{"id":668839,"date":"2026-04-07T17:56:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T17:56:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/668839\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T17:56:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T17:56:15","slug":"rays-speedster-is-proving-he-can-hack-it-at-the-plate-in-strong-start","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/668839\/","title":{"rendered":"Rays speedster is proving he can hack it at the plate in strong start"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays<\/a> reopened Tropicana Field on Monday, following the destructive damage of Hurricane Milton in 2024. It was a successful day, as they defeated the Chicago Cubs<\/a>. 6-4.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of the Rays’ bright spots so far in their 5-5 start to the 2026 season has been one of their up-and-coming stars. A speed demon on the base path, Chandler Simpson is shaping up his game to be complete.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With a batting average of .395 and four stolen bases already to his credit, Simpson is proving he can be a valuable asset. Another key highlight here is that his 15 hits on the year are the third-most in the American League.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Not known for his power, as he has yet to hit a home run in 482 career appearances at the plate, he does have a triple this season. With how fast he is, you should expect to see some highlights of inside-the-park homers from Simpson. His speed is for real, and this has been common knowledge for a while now.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the minors, he stole 94 bases in 2023 and then upped it to 104 in 2024. Then, in his rookie campaign with the Rays last season, he was tied with Cleveland Guardians<\/a> third baseman Jose Ramirez for the second-most stolen bases in the Majors with 44.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This combination of speed and ability to hit is lethal. He can get on base with his bat and then advance himself into scoring position despite his lack of power. The Rays surely have something special here in Simpson, and he is already showing it in his sophomore season.<\/p>\n

More MLB News:\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tampa Bay Rays reopened Tropicana Field on Monday, following the destructive damage of Hurricane Milton in 2024.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620785,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2377],"tags":[5,4,297,2550,68,2551,2549],"class_list":{"0":"post-668839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-rays","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-rays","11":"tag-tampa-bay","12":"tag-tampa-bay-rays","13":"tag-tampabay","14":"tag-tampabayrays"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116364718178330514","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}