Tampa Bay

Rays

The 344-foot shot down the right field line bounced back into play and was initially ruled a double, but replay showed it was over the yellow line. Simpson has one homer in 1,636 professional plate appearances, that being an inside-the-parker in Double-A in 2024. It’s not strictly an exit velocity matter for him — he exceeded 100 mph on seven of his balls in play in the majors last year — but most of his hardest contact comes on grounders. With a .370/.393/.481 line in 30 plate appearances, Simpson has had a nice spring despite missing a little time with a hamstring issue. He’ll almost certainly be the Rays’ primary left fielder against righties, and he’ll be worth playing in fantasy leagues as long as he continues to start most of the time.

The Rays’ lineup would probably work best if one of their lefties from the group of Chandler Simpson, Gavin Lux, Cedric Mullins or Jake Fraley stepped up and took over the leadoff spot, but for now, it looks like they’ll go with Yandy Diaz leading off and Aranda right behind him. Still unclear is whether Junior Caminero will hit third, which he did Tuesday, or if he’ll occupy the cleanup spot, which is where he’s been in most of his starts. They Rays had Lux batting third in between Aranda and Caminero on Friday. Ryan Vilade was there today, but he’s only expected to play against lefties. Fraley and Mullins have hit fifth and sixth, respectively, behind Caminero the last two days.

Rays manager Kevin Cash described Lux’s as a “cranky” while speaking to reporters on Saturday morning. It’ll be Ryan Vilade, who is a near-lock to make Tampa Bay’s season-opening roster, taking over at the keystone while he recovers. Lux will open the year as the club’s starting second baseman but also figures to spend some time in the outfield, if needed. There’s a chance he opens the season on the injured list if his shoulder isn’t feeling better in time for next week’s opener.

Boyle has shown the ability to miss bats with electric stuff, but he’s also shown he rarely has any idea where his arsenal will end up, so he won’t make the Opening Day roster. Both Malloy and Palacios figure to be up-and-down for Tampa Bay as bench options.

Caminero plated Yandy Diaz with an RBI double in the first to give the Rays an early 1-0 lead. The 22-year-old hasn’t shown much pop in the Grapefruit League with a .389 slugging percentage, but there are few young hitters with more power than Caminero. He should be among the homer leaders in 2026.

McClanahan generated eight swings and misses in his five frames, and he struck out four against two walks. The 28-year-old looks healthy, and he was able to get his sinker up to 96.8 mph in what was likely his final spring start. There’s a ton of volatility in McClanahan’s profile, but it’d be foolish to write off what was among the best southpaw starters in baseball not that long ago.

That makes it seem likely that we won’t see Walls with the Rays until sometime in early May. That should give Carson Williams a chance to cement himself as the team’s shortstop for 2026, but considering they had sent him to Triple-A earlier in the week, fantasy managers may want to take a wait-and-see approach here.

Vilade parked a 99.1 mph Jose Alvarado sinker into the seats. It was his first of the spring and boosted his overall batting line to .225/.319/.350 in 45 plate appearances. Vilade is a plausible short-side platoon bat on Tampa’s Opening Day roster, but he’s likely only of fantasy interest in leagues with daily transactions.

He topped out at 95.6 mph with the four-seam fastball and averaged about a two mile decline on each of his main pitches. The result were ugly: He allowed three homers and 11 hits while getting a whiff on just one of 14 swings against the fastball. The outing raised his spring training ERA to 4.91 and his WHIP to 1.50. Rasmussen is clearly still worth a pick later in drafts and it’s good to see him pitching into the sixth inning, there’s nothing downright terrible about this outing for his fantasy stock. But it was clearly a down day against a Phillies team starting most of their non-Team USA affiliated regulars.

Alberto had a 10.80 ERA and 2.40 WHIP in 6.2 innings during Spring Training. He’ll likely return to either Single-A Bowling Green or Double-A Montgomery to open the 2025 season with the Rays. Alberto has not pitched above High-A to this point in his minor league career.