Red Sox/Rays AL Division Series Primer

No matter how far the Red Sox go they can never leave the AL East

How do you beat a team that does everything well? This is the question the Red Sox must answer, and one we’ll come back to later.

Thanks to beating the Yankees in the AL Wild Card game (that was fun!), the Red Sox get to face the 100-win AL East champion Tampa Rays in the best-of-five Division Series. Imagine a world where the Red Sox get to eliminate the Blue Jays, Yankees, and Rays all in a two week span. That’s the world they’re playing for.

It won’t be easy (wouldn’t it be nice if it were easy?). The Rays are quite good. You don’t win 100 games and outscore your opponents by 206 runs and not be good. The Rays present a difficult challenge.

Before we get into it though, if you’re already subscribed to Sox Outsider, thank you! If not, I hope you will. Sox Outsider is me, Matt Kory, formerly of The Athletic, FanGraphs, Sports On Earth and other places, writing about the Red Sox. That’s it. That’s the whole idea. Oh, and you’re supposed to read it. That’s the other part. So check it out. Hopefully you like it. Subscribing is easy and free, and now with the ALDS about to start, there will not be a shortage of topics to discuss. I hope you’ll join me here. Thanks for reading.

Pitching

The Rays are widely assumed to have the best pitching in this series, though that isn’t quite right or fair. According to FanGraphs, despite the difference in ERA in favor of Tampa, it’s the Red Sox who have better WAR numbers. Overall the pitching staffs have accumulated very similar numbers that just barely favor Tampa, though it depends on which stat you look at.

But that’s not the whole story. Playoff pitching staffs are quite different than regular season pitching staffs. The Red Sox used 37 different pitchers during the season. The Rays will face very few of those. What’s more, in a five game series, Alex Cora will supplement the Boston bullpen with a number of starters, just as he did in the Wild Card game against New York and during the Red Sox run to the 2018 World Series. During his introductory presser in Tampa, Cora mentioned that he’d have Eduardo Rodriguez start the game, but that Nick Pivetta would be in the bullpen for that game as well. So the season numbers, the ones that the networks and experts are going to pull out and point to and say the Rays are better? Throw those out.

Eduardo Rodriguez will get the first start today in Tampa and though the Red Sox haven’t officially announced it, Alex Cora said it is likely Chris Sale will pitch in Game Two. Then after the travel day, it wouldn’t be shocking to see Nate Eovaldi on the mound at Fenway Park for Game Three. Any one game is an unknown, but with Sale’s recent struggles there is some danger as well as some considerable upside. I’d expect a quick hook with Sale and for that matter with all the Red Sox starters. Still, that’s as good a collection of starters as the Rays can muster.

In fact, the Rays starters are going to be remarkably young. Shane McClanahan goes tonight and though he’s rather experienced for a 24-year-old (he threw four innings in last year’s playoffs including a scoreless inning in last year’s World Series), he’s still only thrown 123 innings in his major league career. Shane “Another Shane” Baz, Tampa’s Game Two starter, has 13.1 major league innings to his name in total. No names have been announced past that, but Drew Rasmussen seems a likely bet to get Game Three. He’s 26, so virtually a senior citizen, and has thrown 91 innings in his major league career.

That brings us to the pen, and though the Red Sox haven’t announced their Division Series roster as of this writing, expect some familiar faces. Cora is going to lean heavily on Garret Whitlock, Tanner Houck, (deep breath) Hansel Robles, and which ever starters are lingering about. If the game is close, those are his guys. Josh Taylor is now healthy enough to pitch (apparently) so toss he and Garrett Richards into the mix as well. It’s bizarre that I’ve got this deep into the bullpen without mentioning Matt Barnes or Adam Ottavino, but here we are. Barnes may get some run after peaking out of a nightmarish August with a tentatively decent September. Ottavino is either on or off and if he’s off yikes. And, the fun part is you never know until you put him in which one you got. That’s still quite a few decent options for a team with supposed bullpen problems.

The Rays pitching staff is basically a giant bullpen. Their starters seem to go three innings and then, even in the midst of a perfect game, get pulled for some rando I’ve never heard of. But it works! Somehow, some way it works. The Rays. Their bullpen is the deepest in baseball history. The just pull guys off the street, the crazier their names the better (Louis Head? I mean come ON!), and toss ‘em in… of course they don’t do that. This organization is extremely and shamefully smart. There’s a reason they win so many games with such anonymous pitchers. They work tirelessly to pull acquire and cultivate the depth they have on hand and it’s a testament to their front office, annoying as that fact might be. The end result though is a lot of very good interchangeable parts, players that cover for each other’s weaknesses while exploiting their opponents’.

In the end though, if Sale is healthy and good, the Red Sox might have the straight up advantage here. If he isn’t, then things probably go the other way and the Red Sox have to make up ground with their bats and gloves.

Managing

Not only will the Red Sox have to be very good in this series, but Alex Cora is going to have to keep up with Kevin Cash. Cora’s team is constructed differently than Cash’s so Cora’s tactics will be different as well, but he’s going to have to work to avoid giving the Rays the advantages they feed on getting. Things like reliever usage and shifting will play large roles in the outcome of this series.

Another thing Cora will have to keep in mind is how the Red Sox tend to struggle against lefties. The Red Sox faced a string of lefties over the last week or so of the regular season and it really messed them up. The Rays first starter is, of course, a lefty in Shane McClanahan, so Cora is going to have to figure out the best way to combat that without removing too many good hitters from his lineup, because, not only is McClanahan good, but he’s also not likely to be in the game for very long as that’s the Rays way.

Another thing Cora is going to have to work to do as best he can is deal with the implications of playing at a field in a ballpark that actively hurts his team. Just as the Green Monster stole two homers from Giancarlo Stanton in the Wild Card game, so too will Tropicana Field’s eccentricities provide the Rays with big advantages. First, the Red Sox are going to be forced to either play a real left fielder who can provide real range in left field while in Tampa, or they’ll have to put Kyle Schwarber or JD Martinez there and deal with the fallout from their less than stellar defensive efforts.

Then there’s the problem of the turf. Ground balls shoot through the turf infield in Tampa and the last thing Boston needs is more grounders getting through their infield. How will Cora fix this problem? Well, he won’t. But perhaps he can come up with some way to blunt it slightly? I’ve been thinking about it and all I have is lining some sandbags where the outfield meets the infield dirt.

This is kinda the bed the Red Sox have inadvertently made for themselves and it’s not one that’s a great fit for Tampa.

Batting

The Rays out-scored Boston by 28 runs on the season, on their way to finishing second in baseball in runs scored behind Houston. Tampa was also one of the best hitting teams overall with a wRC+ of 109, two points ahead of the Red Sox. But as I said, the full season stats will only get you so far here. The Rays have added Nelson Cruz, though he’s not hit well since coming to Tampa. They’ve also called up Wander Franco, who is quite good despite being only 20 years old. The Red Sox have added Kyle Schwarber, but have lost Jose Iglesias and potentially JD Martinez. Which version of Bobby Dalbec do they have? Is Christian Arroyo going to be able to approximate his season numbers or is he still too rusty after returning from a long stint on the IL? Questions!

Since adding Schwarber, the Red Sox lineup has gotten a lot longer and more imposing, as we saw against Gerrit Cole a few days ago. Losing JD Martinez would be a blow, as he’s one of the few Red Sox hitters who excels against left handed pitching.

The Rays have the kind of lineup that never stops. Just like their staff, the lineup doesn’t have any holes in it and Cash & Co. do everything to create advantages for all their players.

So who is better? I have no idea. I’ll say this though: If the Red Sox don’t have their fielding gloves on, it’ll be the Rays who end up looking better.

Fielding

Normally the less said about this the better, but the Red Sox did a great job with their gloves in the Wild Card game. Xander Bogaerts’ relay to cut down Aaron Judge at the plate in the sixth inning was the highlight, but that play wasn’t all on Bogaerts. The whole team played things well, which is why it worked. Enrique Hernandez backed up the play in left center field and ended up with the ball rolling his way after it caromed strangely off the wall. His throw short-hopped Bogaerts who made a great scoop, quick transfer, and accurate throw to Kevin Plawecki who caught it and made a great tag on Judge. So great! So, great!

Beyond that, think of one time where some Red Sox fielder dropped a catchable ball, didn’t cover a base he obviously should’ve or, called everyone off and then just straight stood there while the ball fell to the ground. None of those happened, which is especially good since each of those plays have happened to the Red Sox in the very recent past. That kind of silliness has to be kept to a minimum. I know, it’s hard to teach a leopard not to be stripped but if the Sox want to beat the Rays, Alex Cora is going to have to try to figure out a way to paint a leopard.

Finally

The experts are all going to pick Tampa. And honesty if Tampa wins, that’s not good, it’s not the goal, but it would still be a successful season for the Red Sox. The Rays though? They went to the World Series last season. They won 100 games. They’re the twice-defending divisional champs. They’re going to be picked by every expert. They’re supposed to win. And yet…

Matthew Kory @mattymatty2000

Red Sox went 8-11 against the Rays this season, but the runs scored/allowed was 104-106.

It’s a short series so it could really go either way, but the Red Sox have a real shot here. This isn’t the ‘27 Yankees against your local high school team. If the Red Sox play well, take advantage of their opportunities, and do all the stuff you and I both know they can but don’t always do, well, then you might be reading another 1600 words about the ALCS matchup.

That brings me all the way back to this question: how do you beat a team that does everything well? You do it with great individual performances. The Red Sox have some great players in Chris Sale, Nate Eovaldi, Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Kyle Schwarber, and, if healthy, JD Martinez. Great as they are, the Rays don’t have a collection of great talent like that. The Rays survive on an uncountable number of good players. There are no holes in the pitching staff, their lineup, or in their bullpen. The are the ultimate high-floor team. The Red Sox aren’t that way. For better or worse, the Red Sox have Sale and Bogaerts and on and on. If those guys live up to that greatness, a tall order when you’re playing against a team that hits, pitches, and fields as well as Tampa, then the Red Sox have a chance. If some of those players can take over the series, well, then we’re talking.

I’ll be here tomorrow with the recap. Thanks for reading and subscribing, everyone.