Denard Span saw the writing on the wall, although he never expected to be traded this early in the season. (Photo Credit: Tampa Bay Times)

The Tampa Bay Rays stunned the baseball world Friday afternoon, kicking off the trade season early by dealing OF Denard Span and RHP Alex Colome to Seattle for a pair of pitching prospects. Call the timing of the deal surprising or unexpected, yet the move itself is not shocking in the least. After all, everyone knew that Span and Colome would be dealt at some point season, after the trade-rumor-filled offseason bore no fruit for the pair.

The hot-takes on the deal were almost instantaneous. Rays ace Chris Archer was frustrated by the move, saying:

Erik (Neander, Rays GM) is on record saying that it doesn’t make our team better today, which is a little frustrating to hear. We got off to a slow start, but the last month or more we’ve been playing a lot better baseball.

Everybody in this room wants our team to continue on the path that we’ve been on, and it’s going to be tough to do without the guy who led off for us most of the last two months and the guy who’s been pitching the ninth inning for the last three years for us.

Hopefully we see some type of return, maybe some of younger guys get called up soon. But, again, I’m not here to be mediocre or just be competitive. I want to win. I want to win on a regular basis. Hopefully we can keep our head above water until we get injected with that new blood they say is coming.

Span enjoyed his time in Tampa Bay, and he wasn’t shocked by the trade per se. Rather the timing of it took him by surprise:

It’s a bittersweet day, more bitter than sweet though. I never thought that I would enjoy being home and playing for my hometown team as much as I did.

Just seeing even the first two months of this season, how this team had already grown and gotten better, it was just a joy to see. And just the atmosphere in that clubhouse, it’s unlike any atmosphere I’ve ever been a part of to be honest. It’s loose. It’s fun. I told Erik and (senior VP) Chaim (Bloom) that they have a good thing going here.

On one hand, it landed the team a starting pitcher, Andrew Moore, that the front office sees as part of the future core, and opened additional opportunities now for younger players like Johnny Field, with others slated to come up in June.

And if we are being honest, Span’s offensive contributions waned as the first month rolled into the second. No disrespect to the outfielder, but he was unexpectedly productive to start the season — PECOTA pegged him for a .259 BA/.316 OBP/.373 SLG/.689 OPS line with six home runs, 54 runs scored and 37 RBI in 372 plate appearances, and at the height of his productivity (March/April) he slashed .256 BA/.372 OBP/.449 SLG/.821 OPS with a 130 wRC, three homers, 14 runs scored, and 21 RBI. Yet his productivity fell dramatically in May, with Span slashing .215 BA/.354 OBP/.308 SLG/.662 OPS, with a 95 wRC in 79 plate appearances. Because of it, the Rays likely viewed his productivity during the first month of play as unsustainable over the long haul, and chose to strike while the iron was lukewarm … while he still had some trade value. The question begs, can the tandem of Carlos Gomez and Field ratchet up their contributions at the plate in Span’s wake?

As for Colome, the right-hander sports an unsightly 4.15 ERA and a 2.88 K/BB. Then again, he also carries a 2.69 FIP and an improved 9.6 K/9, not to mention a 54.5% groundball rate. His low strand rate (65.4%) and high BABIP-against (.354) help explain the discord.

The Rays also picked up Wilmer Font from the Athletics; he has been added to the 25-man roster as depth out of the bullpen. Neander confirmed that they would veer toward a closer by committee scenario over the short-term, leaving the ultimate decision up to Kevin Cash on a game-by-game basis. It is plausible that Jose Alvarado could get the first crack at closing, after all his big velocity, improved command and “cool” during high leverage situations makes him the heir apparent to the job.

Either way, the Mariners essentially took the $12-million they saved on Robinson Cano’s suspension, and added a setup man — which Colome will be used as — and another outfielder.

On the other hand, the perception by many is that this is an extension of principal owner Stu Sternberg’s offseason directive to slash payroll.

To be fair, everyone is right in a sense. After all, Gomez is expected to return from the DL on Saturday, and the deal allows Field, who has exceeded expectations thus far, to stay with the big league squad. Moreover, the Rays organizational pitching depth took a hit thanks to injuries, and the trade helps replenish the Minor League stock of arms.

While Neander argued that this was not a salary dump, at least not in the traditional sense, the Rays wiped the slate of more than $9.1-million after the $4-million in cash considerations they sent to Seattle are taken into consideration — reducing the overall payroll to approximately $64-million, the lowest it as been since 2011.

And since it all relates, previous to the start of the 2018 campaign, Rays Principal Owner Stu Sternberg took umbrage to a grievance filed by the MLBPA in February, bandying about a $75-million payroll total — a sum that was approximately $3-million higher than the starting figure a season ago.

We have a good sense of what we’re doing, we have … a great track record of putting a very competitive product, or an incredibly competitive product on this field for the last 10 years, Sternberg said. And I’ll stand by that for 2018 and beyond as well.

Then again, the Rays ended last season with a $91-million payroll — the highest payroll total under Sternberg’s tenure, and almost $30-million more than today. In all fairness, Sternberg indeed did increase the payroll at the start of the season, however, he did so unintentionally, not because he actively sought to improve the product on the field via a flurry of lateral moves. The figure was higher because the team took on payroll when Span was acquired from San Francisco, in the Longoria trade. It is now significantly lower than the 2017 Opening Day figure. I guess he cannot flaunt that substandard payroll total any longer.

In the end, the trade can be viewed both positively and negatively, just like any other Tampa Bay trade of the last decade. The timing, however, is atrocious when viewing it through the lenses of developing team chemistry.

If I may quote the late, great Kurt Vonnegut:

And so it goes…

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