Tampa Bay Rays right-hander Ryan Pepiot compares favorably to most starting pitchers in Major League Baseball. His results stand pretty tall among them, actually.
Since the start of the 2024 season and coming into this month, only 23 pitchers with as many innings logged as Pepiot put up a lower ERA (3.50). Only 19 pitchers had a higher strikeout rate (25.2%). Only 15 allowed a lower batting average (.218).
You also could say, at 6-foot-3, Pepiot stands tall literally among other pitchers. Per Baseball Reference, only 273 pitchers list as being taller than him, whereas 530 pitchers list as being Pepiot’s height or shorter.
When he attended the wedding of teammate Josh Lowe in January, Pepiot got to meet one of the tallest and most talented players in the league, one who also happened to be the main piece sent to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the trade that brought Pepiot to the Rays: right-hander Tyler Glasnow.
Awkward? Yes, in a sense. Pepiot told Pitcher List there was a photo taken at the wedding of himself standing between Glasnow and Rays teammate Pete Fairbanks. Both men tower over Pepiot, with Glasnow listed at 6-foot-8 and Fairbanks at 6-6.
Pepiot laughed, recalling: “I’m like, ‘Guys, c’mon. I’m on my tippy toes here.’ But meeting Tyler, he’s an unbelievable guy, just great.”
Being introduced to Glasnow personally, and liking him, seemed to remove a remaining bit of apprehension Pepiot felt about being traded. He had heard rumors the Dodgers could deal him in the weeks before the December 2023 trade, which also sent outfielder Jonny DeLuca to the Rays and outfielder Manuel Margot (and cash) to the Dodgers.
Pepiot still felt a jolt when the deal happened, even if it didn’t come from nowhere. The Dodgers had drafted Pepiot in the third round in 2019, helped him develop into a consensus top 60 or so overall prospect, and promoted him to the majors for promising stints totaling about 78 total innings in 2022 and ’23.
Seen by most analysts as the player in the trade who had the highest upside, Glasnow already had completed parts of eight seasons between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Rays. The Dodgers brought him in to be a difference-maker come playoff time, only agreeing to the Pepiot trade once Glasnow signed a contract extension for five years and $136.5 million.
Glasgow’s credentials would be a lot for any player to live up to, Rays manager Kevin Cash said. And maybe, at the time of the trade, Pepiot thought some about wanting to do that. The day after the trade in a phone conversation, Cash made sure to emphasize to Pepiot that the Rays preferred he didn’t.
“I think Pep, when we first acquired him, there’s no doubt it’s human nature for guys to come in and say: ‘I got traded for Tyler Glasnow. Now, I need to live up to that,'” Cash said. “Maybe that might have been his mindset. But I thought, in spring training, he did a good job — a really good job — of being himself real quick.”
Lowe said he has been impressed with Pepiot’s attitude from the beginning in light of whom the Rays sent to the Dodgers, and he’s been even more impressed with how Pepiot has grown as a ballplayer since he arrive.
“I’ve never been traded so I wouldn’t understand what that is like, but I can definitely understand how it could be a thing when it comes to trading a superstar-type pitcher like Tyler Glasnow,” Lowe said. “Ryan is another guy we’ve seen over the past year and a half develop even more into being a dominant pitcher. It’s been really fun to watch. He’s got electric stuff, and when he takes the mound, he’s a bulldog out there.”
Having himself been traded to the Rays, for Nick Solak in 2019, Fairbanks wanted to make Pepiot feel welcome. He understood what it was like to be the new guy in the Rays organization.
“Anytime you get somebody that’s a part of a famous Rays trade tree, whether they want to or not, they’ve got a mantle to uphold,” Fairbanks said. “You can definitely fall into that trap of trying to do too much.”
Fairbanks also said that it’s up to players themselves to realize they shouldn’t carry the burden of other people’s expectations when a trade is made.
“I don’t think it’s his responsibility for making the trade,” Fairbanks said. “In that situation, both teams got what they wanted. That’s not on us to do anything that we’re not capable of.”
Being traded can be a peculiar experience, for the player traded and for those around them. Pepiot happened to be at dinner with a group of friends when the news came. One of those friends was left-hander Alex Vesia, who himself had been traded a couple years earlier. Vesia didn’t seem ready for his friend to go.
“We had heard reports and seen them all over social media,” Vesia said. “Ryan answered his phone and we all went silent before he got up and went outside to talk. He came back after a time, and we were all looking at him, kind of waiting. A few beats later he says: ‘All right guys, I got traded.’
“We all laughed because it was a funny moment. But it also was so surreal.”
One of Cash’s strengths is the authentically supportive way he communicates. So when a player like Pepiot hears “He wants me to be me” from Cash, like in their talk the day after the trade, it doesn’t come off as a sales pitch.
“The Rays do a great job here of wanting people to be themselves and do what they need to do to be successful,” Fairbanks said.
Having the manager convey a comforting message is a good first step after a trade, but having pitching coach Kyle Snyder as a resource has been an even bigger ace in the hole for the Rays. Tampa Bay promoted Snyder from the minors in 2019, and ever since the Rays have had the third-best ERA and fourth-best FanGraphs WAR in the league. The best among the starters this season has been right-hander Drew Rasmussen, who likely deserves an All-Star spot after recovering from two Tommy John surgeries and a third internal brace procedure on his elbow.
“I was very happy about it back when I came over here in ’19,” Fairbanks said. “The atmosphere that’s fostered from the top down and continues in the clubhouse is something that makes it easy to transition to.”
Snyder said the team can only do so much. Players have to buy in too.
“Even on Day 1, we made sure for him that he wasn’t going to replace Tyler, nor did we want him to,” Snyder said. “We wanted him to be developing into the starter he could become. And he’s done just that.”
Vesia has kept a close eye on his friend, saying it’s clear that he’s become a better pitcher with Tampa Bay.
“His pitch arsenal, once he got over to the Rays, got even better,” Vesia said. “They have a very good system over there, and they know what they’re doing to develop guys. It was probably a really good place for him to go, if he was going to go.”
Since the start of ’24, Pepiot has reached double digits in strikeouts three times, including 12 against the Boston Red Sox in September a season ago, and 11 against the Baltimore Orioles in June. He has kept opponents from scoring five times, most recently in consecutive starts in late May against the Toronto Blue Jays and Houston Astros.
In his 12-strikeout performance against Boston at Tropicana Field, Pepiot reached pitching nirvana (short version) with an immaculate fifth inning. Immaculate innings happen when all three batters strike out on nine total pitches. Pepiot’s victims: Connor Wong (looking), Wilyer Abreu and Triston Casas (both swinging).
Pepiot’s was the second immaculate inning of 2024, after Michael Kopech, and 117th in MLB history, with Cal Quantrill adding No. 118 in May. They’re a relatively rare occurrence, though contemporary strikeout fashion make them more frequent nowadays. Back from 1929-1952, not a single one happened.
Pepiot wanted to accomplish his immaculate inning using only four-seam fastballs, with that being how he got the first two batters. But with two outs, catcher Ben Rortvedt signaled for two changeups to start off Casas. The first was called and the second was fouled off. Pepiot used a 96.1 mph fastball, his second-fastest pitch of the game, to get Casas swinging for strike three.
Pepiot said he knew about the immaculate inning after Wong and Abreu went down, and “thought it would be cool” to stay exclusively with the heater to finish off the inning. No matter, Pepiot said he wasn’t going to disagree with Rortvedt’s pitch selection, adding: “I don’t shake.”
Pepiot was happy to get the fastball signal again on 0-2, because he was pumped to “throw it as fast as humanly possible,” for strike three.
“If he hits it in the seats, he hits it in the seats,” Pepiot said.
Pepiot added two more strikeouts in the sixth inning, giving him 12, and the most in a game by Rays pitcher since … Glasnow struck out 14 the season before. There’s that man again.
Glasnow in ’24 gave the Dodgers what they wanted, at least in the first half of the season, when he made his first All-Star team. Glasnow also reached 134 innings, a career high. But he made only two starts after July, and missed the playoffs because of elbow tendinitis. The Dodgers won the World Series without him able to pitch.
Regardless that he missed out winning a championship ring, Pepiot said he wouldn’t switch places again with Glasnow for it. Did he even consider it a bummer that he missed winning the World Series?
“No, because I’m happy where I am,” Pepiot said.
This season, Glasnow had made just five appearances, none since May, and logged only 18 innings, before being sidelined with right shoulder inflammation. He’s been working his way back on a rehab assignment, and is due to rejoin the Dodgers’ rotation Wednesday against the Milwaukee Brewers. Glasnow has been quoted as saying he finds his own extensive injury history to be “exhausting.”
Going back five years or longer, few pitchers in the majors have better measurable stuff than Glasnow. But Pepiot is a riser on the those kind of leaderboards, and there also is significant value in him just being available to take every turn in the rotation. Pepiot has not missed a start this season, and has been pushing himself to go deeper into games, after getting zero outs after the sixth inning in ’24. Rays starters as a group are throwing more innings than they have in the past, though only Zack Littell has thrown a complete game.
“Littell has been holding his CG over our heads for weeks,” said Pepiot, who has gone as far as eight innings. He is pushing the envelope, but it’s his own envelope.
The Rays told him from the time of the trade — from team president Erik Neander in the front office, to Cash in the dugout, to Snyder in the bullpen and to teammates in the clubhouse — to be himself. And whatever happens with Glasnow in Los Angeles stays in Los Angeles.
“People are going to compare. It’s going to happen,” Pepiot said. “I’m not one to look into stuff and go down a rabbit hole. It wouldn’t be good for anything going on in my brain. But it’s something they told me from very early on, right after the trade happened: ‘Just be who you are, and that’s going to be good enough for us.'”
