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We Need To Stop Giving The Tampa Bay Rays A Pass For Their Postseason Struggles

This annoys me to no end. Look, the Tampa Bay Rays are an exceptional organization. They do more with less every single season. The 2023 campaign was a prime example of that. They suffered a million pitching injuries and had the Wander Franco situation, which is one of one the most horrific things baseball has seen in recent memory. They still won over 95 games and made it to the postseason. The front office in Tampa Bay is elite. The players are solid. Their ownership sucks, and the team does not play well in October—end of story.

This team made it to the World Series twice, once in 2008, which was legitimate. And once in 2020, which doesn't count. Nothing that happened in sports in 2020 meant shit. You had teams hitting walk off home runs at their opposing team stadiums. It was Fugazi. Besides that magic run in 2008, this team wins 90 games every year they get into the postseason, and then they lose the teams that spend real money. 

The problem I have with Tampa Bay isn't so much the fact that they always lose in October. There is something to be said about a team in the mix every year. But if any other organization consistently lost in the postseason like the Tampa Bay Rays do, they'd get bashed for it. Say what you will about the New York Yankees, but they get put on blast when they fail in October. Their players will own up to it; their management will own up to it. They will acknowledge that it's unacceptable to make it and lose every single year. Every time the Rays lose in October, we give them a little pat on the head, praise them for being a team that made it farther than they should, and then they go on their merry way. 

The Tampa Bay Rays have money. The Tampa Bay Rays choose not to spend money. There's a huge difference. So I won't give them their flowers just because they present themselves as a team with no cash. From a front office standpoint, they're second to none. They put together a roster every year capable of playing with the big boys, which means they also deserve the criticism that comes with consistently getting their shit kicked in by the big boys in October. I'm well aware of the injuries; I'm also aware that the Rangers, the team that just beat Tampa, had a combined 5 Cy Young awards sitting in the dugout due to injury. It didn't seem to impact them.