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Rays News
- Tampa Bay Times announces temporary pay cut for full-time staff: We are all worse off, significantly worse off, without strong, well supported, and independent local press. When it comes to sports, this is especially important as we all know as Rays fans: the rest of the world will ignore the teams and the stories here. But the hard work of our friends at the Times is vital for all fans to relay the stories of our region, of this team, and of our time.
I haven’t lived in the Tampa Bay area for years, but subscribing to this paper and getting to read all of the amazing work that Marc and the rest of the Times crew put out makes me feel connected to my home.
DRaysBay supports the Times, and fully encourages our readers to subscribe.
We're always promoting our work and the opportunity to subscribe to @TB_Times for our great sports coverage and much more, and we'd be especially appreciative now (see https://t.co/8OCOabFSvG) given our ongoing financial issues. https://t.co/TpqKVJW99a
— Marc Topkin (@TBTimes_Rays) February 27, 2020
- Rays aim to take the next step, build on ‘19 run - Juan Toribio, MLB.com: The Rays surprised people in 2018, made people notice in 2019. Now comes the harder step: surpassing high expectations.
- The newest edition of This Week in Rays Baseball is out:
- Here are the Rays’ 2020 Top 30 Prospects - Mike Rosenbaum, MLB.com: Rays fans were treated to Wander’s first Spring Training action yesterday (and get his first start later today), getting that glimpse at the headliner of the top farm system in baseball.
- And you can listen to Wander’s impressions on that first game:
#Rays Franco, with interpreter Manny Navarro, on 1st big-league spring game: pic.twitter.com/DzCl1tCb4B
— Marc Topkin (@TBTimes_Rays) February 27, 2020
- Fantasy: 5 pitcher breakout candidates - Michael Bradburn, The Score: Fantasy focused, but Bradburn is right aboard, ticket in hand, on the McKay train.
- Rays 2020 Media Guide is here!
The Tampa Bay Rays 2020 Media Guide is now available at https://t.co/imo9JGHl0H (login required) and https://t.co/nMFFIT3N3Q (no login necessary). pic.twitter.com/Xp11nkSW0e
— Rays Communications (@RaysPR) February 27, 2020
- Willy Adames re-lives and takes us through The Relay:
The perfect relay throw. @willya02 knows a thing or two about those!@RaysBaseball | #30Clubs30Days | @Plakata | @CliffFloyd30 pic.twitter.com/MhdhPAygqL
— MLB Network (@MLBNetwork) February 27, 2020
Around the League
- MLB Appoints Kerwin Danley as First Black Umpire Crew Chief - Associated Press, Sports Illustrated: A another bit of history made this off-season.
- MLB cracking down on pitchers using foreign substances - Joel Sherman, New York Post: Somewhere Joel Peralta is scrubbing his hat clean reading this headline.
- The hot new Twitter follow is the Astros Shame Tour, going from 0 to 100K followers awfully quick. Since the players escaped any real punishment, shame is all we got.
CUMULATIVE HBP UPDATE:
— 2020 Astros Shame Tour (@AsteriskTour) February 27, 2020
Five games played
Seven Astros hit by pitch
For an average of 1.40 HBP / game
Versus a 2019 league average of 0.41 / game
- Speaking of the Astros, thanks to Manfred choosing to bypass punishments for deals, beanball street justice seems to be on the menu in the Spring:
The Houston Astros have been hit by the most pitches (7) so far this Spring Training. pic.twitter.com/pqB5BO7lLC
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) February 27, 2020