The Rays thrashed, mauled, pummeled, wrecked and in the end, squeaked past the Red Sox. Bring on the Phillies.
This World Series will be one of those first-ever meetings between the two combatants. The Phillies and the Rays have never played each other in October because this is the first October in which the Rays have played, and the World Series, which begins Wednesday night, will be the first in which the Rays will play.
Why, though, are the Rays still playing? Why are they in the World Series? All right, they are there because they beat the Red Sox four games to three, thwarting another incredible Red Sox comeback.
Earlier in the American League series, the Red Sox did not appear to be prepared to stage another comeback. The Rays crushed them, 9-1, in Game 3, 13-4 in Game 4 and led 7-0 after six and a half innings of Game 5. If ever the Red Sox looked beatable, it was then.
But the Red Sox staged the second biggest comeback in post-season history and won that game, 8-7, then won Game 6 and forced the Rays to demonstrate their raging resilience once more by winning Game 7 despite having had the Red Sox break their pattern.
Twice in September the Red Sox won the first game of a three-game series and appeared to have the Rays teetering on the brink of losing their division lead. But then the Rays won the second and third games.
That pattern was repeated in the first three games of the playoff series, but then the Rays had to go and mess up their march to the World Series by also winning Game 4. Had they lost that game, they could have won the next two games and ended the series in six games. But you know what? The Rays will take what they got.
That leaves the question: How does a team with a major league-low 66 wins one year go to the World Series the next?
Only the 1991 Atlanta Braves went from having the worst record in the majors to playing in the World Series a year later. The Braves didn’t win that World Series so the Rays can become the first team to go literally from worst to first.
So how in the name of Vince Naimoli did they get here? They are in the World Series and the Red Sox, the Yankees and the Angels, the league leader in wins, are not. This remains a mind-boggling mystery.
Had Stuart Sternberg not rescued the Rays from their founding owner, Naimoli, the team would still be wallowing in major league muck. The way Sternberg started out when he assumed control of the Rays following the 2005 season it appeared they might never rise above the muck.
But contrary to appearances, Sternberg mounted a brilliant operation. Instead of bringing in experienced baseball veterans to run the organization, Sternberg drew on his background from the world of finance and put baseball rookies in charge, Matt Silverman, who was then 29, as president and Andrew Friedman, then 31, as head of baseball operations.
For baseball experience and expertise, they brought in Gerry Hunsicker, who had been the Houston Astros general manager for nine years. It appeared that Hunsicker would run the baseball operations as senior vice president, but Friedman has done the job Sternberg hired him to do.
“Andrew Friedman is a young star in the making,” Hunsicker said. “He’s as bright as any young guy I’ve been around in the game. I’m amazed at how well he understands the game. His thought process and decision-making process is amazing. I’d put this kid up against anyone. He’s a special kid.”
Sandy Dangler, the team’s director of major league administration, had been with the Rays for eight years when Sternberg replaced Naimoli and, like others in the organization, wasn’t sure what to expect with the changes. Her view now: “There’s something to be said for thinking outside the box.”
The Rays have easily written the most remarkable baseball story in years, maybe the most remarkable since the 1969 Mets. For their first 10 years, the Rays were one of baseball’s biggest losers. They never won more than 70 games and won 70 only once. They finished last in the American League East nine times and fourth once, when they won 70.
Throughout their history they have had the smallest payroll or one of the smallest payrolls and have played like it. This year they didn’t play like it. They began the season with a $44 million payroll, second lowest only to the Florida Marlins’ $22 million, and outplayed the Yankees ($209 million), the Red Sox ($133 million), the White Sox ($121 million) and the Angels ($119 million).
They know that winning will have an impact on the payroll, but they have taken steps to lessen the impact. Adopting the Cleveland Indians’ plan of the mid-1990s, the Rays have signed some of their best young players – Carl Crawford, James Shields, Scott Kazmir and Evan Longoria – to long-term contracts that will save them many millions in salaries.
“We’ll tie up players for millions but not for 10s of millions,” Hunsicker said. “The Indians had some duds. There will be some for us, too. You start out with the premise that this is a high-risk business; you’re going to make some mistakes.”
But the Rays have embarked on their signing plan intelligently. For example, they signed Longoria, when he had only 14 days of major league service, to a six-year contract for a guaranteed $17.5 million. The contract has three additional option years with salaries totaling $30 million.
Had Longoria decided to go year by year, he would have been able, barring serious injury, to earn many millions more through salary arbitration and free agency. But he has given up that opportunity in return for the security the guaranteed money provides him. The Rays save money by having bought out his arbitration years and, with the options, the first three years of free agency eligibility.
Longoria figures to be one of the most important players of the Rays’ future, but there is one person who will be more important than Longoria, Crawford, Kazmir or Shields. That is Joe Maddon, the manager, who was as important to the team’s success this year as any manager has ever been to any team’s success and more important than most.
The Rays have developed some very good young players, but it was Maddon’s leadership that created the winning environment in which those players prospered.
“I would agree with that,” Hunsicker said. “I’ve always subscribed to the theory that managers get too much credit when things go well and too much blame when things don’t go well.”
In this case, however, Hunsicker added, “Maddon has had a greater impact on this team than any manager I’ve been associated with. He’s shown confidence in these guys from day one. Going back to the day he was hired, he’s been patient, he gives players opportunities, he’s confident and he gives them a chance to play.
“This team has clicked with him. That’s a really important attribute for a manager these days. It’s not so much how smart you are between the lines, outmanaging your opponent strategically, but do you have confidence in your players and are they able to play the way you want them to?”
The Rays have played the way Maddon has wanted them to.
The morning after the Rays squandered their 7-0 lead and lost to the Red Sox, 8-7, I was walking to a train in Penn Station in New York, and a young man walking in the same direction glanced at me as he passed by.
“You guys blew it last night,” he said to me. I had no idea what he was talking about, but then I realized I was wearing a Tampa Bay baseball cap, blue with “TB” in large white letters. I am not a Tampa Bay fan, though I have been utterly impressed with the Rays, but I have the cap because the Rays sent it to me last winter as part of their public relations campaign to exorcise the “Devil” from their name.
Still, if I saw that same young man who said “you guys blew it,” I’d have to tell him, “No, we didn’t.”