People are acting like the Rays have come completely out of the blue and are such a magical story. This team has been restocking for years now, it is no surprise that all their number one prospects are panning out after having a top six draft pick every single year for the past ten years bar 2005, when they drafted Oriole great Wade Townsend. Even though this organization has been absolutely pathetic, it is hard for any professional club to mess up that many times when your given so many opportunities. I also don’t really get this “good for baseball” bullshit. The reason that the Trop cannot sell out games is because the Rays never had fans period. Analysts and people on blogs say that people are finally coming back to the Trop in droves.
1.) They’re not.
2.) There were never Rays fans period because they play in a terrible baseball state, with a terrible baseball stadium, and have been a historically terrible team.

Congratulations Tampa Bay on taking ten years to build one team that is first place on July 2. Remarkable.

By the way, that wasn’t aimed at you, Z, just me mouthing off.

I didn’t think they would be this good this fast. 1) Their defense was awful last year but I read somewhere they’re now 1st in defensive efficiency. How did that happen? They added Barlett but they’re team isn’t all that different defensively from last year. 2) Their BP was awful last year, but fixed it by adding Percival (?!) and their starters are pitching deeper into games. I thought their BP would be bad again but hey missed that one.

Boston is closer to 3rd than they are to 1st in the loss column.

In the words of Stimpson J. Cat, “happy, happy, joy, joy”

1. When they dropped “Devil” from their name, the team took off. We were saying here last fall “Watch out, they could suck significantly less next year!” We were modest.

2. OK, no more debbils makin’ ‘em do it, but you can still have sympathy for them. I mean, it’s cool that they Sucked Worse Than Us for just oh so long—and now they suddenly don’t! If that isn’t inspiring, you really need to switch back from decaf.

3. Their chief problems right now:

(a) generic jerseys. I mean, look at thos…zzz…zzz…Oh, sorry, must’ve dozed off looking at the Rays virtually colorless, virtually emblem-less uni’s. Apparently the FO thought “Hey, we’ve still got 2-3 years before we’re gonna be really good—let’s see if some nice uni designs and logos come in over the transom. Y’know, we’ll do a middle school contest or something, they can keep the crayons for prizes. We don’t have to hire an actual PR firm and all that yet. ” Oops.

(b) The Trop = The Slop. And what are those stains on the infield rug? The Glop. Cheap-looking, bad backround, even more boring rthan the uni’s—The Trop’s a crummy venue in a place with no reason for one. Presumably, this season is their breakout year, literally.

4. duck: I wish you’d make some Lucite points too. You could start by suggesting some colors for the Trop walls currently adorned with sparkling Cement-Block Gray, a terrific choice for the interior of an adult correctional facility—which the place sorta was, of course, when Canseco was around. Hey, that’s over. I’m thinking chartreuse.