Joel Sherman posted his 2010 predictions for 2010 awards this morning and the Rays figured prominently.  Evan Longoria is becoming a popular choice to win the MVP award.  In explaining his choice, Sherman almost sounds like he’s feeling guilty for not picking Joe Mauer.

For me, the most interesting tidbit from Sherman was his Cy Young writeup.  Felix Hernandez was his choice.  But, there’s this:

Tempted to pick Tampa’s Matt Garza, but he just might be A.J. Burnett 2.0, great stuff that never fully translates due to issues with pitching IQ and maturity.

Finally, both Wade Davis and Jeremy Hellickson get mentioned in the Rookie of the Year race, which Sherman gave to Baltimore’s Brian Matusz.

Back in October, I posed ten questions about the off-season.   

Who’s here today that won’t be here in February? Thankfully, the names are few.  Gabe Gross is gone.  Aki was traded.  Pretty much all else remained in place for the upcoming season.  And, that explains why we remain optimistic for the 2010 season.

Who do the Rays need to return to the playoffs?   The obvious answers were closer and catcher.  Both were addressed during the off-season.

What does the outfield look like next Spring?   Carl Crawford and BJ Upton are the anchors.  To this day, right field remains a bit of a question.  Matt Joyce will, most likely, open the season on the disabled list.  At this point, it would appear that the decision could very well be who Joe Maddon feels can play right field (or second base) better, Sean Rodriguez or Ben Zobrist.

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Has Hank Blalock done enough to break camp as a Tampa Bay Ray?  Most likely, that all depends on Willy Aybar.  Joe Maddon is more and more optimistic that Aybar will be healthy and ready to go.  That doesn’t bode well for Blalock.

Could his old team want him back?  ESPN.com’s Jim Reeves writes that the Rangers are in search of a backup corner infielder.  According to the article, they remain interested in bringing Mike Lowell to Texas, and it mentions a few other options.  But, no mention of Blalock. 

Earlier in the off-season, the Rangers had agreed to trade backup catcher Max Ramirez to Boston for Lowell, but backed off when Lowell’s health became too concerning.  While it wouldn’t appear that Ramirez is destined for catching greatness, wouldn’t it seem like the Rays could use depth there as well? 

For me, there’s probably not a lot of production difference between Blalock and Aybar.  Aybar, when healthy, might be a tad better hitter.  But, Blalock comes with his share of risk as well.  If Dan Johnson accepts his Triple-A assignment, it would seem that the Rays would have an adequate backup plan.  I say shave the Blalock contract off the books and see if they can obtain something useful for the organization like another catching alternative.

Here’s a Rays season preview from a Toronto Blue Jays blog.  The Bluebird Banter provides an example of why bloggers often let other team’s bloggers do the preview for them. 

Obviously, I’m doing a blog.  But, I’m not sure how many people would speculate that Pat Burrell is penciled in as the starting right fielder going into the 2010 season.  He’s not.  Thankfully.  And, that doesn’t make Hank Blalock our everyday DH.  Although, that one has merit. 

Another miss on this preview is the addition of Winston Abreu to the bullpen.  I’m pretty sure Lance Cormier is a lock.  Overall, not a horrible assessment, but it gives pretty good idea that, outside of the local area, others aren’t exactly sure what’s up with the Rays.  Whatever anyone thinks, it’s not looking like “Pat the Bat” will be grabbing a glove.

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This is a few days old, but I like the preview provided by Zach Sanders on the Baseball Daily Digest.  Particularly, I love the optimism.  Here’s why:

I’ve never been to a Rays home game, but I imagine the stadium will be going crazy when the Rays are playing the Red Sox and Yankees late in the year, battling for a playoff spot. Can they do it? That remains to be seen.

Imagining the Trop going crazy late in the season is optimism.  I love it.  A playoff contending Rays WILL rock the Trop.  Let’s just hope that’s what’s happening in August and September.

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Finally, I like this from realgmbaseball.com.  Why?  Because they have them as the AL Wild Card team.  I’m not sure I could say it better.

Tony Massarotti, Boston Globe -

Good rotation, good lineup, good defense, good bench. As for the bullpen, Tampa went out and acquired closer Rafael Soriano in hopes of stabilizing the bullpen. If everything clicks, it could be 2008 all over again.

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USA Today has a poll going for readers to suggest who will win the AL East.  After only 230 votes, the Yankees have 55% of the vote.  No surprise.  But, here’s what caught my eye.  9% have selected the Orioles, while only 8% have selected the Rays.  Seriously?

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While we’re looking at rankings, the Globe’s Nick Cafardo ranked the 30 managers top to bottom.  Joe came in 12th. 

One of the most intellectual, innovative (think Ortiz shift) managers in the game. Uses psychology as well as anyone in motivating players and thinks outside the box with strategic matters. 

Cafardo had Ozzie Guillen 10th and Lou Piniella 11th.  You’d be hard-pressed to convince me that either of those managers would do a better job than Joe.  Lou tried, and failed.  I’m just saying.

Last June, the Tampa Bay Rays drafted Levon Washington first in the 2009 draft.  But, in the end, they couldn’t come to terms on a contract and Washington decided to go to college instead of taking the Rays’ best offer.

Eleven games and an injured hand into the 2010 Chipola season, Washington certainly isn’t turning heads.  He’s hitting .231, 9 for 39 with only three extra base hits and three RBI.  According to an assessment from website 5tooltalk.com:

While he’s far from a finished product, he knows what needs to be done to reach his lofty potential. “This season I need to get healthy, and be healthy when the draft comes.”

• This is the first edition of What’s Important Now, our daily game wrap up/game preview article. I am debuting it a couple weeks early as we approach the part of spring when starters will begin getting playing time.
• The Rays beat the Blue Jays in Port Charlotte with a final score of 5 to 3. Jeff Niemann got the start and pitched five innings, allowing two earned on seven hits. Rafael Soriano followed Niemann, pitching one inning and allowing a homer. Choate and Thayer took the final three innings and niether allowed a run.
• Jason Bartlett was impressive, going 3 for 4 with two solo homers. Crawford was 2 for 3, Longoria was 0 for 2 and Sean Rodriguez was 1 for 3 with a run.
• The Rays will play the Twins tomorrow at Charlotte Sports park. The game starts at 1:05 and will be televised on Sun Sports.
• More news from today was that Wade Davis locked up the fifth starting spot over Sonny. Despite his at times rocky spring, with JP injured, the Rays needed an extra arm in the pen and, according to the Heater, Joe thinks Sonny is better in the pen than Wade.

The Rays are whittling away at their roster, with 11 more players sent out from camp to the minor leagues. 

Probably the biggest name, or perhaps most disappointed, is Justin Ruggiano who had an excellent camp.  But, all things considered, hitting .447 for the spring still didn’t give him much of a chance of breaking camp on the big league roster. 

During the off-season, the Rays started to build a stockpile of first basemen.  Two of them, Dan Johnson and Ryan Shealy, also got demoted this afternoon.  For Johnson, he might be on the move, as he is out of options and must clear waivers to take an assignment in Durham.  Again, this is no surprise, considering the Rays still have Hank Blalock in camp and Willy Aybar returning.  There really wasn’t room for either on the roster.

The remaining Rays being reassigned were Winston Abreu, Joe Bateman, Jeff Bennett, Richard de los Santos, Carlos Hernandez, Heath Phillips, Angel Chavez and J.J. Furmaniak.  Like I said, really no surprises here. 

The Rays are down to 34 on the spring roster.  The hardest cuts are yet to come.  It still wouldn’t surprise me to see Andy Sonnanstine traded, ideally for a lefty reliever.  And, in the race for back-up slots at third and first, I would not be shocked if Hank Blalock beat out Willy Aybar.  Of course, Aybar is out of options, so he, too, could be dangled as trade bait.

But we should keep in mind the careers of (Bret) Boone and (Richard) Hidalgo before we assume Zobrist has established a new level of performance.

Eno Sarris at Fangraphs/ESPN’s TMI

There you have it.  The numbers geeks at Fangraphs.com feel that Ben Zobrist’s 2009 season “could” be a fluke.  Sure, it could be.  The level at which he performed last year was the first year he did that.  Statistically speaking. 

If you follow the link, you got WAR and blah blah blah.  Ben Zobrist started to show signs of offensive production upon his callup in 2008.  If you look at his September 2008, he hit .321 with 5 HR and 12 RBI in 20 games. 

I would argue that Ben Zobrist went through a philosophical change as he saw his value to the Rays change.  Zobrist came to the Rays as a young shortstop.  Jason Bartlett had planted himself as the shortstop of the present and the future of the Rays.  So, for survival, Ben had to change into something else.  So, he transformed himself from a slap-hitter to a power-hitter via teachings from hitting coach Jaime Cevallos.

Sure, the statitstical gurus look at the numbers and throw out skepticism.  Should we look at his 2009 as the start of something great or an anomaly?  I’ll argue that Ben is a pretty intelligent guy and saw that he needed to make a change to his repertoire and became a versatile power hitter.  Shortstop with the Tampa Bay Rays appeared to be a dead end.  But, there were other opportunities.   

New York Daily News baseball writer Bill Madden has an article posted stating that the Rays are talented.  And ready to contend again.

It’s the typical Rays assessment of good young talent, a team that has another year’s experience. 

It’s the very first sentence that I enjoy the most.

Everyone seems to agree the window of opportunity is closing for the Tampa Bay Rays with three of their key players – left fielder Carl Crawford, first baseman Carlos Pena and closer Rafael Soriano – free agents and likely unsignable after the season.

I love the fact that everyone writes the Rays off after losing these three players.  First, they haven’t lost them yet.  So, 2010 remains bright.  But, I still like the depth in the Rays minor league system to rebound if and when the Rays lose these players.  Desmond Jennings isn’t far off.  Jake McGee could very well be being groomed as the next closer.  That leaves first base.  Heck, who says Ben Zobrist doesn’t end up there. 

With all that said, let the rest of baseball think that the Rays are done after 2010.  Won’t 2011 be a great story when the Rays remain in contention?

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By now, you might have already heard about Jim Rome’s “take” on the Rays taking a “night club” approach with drawing fans to the Trop.  He suggests a more “tight” and “sleek” name for the Trop.  He offers up “Juice” or “Squeeze” or “813″. 

WHAT?  813?  Is this taking the Tampa / St. Petersburg ignorance to another level?  The name of the building should be after the area code that you do NOT call locally if you want to get into the building?    Note to Romey, the Trop and the Rays are in area code 727, genius.

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The New York Times has a profile of former Rays minor league outfielder Jon Weber posted.  Weber signed on with the Yankees after spending the past three seasons in the Rays organization.  Weber told the NYT:

“I had a bunch of offers, but it wasn’t the offers that New York brought to me. They told me they were going to bring me into camp and give me a shot. Other teams were like, we want you to be a Triple A veteran guy. I’ve done that the last six years.”