Rebuilding Tampa Bay Rays for 2026

Rebuilding Tampa Bay Rays for 2026

The Tampa Bay Rays finished another season just shy of 500. And with a lot of key performers entering their final years of their deals, the pressure is on to capitalize on the current roster. Will the Rays finally grab some quality free agents or continue their cheapkate ways and watch this team fall short again? Hello, my name is Avery Taylor and welcome to Rebuild October, a series where we rebuild every single team across the month of October. So whether you’re looking for your favorite team or just generally curious as to how every team should approach the off season, then this is the series for you. And with that being said, let’s go ahead and get back into the video. As you can see from the war by position, the Rays are one of the more complete teams so far in the series, only having two position groups in the bottom third of the league. While Diaz, Aronda, and Kimro headline a powerful trio in the corner infield and DH. The team has its talent, but will it be able to capitalize on it? Before we can talk about who the team will need to add to the roster, we’ll have to talk about the impending free agents and what the team should do there. The Rays are faced with three club options, as well as one unrestricted free agent in Adrien Howser. Three club options include Pete Fairbanks at 12.5 million, Brandon Laauo at 11.5 and Taylor Walls at 2.4. Fairbanks is the most interesting one because his option is much different to the one that he signed whenever he had his extension a few years ago. In 2025, Fairbanks was able to raise his club option by $4.5 million through incentives. And it makes the decision much more difficult. With it being the raise, will they want to pay a reliever that much money and have him be their highest paid player? Fairbanks is really good and has been the model of consistency over the past three seasons, but 12.5 million for the Rays seems a bit high. However, they will pick up the option, but not with the idea of him being their closer for 2026. Instead, they will trade the right-hander to the Detroit Tigers, who have a need for pitching on the hole and would greatly appreciate a great reliever. In exchange, the Graves will grab catcher Jake Rogers and prospect Tyrone Loronzo. Rogers presents an immediate solution for the raise at catcher with his defensive prowess and ability to pull the ball in the air for home runs. He also has one year left on his deal, so he’ll need to be met with more value. And why not grab a prospect that is free falling a bit in Tyrone Loronzo. Loranzo is a power over contact type hitter with fringy skills at best at catcher. Realistically, it’s much more likely to see him at first base or DH long term. He got a lot of his pedigree from tearing up high A and the fall league with the Tigers and looked like a premier hitting talent. That was until he moved to DoubleA this season and his strikeout percentage ballooned over 31%. The poor hit tool was finally exposed and now there are questions as to what he would look like as a finished product. The power is still there and the Rays would love to get their hands on a guy like this for their system. As for the other club options, the Rays will pick up both with no underlying purpose. Brandon Lau continues to be incredible and even though it is the last year of his deal, the Rays will likely ride it out until the trade deadline. As for Taylor Walls, he’ll start the year probably as the everyday shortstop. Carson Williams looked a little overmatched during his time at the end of 2025. And having Walls as a secession play until Williams is Freddy is a solid option. Having a starting shortstop back at $2.4 million is a solid addition to any roster, especially for the ones that like to keep it cheap. As it stands for Adrien Howser, the lone unrestricted free agent. He will not be returning to the Rays in 2026. Unfortunately for the Rays, they didn’t get the version of Hower that the White Socks were getting, and they just have better, more exciting options internally. As for the prospects that we can and probably will see in the majors at some point throughout the year, we have to start with the previously mentioned Carson Williams. Williams is a powerhitting shortstop that can field his position with the best of them. As he has grown within the race system, the hit tool has become more and more of a problem. And that showed strike out over 40% of the time during his major league stent. Still, just being 22 years old, I have no rush to put him into the major leagues to start the year, but the second he gets hot, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him there. Another name to keep an eye on is Ray’s number three prospect Brody Hopkins. There is no doubt of whether Hopkins has stuff. Last season in DA, he was striking out close to 29% of the batters he was facing with his big-time fast ball and slider accompanied by a nice curveball and cutter with a developing change up. The biggest question mark around Hopkins continues to be his control, which has led to a walk rate over 10% in both of his minor league seasons. When you get up in those numbers, you run some reliever risk, but it’s always fun to dream on a starter with this kind of stuff. Aside from that, the Rays have a pair of first base prospects that couldn’t be more different. Xavier Isac has light tower power, but has yet to round out the rest of his game. While Trey Morgan has everything but power with good contact skills and elite defense at the cold corner. It’ll be tough for either of them to make much of a difference on the major league roster with the current log jam at the position. Aside from that, there are a number of prospects that can and will grace the major league roster at some point with much less potential. Especially look out for some of these names to be in the bullpen come second half of the year. Returning players to the roster will include Jonathan Aronda at first base, Junior Camero at third, Jake Mangum in left, Chandler Simpson in center, who I hope shows big improvement defensively, Josh Lau platooning in right field with Yandi Diaz at the H. The bench will include Nick Fores, Johnny Duca, and Tristan Gray. That leaves one spot left where the team will need to head the free agency for a corner outfielder that mashes left-handed pitching. I can’t imagine the Rays going any direction but cheap. So, we’re going to see them add Austin Slater for the 2026 season to platoon in the outfield. He isn’t a super fun option, but he does get the job done against left-handed pitching across his entire career. For the pitching rotation, it’ll also look very familiar returning Shane Mlanahan, who we are praying can finally stay healthy, as well as Ryan Pepio, Shane Bos, Drew Rasmusen, as well as giving Ian Seore another opportunity to start. If Mlanahan can stay healthy, this unit has both the potential and the quality of depth to be one of the best rotations in baseball, but we’ll probably be close to middle of the pack again. And the same thing goes for the bullpen, which can find all of their answers internally. Returning Griffin Jax, Edwin USA, Derek Clevener, Cole Szer, Brian Baker, Hunter Biggie, Nate Lavender, and Alex Fedo. This unit doesn’t have the household names, but I’m sure with the Rays, they will be in the upper half of the league. And that’s going to do it for the video. I know it wasn’t the super exciting influx of talent that Rays fans are probably hoping for, but I think it does keep it well in tune with what the Rays will probably do this off season, and that’s going to be not much. I hope you guys enjoyed it. Thank you guys for watching and have a wonderful day.

The Tampa Bay Rays fell off a cliff in the 2nd half, are in need of a successful offseason to make the push for the postseason in a tough division. However with their cheapskate ways, will they actually be able to make the moves necessary to make the playoffs?

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