Ah, the American League East, the division of Ruth and Berra, Yastrzemski and Ripken Jr., Halladay and Longoria. It’s home to classic teams of the sport, age-old rivalries, iconic moments and locations – From the Green Monster to the Short Porch and even more recently the not-so-beloved but now dearly departed dingy Trop.
But enough of names, faces, and places of years past. Let’s instead focus on the present. More specifically, let’s look at where the AL East is headed and what we might expect from it as we barrel toward the 2025 season.
The only logical place to start is with the reigning champions, the New York Yankees. It was a banner season for the Bronx Bombers a year ago, one which saw them atop the division with a 94-68 record, two MVP-type performances, and an AL pennant. All went according to plan until manager Aaron Boone plucked starter-turned-defacto reliever Nestor Cortes from the bullpen in Game 1 of the World Series. Everything after went about as wrong as they once went right.
For starters, and perhaps most devastatingly, the Yankees lost the World Series thanks to a stretch of embarrassing turns. Then, Juan Soto jumped over the Throgs Neck Bridge to Queens and joined the Mets. It was a dark what-if start to the winter in the Bronx.
Thankfully, the sun soon parted. Max Fried flocked to the pinstripes and fled Atlanta on an eight-year, $218 million deal, All-Star closer Devin Williams came via trade from the Milwaukee Brewers, and Cody Bellinger soon followed after the Cubs ran out of space for him on their roster and payroll. Former MVP Paul Goldschmidt rounded out the additions to close December and all but close the book on the offseason.
All in all, the Yankees made the best out of what could’ve been a bad situation. Not many teams can lose a player of Soto’s caliber and enter their next season feeling just as good about their chances of winning the World Series. The Yankees can. They’ve earned that right.
Or, at least, they had. Since spring training, the Yankees have seemingly lost Gerrit Cole and Giancarlo Stanton to season-ending surgeries. Cole needs Tommy John surgery after experiencing elbow soreness a week ago, and Stanton hadn’t even swung a bat before injuring himself. His injury, unlike Cole’s, is far more mysterious. Information is limited to an elbow injury that’s left the sluger with “very high” levels of pain. Stanton’s left Yankees camp to speak with specialists and to attend to a “personal matter,” both of which have left him more of a name than a face this spring. When present, Stanton’s called his injury “considered severe in both elbows,” with season-ending surgery as the only remedy.
That’s not where it ends, though. Before either Cole or Stanton became a worst-case scenario, Luis Gil came first. The reigning AL Rookie of the Year will miss at least the next three months due to a lat strain. When it rains, it pours.
Losing both pitchers – especially Cole – is obviously a blow. He’s not just the team’s best pitcher, he’s one of the best in the sport. But what’s some comfort is the depth behind Cole. Fried is more than capable of pitching like an ace, and before the emergence of Spencer Strider, he was Atlanta’s #1. Carlos Rodón can also help carry the torch after a rebounding 2024. Clarke Schmidt will do the same, coming off a 2.85 ERA in 16 starts. While not ideal, having Marcus Stroman as a fourth starter and Will Warren as a fifth isn’t the end of days. If the Yankees need to add a back-of-the-rotation starter, they can find one in a trade or off the scrap heap.
What they can’t find so easily is someone who can replace Stanton. And that’s because of the blue-and-white elephant in the room: Without Stanton and past Judge, who should the opposing pitchers be scared of in the Yankees lineup?
Bellinger is the first answer that comes to mind. After all, he’s their replacement for Soto. But let us not forget that Bellinger’s coming off a worse 2024 than 2023. His OPS dipped from .881 in his first year in Chi-town to .751 in his second. In addition, Bellinger collected fewer home runs and RBIs despite playing another 130 games. And it’s not as if he played with a diminished Cubs team. They went 83-79, finished second in the NL Central, and would’ve made the playoffs if not for the Mets and the Diamondbacks. The Cubs had plenty to play for, yet Bellinger finished 10th on the team in fWAR, three spots behind rookie Pete Crow-Armstrong and four behind Justin Steele, who made just 24 starts.
Playing in Yankee Stadium will help erase some of those concerns. Bellinger will surely reap rewards from the Short Porch – as does everyone playing in the Pinstripes. But it’s still worth remembering that Bellinger is coming off the third-worst OPS in his career, will play most of the campaign as a 30-year-old, and is now the second-most important bat on the team. He’s no slam dunk.
While Jazz Chisholm Jr. is the closest to a rim-rattling putback thanks to his .825 OPS with the Yankees last season, it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. An elbow sprain cost Chisolm some time and some juice. After returning from the injury, he only hit .252 with a .711 OPS. Those numbers dropped again in the playoffs, where Chisholm hit .182/.250/.309 with a .559 OPS and 14 strikeouts. Couple those concerns with Chisholm only having one season with a .770 OPS or better in his entire career, and another grows. The plain truth is this: For Chisholm to be the hitter the Yankees need, he’ll have to defy the expectations he’s set throughout his career.
As for the rest of the lineup, well, it doesn’t get much better. Goldschmidt is coming off the worst offensive season he’s ever had and is 37. Jasson Domínguez is still anyone’s guess, Anthony Volpe remains up-and-down offensively and is only hitting .179 with a .600 OPS this spring, and DJ LeMahieu hasn’t been the same in four seasons. Ben Rice will presumably take Stanton’s place in the lineup and, despite the fanfare, hit .171 last season. The most reliable offensive player behind Judge might be Austin Wells, whose OPS last season was .718.
This is no Murderer’s Row. It’s more the murderer and his merry band of pickpockets.
The Yankees and their Bleacher Creatures should still feel strong heading into 2025. But it’d be foolhardy for either to feel certain that this team will end what’s becoming the second-longest title drought in the franchise’s 122 seasons.
From the Bronx to Boston, let’s talk about the new-look Red Sox.
After three straight seasons without a winning record, the Red Sox needed to change. More specifically, ownership had to change. Fenway Sports Group lauded themselves for sparing no expense for the first era of their run. Doing so helped the franchise break the Curse of the Bambino and later shatter the myth with championships in 2007, 2013, and 2018. Nothing mattered in Boston but winning. Nothing until Mookie Betts’ contract came up.
The story is known, and there’s no need to relitigate it. Needless to say, the Sox traded Betts and bottomed out in the years following. Worse, ownership began operating as the antithesis to themselves. They wouldn’t spend, wouldn’t rock the boat, and surely put in financial parameters for their front office. Winning, it seemed, only mattered so long as it was cost-effective.
Whether due to fan discontent, public shaming, or the recognition of their errors, ownership made necessary changes this offseason. They’d spend $176 million in free agency, the sixth-most in baseball, and traded several prospects to acquire White Sox ace Garrett Crochet. Not enough can be said about Crochet, a talent the Sox haven’t had in their rotation since the last time they traded with the White Sox. Now, the Sox appear to be back with a revamped line-up, capable pitching staff, and a farm system full of potential stars. But are appearances what they seem?
The short answer is yes. The Red Sox haven’t brought Alex Bregman and Crochet aboard to salvage a sinking ship. This team has talent, whether it be Rafael Devers, Jarren Duran, Tanner Houck, Brayan Bello, Wilyer Abreu, Trevor Story (if he can stay healthy), or Triston Casas (if the Sox stop trying to trade him every possible second of the day). It’s a good roster. Even their secondary options like Ceddanne Rafaela, Rob Refsnyder, and Lucas Giolito bring some upside. The bones of a good baseball team exist on this roster. Bregman and Crochet only need to add a little more calcium.
Whether they can remains a question, and for Bregman, those queries ring louder than Crochet. By almost every stat, Bregman’s 2024 was a career-worst. His OPS was down for a third straight year, his OBP plummeted, and his wRC+ hadn’t been worse since his 2016 rookie season. It wasn’t the type of walk year he hoped for, and it partially led to his long winter.
That said, Bregman’s career-worst season was still plenty good. His .768 OPS was still ninth among all third basemen, while his 25 homers were sixth, 74 RBI were seventh, and his 119 wRC+ was seventh. Ke’Bryan Hayes would kill for a season like that.
Jokes aside, there’s still plenty to like about Bregman. Chief among them are his numbers at Fenway Park. In Bregman’s 21 games in Boston, he’s hitting .375/.490/.750 with seven home runs, 15 RBI, and a 1.240 OPS. That last number is the highest among all players in MLB history with at least 75 plate appearances at Fenway. It’s a small sample size, not a full calendar month, but Fenway is perfect for Bregman’s swing. We’re already seeing that at Fenway South, a field with similar features to the real deal, where Bregman went 3-3 in his debut with a home run, double, and single. In other words, he’s fitting in just fine.
Bregman’s biggest contribution, however, might come on defense. While his position remains in the air, he’ll improve the team wherever he lands. In 2024, Boston finished with the second-most errors in baseball, trailing only the 62-100 Miami Marlins. The Sox were third with 102 errors made the year before that, only behind the San Francisco Giants and then-Oakland Athletics. Bregman, a former Gold Glover who maintains elite defensive metrics, will hopefully keep them out of the bottom three moving forward, regardless of his position.
As for Crochet, he’ll stabilize the starting staff. Doing so shouldn’t be too hard, considering the recent state of the Red Sox rotation. In 2023 and 2022, the Sox were 22nd in starting pitcher ERA. Though things took a turn for the better once pitching coach Andrew Bailey joined the staff last season, this rotation still needed an ace. Crochet can be that. He’s coming off a 3.58 ERA, 209-strikeout season. On top of that, his 2.69 FIP was second in the AL among all starters with at least 140 innings pitched. And that’s while playing for the 2024 Chicago White Sox, a team that broke the modern MLB record for the most losses in a season.
It was an impressive off-season for a franchise in desperate need and a much-wanted sign that Red Sox ownership wants to do more than the bare minimum.
The Baltimore Orioles were baseball’s darlings a year and a half ago. They were in the thick of an AL-best 101-61 season and the host of highlights on and off the field, whether it be Gunnar Henderson’s extraordinary rookie season or the water-spitting, sprinkler-celebrating from the dugout. The 2023 Orioles were like an unexpected teenage tryst at sleepaway camp: Young, fun, and continually surprising.
Though fate led them to a 3-0 ALDS series loss against the eventual World Series-winning Texas Rangers, everyone believed this was the start of something special. That belief only ballooned when David Rubinstein bought a majority share in the club that offseason and promised he’d do what the Angelos family couldn’t: Win a World Series. Rubenstein didn’t seem all talk, either, trading for former NL Cy Young winner Corbin Burnes before the season started. Suddenly, the Orioles had a loaded farm system, a near-complete Major League roster, and financial backing. The sky was the limit.
What’s happened since? Well, in the words of Nobel laureate and cultural pied-piper Bob Dylan, things have changed. The Orioles are a worried man with a worried mind. They’ve just walked 40 miles of bad road, and as we enter 2025, we find the once prodigal son a red-headed stepchild.
Maybe that’s hyperbolic. This team still has more talent than the Chicago White Sox, Colorado Rockies, and Miami Marlins combined. Henderson, Adley Rutschman, Jordan Westburg, Ryan Mountcastle, Colton Cowser, Grayson Rodriguez, and a returning Félix Bautista – Have mercy. They’ll compete for the AL East and most likely make the playoffs. So, what’s the problem?
The problem is this: Are the Orioles significantly better on paper or as good as the best teams in baseball? No. Their lineup, rotation, and bullpen all have glaring question marks that can’t be ignored.
Let’s start with Baltimore’s best unit: Its lineup. Top to bottom, it’s solid except for a couple of things. One, it’s without Anthony Santander. While not a perfect hitter or an easy contract to talk oneself into, Tony Taters still clubbed 44 home runs and 102 RBI for the O’s last year. Losing him isn’t something they can shrug off. Tyler O’Neill, Santander’s replacement, could live up to the task, but he’ll have to stay healthy, something he’s struggled to do, playing 130+ games only once in his seven-year career.
Another problem arises if Jackson Holliday doesn’t take a step forward. The former first-overall pick looks overwhelmed thus far in the MLB, hitting .189 with a .565 OPS thus far in his career. That can’t continue if the Orioles want to go further than they have. Another player seeking redemption is Cedric Mullins. Since his 2021 All-Star season, Mullins hasn’t been the same, hitting .233 these last two seasons with a just-above-average 102 wRC+.
The real issue, though, is on the pitching side of things. Baltimore’s solution to replacing Burnes and shoring up its rotation? A 41-year-old Charlie Morton and Tomoyuki Sugano, a talented albeit unknown addition from Japan. There’s hardly any guarantee there. Nor is there past Morton and Sugano. Dean Kremer has a 4.11 ERA over his last two seasons, and Cade Povich finished his rookie campaign with a 5.20 ERA in 16 starts. And that’s just their healthy starters. Kyle Bradish is out for a chunk of the season, Trevor Rogers isn’t expected to be ready for Opening Day after offseason knee surgery, and Tyler Wells is still recovering from 2024 elbow surgery.
Baltimore’s only standout starters are Grayson Rodriguez, who couldn’t finish his breakout season and won’t start 2025 on the Opening Day roster thanks to a triceps injury, and Zach Eflin. That’s it for a bleak rotation.
The good news is that Baltimore’s bullpen can’t get much worse after finishing with the eighth-worst ERA among all relievers in 2024. Getting Bautista back will help matters but won’t fix them, especially when the 2024 bullpen and 2025 iteration look similar outside of the addition of Andrew Kittredge. Kittredge, though, will miss months after getting knee surgery. So, there goes that notion.
Questions about the Orioles extend to the top with Rubenstein and general manager Mike Elias. As for Rubenstein, he started this offseason saying, “I’ve got to speed up the effort to get [to] a World Series.” Later this winter, Rubenstein stated, “I don’t have a financial limit.”
Did Rubenstein deliver on these promises? Well, if by “speed up” he meant doing very little, then yes. And if there’s no financial limit, why did the Orioles, a team that hasn’t won a playoff game since 2012, rank 10th in free-agent spending this offseason? Likewise, why are they entering 2025 with the 14th-highest payroll in the sport? The Houston Astros lost Bregman and traded away Kyle Tucker, and they’re still ahead of the Orioles, for Pete’s sake.
Baltimore’s young talent explains part of that problem. Henderson, for example, is making $800,000 this coming season. Yet that’s even more reason to spend. Supplement the cost-controlled pieces with big names that bolster the roster. O’Neill, as good of a player as he is, shouldn’t be your biggest offseason signing. Not when Burnes and Santander are streaking out of the building, and the free agency class consists of several suitable replacements.
Most teams with this conundrum trade for players instead of signing them. Except the Orioles aren’t doing that either. Instead, they’re letting their farm system grow while the major league roster stagnates. Coby Mayo, a career minor league infielder with little room on the MLB roster, remains in the organization instead of being flipped to fetch another much-needed starter. A similar situation persists in the outfield. Baltimore knows that two of its three outfield spots are most likely taken for the next three years with Cowser and O’Neill. Yet they’ve kept their best three outfield prospects and former top prospect Heston Kjerstad.
It’s baffling. If ownership isn’t going to spend the way they need to, or if Elias won’t utilize Rubenstein’s deep pockets, they need to do something else. Because where they are isn’t good enough. Not when the path they’ve devoted themselves to hasn’t even led to a single playoff win.
Orioles fans care. They want to believe this era will change the status quo rather than conform to it. But if 2025 isn’t special, they’ll sing the chorus of Dylan’s 2000 hit song: “I used to care, but things have changed.”
If the Orioles aren’t maximizing their championship window, the Toronto Blue Jays are doing the opposite. From plucking Santander’s feathers to a new blue shade, signing future Hall-of-Famer Max Scherzer, and acquiring All-Star second baseman Andrés Giménez from Cleveland, Toronto is all-in. They’re a car hurling down the highway at 100 miles-per-hour, blowing by every sign and plowing through every barricade like it were made of two-ply.
That attitude is because this is all Toronto’s guaranteed. Four-time All-Star Vladimir Guerrero Jr. will be a free agent this coming winter, as will two-time All-Star Bo Bichette. This generation of Blue Jays is about ready to leave the nest for greener pastures. And barring something unforeseen, they will. They’ll fly high into the sunset, south of the border, and make landfall elsewhere unless Toronto does enough in this one season to convince them to stay.
Can they? Is this roster capable of playing well enough that Toronto’s even a destination for its free agents? That’s the hundreds-of-million-dollar question circling the Six.
At first glance, there are a lot of positives in Toronto’s lineup. It’s one-through-four is George Springer, Guerrero Jr., Santander, and Bichette. That’s 11 All-Stars and five Silver Sluggers between them. It’s also a nice blend of ability. Springer is historically a get-on-base type, Guerrero is the do-it-all bopper, Santander is the masher, and Bichette is the slapper. He’ll hit for contact, knock the ball around, and if others are derailed, he’ll keep the train rolling. If it’s World Series or bust, the Blue Jays should have a top-of-the-order keeping them in the conversation.
But that’s only at first glance. Deeper inspection finds mold top-to-bottom, including in that one-through-four.
Springer is the most obvious place to start. In his first three seasons in Toronto, Springer was what the franchise hoped for, hitting .262/.338/.460 with 68 home runs, 198 RBI, and a .798 OPS. And that’s while maintaining average defensive metrics in the outfield. The story in 2024, though, was more nightmarish. Springer’s average slid to .220, his slugging percentage crept to a career-low .371, and his OPS dipped to .674, another career-worst. Accompanying those drops were others in his HardHit%, exit velocity, and his Launch Angle Sweet-Spot%. It was a horror show, and given Springer’s now 35 years of age, it’s fair to wonder if the credits are closing in.
Concerns stretch three spots down the lineup and land on Bichette. Like Springer, he’s also coming off a terrible season, with career-worsts in every single offensive category that comes to mind: average, OBP, slugging, and OPS. Bichette’s OPS was especially bad, clocking in at .598. It’d be the worst in baseball had he qualified. Thankfully, Bichette avoided that fate, thanks to a series of injuries in 2024. They range from neck spasms in March, a calf injury in June, a forearm issue in July, and then a reaggravation of that leg later in the month before a fractured finger ended his season in September.
Bichette’s health serves as a caveat – an explanation. What doesn’t are his splits. In the first half of 2024, when Bichette played in 79 of 97 games, his .595 OPS was the fourth-worst in baseball. His season numbers aren’t only a case of sample size or an inability to stay on the field. No, they speak more to a hitter who lost his way. While Bichette is worth a glass-half-full view, needing a hitter to revive their bat in a walk year while that same year decides what happens to the franchise for the next decade, well, it’s not the best feeling in the world.
And that’s just the concerns at the top of Toronto’s lineup. Past Bichette and Springer, it’s a hodge-podge of question marks. For example, Ernie Clement is projected to win the team’s third-base job. He has a .643 career OPS and is on his third MLB team since debuting in 2021. Let’s continue. Nathan Lukes, a 30-year-old with only 122 Major League plate appearances, or Joey Loperfido, who has a .614 career OPS, might start in center while Daulton Varsho recovers from offseason rotator cuff surgery. How about Alejandro Kirk’s descent from an All-Star and a Silver Slugger to someone coming off back-to-back sub-.700 OPS seasons?
If those three aren’t enough, consider this: Gimenez, Toronto’s big trade acquisition this winter, has a .674 OPS and a 90 wRC+ over his last two seasons. Brendan Rodgers, who the Rockies of all people, non-tendered has an 86 wRC+ and a .719 OPS during that same span. Gimenez is an outstanding glove, there’s no denying that. But he’s the fifth offensive question mark for a Blue Jays team with World Series aspirations.
Are there things to like about this Blue Jays roster? Yes. Despite Bichette and Springer’s 2024s, it’s a talented offense. Likewise, their pitching staff remains strong with Kevin Gausman, José Berríos, and Bowden Francis. Scherzer and Chris Bassitt round out things as fine albeit combustible options. Even their bullpen has players to get behind, like Jeff Hoffman, Nick Sandlin, Chad Green, and Yimi García. Together, they create a frisky, potentially surprising club.
But frisky isn’t good enough. For an all-in season, the Blue Jays aren’t even the odds-on-favorite in their division. They’re not second or third, either. Most sportsbooks have them fifth. To them, the Rays – a team in the middle of a retooling – are a safer bet than the Blue Jays.
Toronto did what it could to maximize its window. They’ll probably try just as hard, if not harder, to re-sign Guerrero next winter. Yet one can’t help shake the feeling that this franchise, sometimes through no fault of its own, is destined to be a bridesmaid and never the bride.
The nice thing about the Tampa Bay Rays? We get older, they stay the same team.
The 2025 Rays are much like their previous iterations: Cobbled together by trades, draft picks, castoffs, low-cost free-agent signings, and international player development success. They’re a team comprised of a couple of studs, a few up-and-comers, and a cavalcade of names the average Saint Petersburg car salesman couldn’t name if their lot of used cars depended on them.
This is the Rays’ formula. It always has been, and barring an ownership change, it always will be. The good news is no one does it better than them. See, what the Rays do, in simple terms, is gamble. They scout out what bets to make, place them, and pray to all 108 stitches they land on black. They need their no-namers to overperform, their all stars to stay as good, if not better, and their young players to blossom once they reach the bigs.
Usually, the Rays emerge on the other end unscathed. Last season, however, they looked like Las Vegas novices. Not even the soft, velvet-colored carpet of the casino could cushion their fall. By season’s end, the Rays were 82-80, finished fourth in the AL East for the first time since 2015, and missed the playoffs for the first time since 2019. Shane McClanahan never returned from injury, Zach Eflin never tapped into the usual Tampa Bay boost, and the offense played to the names on the back of their jersey instead of the front. By the end of the trade deadline, Eflin, Randy Arozarena, Aaron Civale, Phil Maton, Isaac Paredes, and Jason Adam were all gone.
The Rays came up empty – They lost. The process, though, remains the same. 2025 is just another bet. The only question is whether this parlay will pay off like so many from years past.
On the pitching front, the Rays seem poised to. McClanahan is back after a late-2023 Tommy John surgery, and his return is monumental. McClanahan is not just another Rays pitcher done right. He’s not even just another ace. In 2022, McClanhan finished with a 2.54 ERA, 144 ERA+, 3.00 FIP, and a 0.926 WHIP. Though his 194 strikeouts were 14th in baseball, his 30.3 K% was sixth, and his 10.50 K/9 was eighth. McClanahan ended sixth in Cy Young voting that season, ahead of Shane Bieber, Gerrit Cole, and Kevin Gausman. Calling it an incredible season would be underrating things.
2023 saw some regression from McClanahan before his injury – a FIP much higher than his ERA, a decreased K%, an uptick in walks, and a +.116 difference in opposing OPS. Despite that, McClanahan made the All-Star team with little issue and still boasted a 3.29 ERA and a 1.183 WHIP.
Nonetheless, getting McClanahan back healthy is massive for the Rays. It provides them with not just an ace but possibly one of the best pitchers in the AL. McClanahan looks like the latter thus far in Spring, piping 98-mile-per-hour fastballs in batting practice and ready to dish out his elite changeup. It’s one of a few reasons to believe the 2024 Rays won’t be a repeat of 2023.
Reinforcing that notion is the pitchers behind McClanahan. Taj Bradley was throwing filth at times last season – carrying a 0.82 ERA from early June to late July. Ryan Pepiot also impressed and made trading Tyler Glasnow not seem entirely insane, Shane Baz finally earned his keep from the now-infamous Chris Archer trade, Zack Littel shined as a mid-rotation piece, and Drew Rasmussen will continue to try and reclaim his quietly elite 2022 form. This is a rotation that can go six-deep if needed. And – for what it’s worth – the seventh and eighth options are just as intriguing, with the mountainous Joe Boyle reaching near 100 MPH and Ian Seymour being a former second-rounder on the rise.
Offensively, the Rays aren’t nearly as secure. For instance, according to FanGraphs’ roster projections, Tampa’s Opening Day lineup will consist of players like Jonathan Aranda, Jonny DeLuca, and Taylor Walls. Aranda only has 110 MLB games under his belt. In them, he has a .692 OPS. DeLuca, one of the many pieces from the Glasnow deal, has a .624 OPS through 131 MLB games. Walls is the most experienced of the bunch with 379 games in the Show, yet you wouldn’t know it by his career .580 OPS. It’s a bleak bottom-third.
While the lineup’s quality is far better in the middle and top third, one player determines this offense’s ceiling: Junior Caminero. Caminero is one of those many success stories for the Rays, a 21-year-old who rose through the minor league and prospect ranks like a rocket before planting himself in St. Pete. His abbreviated 43-game rookie season showed the flashes, hitting .248/.299/.424 with six home runs, 18 RBI, a .724 OPS, and a 105 wRC+. It was a strong start. But if this Rays team is going anywhere, Caminero needs to become one of the transcendent young talents in the league.
Luckily, the Rays are giving him every opportunity to be just that. So far this Spring, Caminero’s hit second or third in every game, either hitting behind Josh Lowe or Christopher Morel and Richie Palacios. Caminero’s rewarded the Rays’ faith, hitting .227/.292/.727 with a 1.019 OPS. That performance, coupled with his viral homer from the LIDOM Championship, has Caminero entering the season like a million bucks. He believes in himself, as do the Rays. Now, it only needs to translate.
If it does, the Rays might be high-rolling back into the playoffs, and Caminero might become the only constant for an endlessly changing franchise.
