes. If we were great writers, we wouldn’t be doing this, and you’d be having a better morning.

This bat flip did help my morning, though.

Justin Williams deserves to flip a bat, if anyone does.

And finally, Steve Cishek doesn’t want you to write any “The Rays fixed Cishek” articles about him

Links:

• Ashley MacLennan wrote about the surprisingly good performance of former-Ray Mikie Mahtook.
• Baseball America would like to see Brent Honeywell called up, but says that the Rays don’t need him.
• David Laurila talked to Mike Pelfrey about his recovery from Tommy John surgery, and how he’s struggled to regain command.
• Javier Baez stole home.
• A good piece analyzing pitching (Zach Grienke), by Jan Moffett.
• Baseball Prospectus focused the Short Relief column on Houston today, with an ask for actual relief (donations to the Houston Food Bank).
• If you want to support the relief effort by watching a baseball game, there’s still another day left. Proceeds will go to the Red Cross.