BALTIMORE – The script is similar, even if many of the characters have changed. The explanation is still very simple yet also complex beyond the layperson’s imagination.
The Tampa Bay Rays are once again the best team in the American League. And this particular brand of Rays ball looks sustainable.
At 34-17, Tampa Bay has built a 3 ½-game lead over a very good New York Yankees team in the AL East. They went five weeks without losing consecutive games. They are both hard to strike out but also incredibly stingy issuing free passes.
In short, they’re the sort of low-revenue, efficient nightmare their Major League Baseball rivals have grown accustomed to emerging out of Central Florida.
And though it’s been three years since they last threatened the game’s hierarchy, their current blend – most notably an offense that’s a punishing combo of speed, power and contact – is undeniably potent.
“There’s a place for everything in the game – a place for homers, a place for guys that get on base,” left fielder Chandler Simpson, the Rays’ speed merchant with 14 steals yet zero career home runs, tells USA TODAY Sports. “If you have nine Mes, it might not work out. If you have nine home run hitters, it might not work out.
“If you combine them together, it’s a recipe for success. I feel like both ways are winning baseball.”
Just how can the Rays beat you? Let us count the ways – five of them, anyway:
Speed kills
When the Rays drafted Simpson in the second round of the 2022 draft out of Georgia Tech, nurtured him through the minor league system and anointed him their left fielder in 2025, it seemed more curiosity than anything.
After all, Simpson had never hit a ball over the fence on his own until doing so in a spring training game in March. His lone homer at Georgia Tech? It was aided by a deflection off an opponent’s glove.
Yet the Rays rolled with Simpson anyway, even if modern baseball orthodoxy decreed that his lack of slug would not justify his derring-do on the basepaths. Metrics, though, can’t entirely measure Simpson.
“Chandler’s as motivated, as driven a player that I’ve been around,” says Rays manager Kevin Cash.
Simpson stole 44 bases last season, and many of his offensive numbers are trending in almost identical fashion, with 14 steals, a .285 average after batting .295 last season and an adjusted OPS of 85 – it was 88 in 2025.
So why, then, has Simpson already doubled his WAR from 0.4 all last season to 0.8 through just one-third of 2026?
He has thoroughly flipped his defensive performance.
Simpson was worth minus-5 outs above average last season, as measured by Statcast. The Rays didn’t need to see the metrics to know what he had to do: Work on his first step. Shadow shortstop Taylor Walls’ movements from his perch in left field.
And leverage that speed to chase down balls all over the outfield.
The result? Simpson’s already worth six outs above average, tied for third in the majors and trailing only defensively elite center fielders Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Chicago Cubs and Washington’s Jacob Young.
Simpson boils his turnaround down to three words: “Anticipate every pitch.”
For Cash and his staff, it was a simple objective: Get Simpson’s speed and defensive acumen to match up. Long hours spent with outfield coach Corey Dickerson, a former Ray, paid off.
“With the amount of ground he’s covering this year,” says Cash, “it’s a huge credit to him and the work he’s put in.”
Simpson, meanwhile, doesn’t have to worry about swinging for the fences, not when the Rays love him just the way he is – sticking to their word since the day they drafted him.
“Very thankful that they just allow me to play freely, to play my game,” he says. “They don’t expect me to be anything else and I’m very much appreciative of that fact.”
An offensive buffet
The Rays rank second in the AL with 53 stolen bases, one behind Cleveland. Nine Rays have registered steals, with Cedric Mullins joining Simpson in double digits with 10. Chaos can rule the day.
“We have a lineup that’s in the back of every other opposing pitcher’s minds - if they get a guy on, they start to panic a little more. I can speak to experience about that, facing this team,” says Rays right-hander Griffin Jax, a former Twins reliever who’s converting to starting pitcher with Tampa Bay.
“Because late in the game, if you get a guy on, you’re like, oh my gosh, this guy’s going to get to third base before I throw the next two pitches. That definitely plays into the opponents’ mind a little bit.”
Beyond that, the Rays know how to get down a bunt: Their 18 sacrifices lead the majors. Yet this is no small-ball outfit.
Lest we forget, slugging third baseman Junior Caminero walloped 45 home runs last year and is on a similar pace, with 13 already this year. The All-Star trio near the top of the lineup – Yandy Diaz, Caminero and Jonathan Aranda – sport OPS of .893, .846 and .833.
Slugging pays, and the Rays’ 26th-ranked payroll of $89 million is reflected in their No. 28 ranking in home runs. But the offense as a whole can be a suffocating combination.
“There’s so many different ways we can win,” says second baseman Richie Palacios.
Winning the info wars
Including run prevention.
Pitching coach Kyle Snyder has applied his savant-like touch to Tampa Bay’s starting pitchers since 2018. Yet their success is also a symphony of front office acquisition and ground-floor coaching.
Nick Martinez didn’t top anybody’s list of top free agent starters this past winter. After a year of mild regression in Cincinnati, he was available to Tampa Bay for just one year and $13 million.
Yet the man who carved out a niche as a swingman with Texas, San Diego and Cincinnati and in four seasons playing in Japan found another gear this year, at age 35: He’s 4-1 with a 1.51 ERA, even while striking out just 36 batters in 59 ⅓ innings.
His explanation is almost an echo of dozens of itinerant pitchers who preceded him at Tropicana Field.
“The information we get is really good,” says Martinez. “The communication they give us, maybe when we fall off the wagon a little bit, to get back on track, that gives the pitcher a lot of trust. A lot of confidence.
“And allows us to be more aggressive, knowing that these guys have our backs, and we’re going to adjust to what we need to and give you the information that’s going to make you a better player.”
For Martinez, the phrase that resonated the most in a big-picture sense was simple: Pound the strike zone. For a pitcher who’s hardly a strikeout artist, that message was lost last season, when his ERA skyrocketed to 4.45 in Cincinnati.
“It starts with mentality,” he says, “to be aggressive and challenge guys early and often. And expanding when you have to, instead of being too tricky, too fine, and then fall behind 1-0, 2-0.
“I fell into that pattern last year and it snowballed on me. It felt like I was in survivor mode just trying to stay in the count all season.”
This time, he’s potentially on his way to his first All-Star Game.
Strike zone control
Martinez has bucked a significant trend in MLB this season: He has reduced his walk percentage, from 6.1% down to 5%, in a year teams are averaging 3.54 walks per game, highest in the majors since 2000.
And it seems like the Rays are winning both sides of the strike zone equation. Their 365 strikeouts by batters are by far the fewest in the majors. And their pitchers have issued 160 walks; only Seattle has given out fewer free passes in the AL.
The scary thing is it is all by design. Just ask Baltimore Orioles manager Craig Albernaz, a longtime coach in the Rays’ organization whose new club absorbed a sweep by Tampa Bay last week.
“It’s the same Rays that I know,” says Albernaz. “Their pitching is elite. Kyle Snyder does a great job with those guys. It seems like it doesn’t matter who they put in a Rays uniform on the mound. They’ll have some of the nastiest stuff you’ll see in the league.
“On the offensive side, Junior and Yandy and Aranda are forces in the box. The rest of the lineup are forces as well, but it looks different. It’s a grindy at-bat. They make you work. They fight off tough pitches. They lay off tough pitches. They have the ability to put the ball in play. They have a lot of speed over there, so it causes a little bit of chaos on the defensive side of the ball.
“It’s a very diverse team. It’s very intentional how they construct that team.”
The vibes are good
Simpson noted that he has been able to flourish because the Rays allow him to play to his strengths. And that’s been a hallmark of “Rays culture,” such as it is.
Palacios, now in his third season in Tampa Bay, has seen enough to believe it’s real.
“They just want me to play the game I’ve always played,” says Palacios, who has a .359 OBP but just seven home runs in three seasons with Tampa Bay. “Not try to do anything out of the ordinary: Get on base, steal bases and play defense. That’s always been my game.
“It’s important that I’m able to just be myself within my game and bring the energy that I do. That’s when I play my best.”
As they say, if you feel good, you play good. And if you play good, well, that tends to make the vibes good.
“It’s not just the ability we have but the camaraderie we have,” says Palacios. “We push for each other. It’s a lot easier to make sacrifices for each other because we love each other.”
Can it last?
The Rays hit a wall last season once the weather turned hot in their temporary outdoor home in Tampa; now, Tropicana Field is repaired and the club will enjoy climate control all season.
The margin for error remains thin: The Yankees are lurking, having just added ace Gerrit Cole. The Blue Jays are not far off. The Orioles battled them for 13 innings and beat them Monday.
Yet what’s already in the bank – and what’s been built – feels pretty real.
“I think what we’re doing is pretty sustainable,” says Jax. “It’s six, seven weeks we’ve been doing it.”
And more than a few good reasons why they just might keep it going.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Rays are American League's best team. 5 reasons they top AL East standings
Eric Samulski
James Schiano
