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How good was The Mad Australian this season? Grant Balfour put up some sick numbers this season. In 58.1 innings, Balfour allowed only 28 hits and 24 walks while striking out 82. He pitched to a 1.54 ERA. Certainly the best season by a relief pitcher in the short history of the Rays. But we wonder if there was a bigger context we could look at to see exactly how dominating he was this season.

We went to the "Play Index" at Baseball-Reference.com.

We did a search for every pitcher that has ever posted a season with at least 11 strike outs per 9 innings, while giving up less than 9 hits and walks combined per 9 innings with an ERA less than 1.70 (minimum 40 innings pitched). Three criteria for a dominating relief pitcher.

The results? The Mad Australian is just the 4th pitcher in the history of baseball to post such a dominating season out of the bullpen. The other three is a who's who of dominating closer performances, including Eric Gagne (2003), Billy Wagner (1999) and Joe Nathan (2006). Gagne won the Cy Young Award in '03, while Wagner finished 4th and Nathan finished 5th. The only difference between their seasons and Balfour's was the number of saves. They each recorded at least 36 saves, while Balfour only had 4.

We knew Balfour had a strong season, but we had no idea that it was one of the best in the history of baseball.

DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA...

• In case you missed it yesterday afternoon, we ran a bunch of "Webtopia" links in the evening "Happy Hour" feature. [Rays Index]
• Remember the Rays fan that ended up with the Evan Longoria home run ball above the Monster at Fenway in game 3? He was kind enough to answer a few questions about the incident. [Rays Index]
• Congratulations go out to Gabe Gross and his wife Kelly, who are expecting their first child in May. [Celebrity Baby Blog]
• Rocco Baldelli could get the start in right field tonight with Gabe Gross struggling...Also, Joe Maddon is not worried about the Red Sox history of comebacks noting that he would rather concentrate on executing their own gameplan. [St. Pete Times]
  
• Joe Smith says the key to Scott Kazmir is surviving the first inning. Smith points out that Kid K tends to settle down after long first innings and gains confidence as the game moves along. [St. Pete Times]
  
• The Phillies won the NLCS 3 games to 1...The Rays aren't there yet, but it is worth noting that every time a Tampa Bay franchise wins a championship they beat a Philadelphia team on the way. [The Fightins]
  
• This is worth pointing out again. 18 "experts" at ESPN.com predicted the World Series matchup prior to the playoffs. 2 picked the Rays to win the ALCS. None picked the Phillies. If the Rays win the ALCS, that will be 2 correct picks out of 36. Wow. [ESPN]
  
• Bugs and Cranks found a picture of the reverse mohawks from Fenway. [Bugs and Cranks]
  
• John Romano says Jim Hickey deserves much of the credit for the Rays success and points out that he came very close to losing his job last winter. [St. Pete Times]
• More evidence that the Red Sox Nation isn't as devoted as they would like you to believe. Tickets can be had for ALCS games in Fenway for below face value. [Boston Globe]
  
• Dave Sheinin of the Washington Post says the Red Sox are being betrayed by their age and are suddenly old news. The perfect metaphor for this series is the young, speedy Carl Crawford beating out an infield single with the old Tim Wakefield scrambling on the ground trying to throw out Crawford. [Washington Post]
• Wallace Matthews seems to think the Yankees paid for the Rays success...Bitter much? [Newsday]
  
• John Tomase of the Boston Herald points out that this incarnation of the Red Sox is much different than the teams that made postseason comebacks. [Boston Herald]
• Tonight could be the last game for Jason Varitek in a Red Sox uniform. [Boston Globe]
• Fire Brand of the American League points out 5 keys to the Red Sox winning game 5. [Fire Brand of the American League]
  
• Awful Announcing gets it. We will fully admit that a Rays-Phillies World Series would not be FOX TV's first choice. Thankfully, there is not a single mention of how Bud Selig is rooting for the Red Sox and the Dodgers. We have already pointed out how ridiculous that sentiment is. [Awful Announcing]
  
• The Rays signed four 16-year old players during the international free agent signing period. Among the players signed is a switch-hitting catcher from Venezuela named "Narvaez". Coincidence? [Tampa Bay Rays Prospects]
• Stay classy Pink Hat Nation...How Youz Doin Baseball? Did this blog get their name from a line in "Friends"? That's hot. Oh, and the only other Colby Alum we know is the guy in the bottom of THIS picture. We don't think we have ever seen somebody more afraid of a baseball that was no where near them. [How Youz Doin Baseball]
• We are not sure where this person did their research. It is yet another attempt at showing how the Rays roster was put together. Two problems. The list of players traded by the Rays is short about 6 names. And nobody in baseball is acquired for "FREE". What does that even mean? The Rays traded Josh Butler, a former 2nd round pick, for Gabe Gross. And Chad Bradford was acquired for a player to be named later. The Rays will likely send a player to Baltimore once the season ends. Cheap? Yes. But not "FREE". For the complete list, check here. [Beyond the Boxscore]
• Kevin Gengler stops by The Hardball Times and gives an in depth review of the Rays farm system. [The Hardball Times]
  

THE GOOD: Matt Garza was never dominating, but he was never in real trouble. Despite allowing at least 1 baserunner in each of the first 6 innings and a runner on at least 2nd base with less than 2 outs in each of the first 3 innings, Garza was able to work out of each situation...Hitters 2-5 in the lineup. BJ Upton, Carlos Pena, Evan Longoria and Carl Crawford went a combined 2-13 with 3 walks and 5 Ks in the first game. In games 2 and 3 the group went 14-38 with 12 RBI...Upton now has 5 home runs in the postseason after hitting 9 all season. Kinda nice to imagine how good he is going to be next season once his shoulder is repaired...All 9 starters got a basehit...Leadoff hitters were on base in 6 innings, going 5-8 with a walk...Edwin Jackson. The game was out of reach, but it was nice to see Nuke come in and pitch a perfect 9th inning in his first postseason appearance. He threw 14 pitches, all fastballs, 8 for strikes, hitting 99 mph on one pitch. But before we start screaming about what a great relief pitcher he would be, let's keep in mind that he does seem a little too much like Kyle Farnsworth out of the 'pen. Not even relief pitchers can live on straight fastballs, even if they approach triple digits on the radar gun...P.S. What happened to Jon Lester the Invincible?

THE BAD: JP Howell may not be available tonight. Despite opening up an 8-1 lead in the top of the 8th, Joe Maddon kept Howell in the game in the bottom of the 8th for a second inning of work. Howell worked at least 2 innings in 25 appearances this season. Not once did he pitch the next day. Of course, the double play to end the 7th inning helped keep his pitch count down, and he only needed 20 pitches to complete the 2 innings of work, including 4 to get the three outs in the 7th...BJ Upton did something wacky on the basepaths again. Ohhh Melvin.

THE TELLING: The last time the Rays faced Tim Wakefield, both Willy Aybar and Fernando Perez started and batted right-handed. Both homered in their only plate appearance against Wakefield as he was chased after 2.1 innings. Of course Gabe Gross also homered in that game against Wakefield. The knuckleballer was 0-2 with a 5.87 ERA in 3 starts versus the Rays this season...Evan Longoria tied the record for most home runs by a rookie in a single postseason, with 4...Road teams that win game 3 are 8-2 in LCS...The Red Sox would have to win 3 of the final 4 games in order to advance to the World Series. According to CoolStandings.com the Rays now have a 68.5% chance of winning the ALCS.

DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA...

• We will be back tonight with another Rays Index Live Blog-A-Baloo (Lite).
• As mentioned yesterday Joe Maddon may be leaning towards pitching Scott Kazmir in game 5 on normal rest and holding back James Shields until game 6 at home where he is more effective. Kazmir has a history of big starts in Fenway and the off-day after game 5 could come in handy should Kazmir need much bullpen support. We also wonder if the atmosphere at Fenway can be distracting to Kazmir in a positive way as his problems right now seem to be mental. The crowd intensity may actually help Kazmir focus and keep his mind off his mechanics. Yesterday all Maddon would say is they are "supposed to" pitch Shields in game 5. [St. Pete Times]
  
• Ken Rosenthal of Fox TV reported during the NLCS game last night that a scout for an opposing team told him that he believes Scott Kazmir "has some sort of arm issue."...Keep in mind that this is just speculation on the scout's part.
  
• A great article about Joe Maddon by Howard Bryant of ESPN.com as he tries to get into the mind of the Rays' manager. Joe Maddon does not consider himself a new-age manager. Rather he feels as though he is trying to get the Rays play 1920s baseball, by keeping the game simple.
  
• A Rays fan caught the Evan Longoria home run ball while sitting in the seats above the Green Monster. [Tampa Bay Rays Prospects]
• A few members of The RAYSHEAD Army made their way to Fenway Park including the guy that caught Evan Longoria's home run ball...We love this quote: “I’ve been suffering with this team since Day 1...I was at Red Sox games down at the Trop in ’98 and ’99 when there were 7,000 people. There was no Red Sox Nation. Now all of a sudden, everybody down there is from South Boston.” [New York Times]
  
• It is hard for us to think the St. Pete Times is objective when they shill for the Rays. Sometimes it is hard to tell. This one is pretty obvious. [St. Pete Times]
• "It was almost as if Red Sox Nation had already marked down a Game 3 victory with Lester on the mound."...We are pretty sure they did mark it down as a victory. As they also did with a potential game 7 matchup with Lester. [Fox Sports]
• Tom Van Riper of Forbes.com tries to predict the 10 sports franchises most likely to move. The biggest factor according to Van Riper is poor stadium conditions. The top 2 teams on the list are the Florida Marlins and the Tampa Bay Rays. Only a couple of problems. The Marlins have a new stadium set to open in 2011 (never mentioned by Van Riper) and the Rays are in the works for a new stadium with the only apparent roadblock being location (also never mentioned by Van Riper). The other problem which is mentioned by Van Riper is that only 1 baseball franchise has moved in the last 30 years and that team (Montreal Expos) had to first be purchased by MLB. It just doesn't happen except under extreme circumstances. And yet basketball and hockey teams move all the time and NFL teams move occasionally. (Thanks Zenny) [Yahoo! Sports]
  
• Joe Maddon once put himself in as a pinch-hitter for Joe Carter. Yes. That Joe Carter. [SI.com]
• Jerry Crasnick of ESPN.com takes a look at how the Rays are wining in the postseason. [ESPN]
  
• Josh Kalk of The Hardball Times takes a look at David Price. [The Hardball Times]
  
• Jacoby Ellsbury has yet to reach base for the Red Sox in the first 3 games. [Boston Herald]
  
• Jeff Pearlman of ESPN.com does not understand a world in which the Rays are a good ballclub. [ESPN]
  
• Rake Blog has a mancrush on Evan Longoria, calling him "as close to a sure thing as a young athlete can be on this side of Justin Upton or Lebron James," and insisting he is headed to the hall of fame. [Rake Blog]
  
• First it was the mascots. Now the managers are chatting it up in "The Dugout" and Scott Kazmir has an identity crisis. [Fanhouse]
• Transcript from Joe Maddon's post-game press conference. [MLB]
• Transcript from Matt Garza and Rocco Baldelli's post-game press conference. [MLB]
  

Devil Rays 6, Red Sox 4.
The Devil Rays played yesterday? Unfortunate that the Rays pulled off their best performance in over a week, when the game was played at the same time as a Bucs home game in which the Bucs looked as good as they have since the 2003 season opener against the F'eagles*.

*We are of course dismissing every game since then against the Falcons and Michael Vick.

DEVIL RAYS WEBTOPIA...

• On Saturday, the Rays hitters broke the AL record for strikeouts in a season. BJ Upton became the first member of the 20-20 club in franchise history. [USA Today]
  
• Apparently beating Tim Wakefield is a "sign of progress". We believe being dominated by a knuckleballer is #4,376 on the list of reasons why the Rays are yet to experience success as a team. It comes in just ahead of "too many rainouts at the Trop" and just behind "Joe Maddon's shoe size". Believe us, we understand that finding an angle on a game with one week remaining in the last week of yet another 90+ loss season is a trying task at best. But Papa Joe...come back to us. please. [TBO]
• Carl Crawford did not play this weekend and with only one week remaining, he may not return this season. [tampabay.com]

"I'm not so sure right now he's going to be able to do this," Maddon said. "We're hopeful for the first game back (Tuesday), but it just doesn't seem like it's going anywhere we need it to go for him to participate right now. We'll look at it again after the day off but I'm not anticipating he wil be able to play."

• Joe Maddon makes a case for Delmon Young to be rookie of the year. [TBO]

"You put the whole picture together to tie this whole thing into a nice little bundle, and I think it equals Rookie of the Year," Maddon said. "Everybody just wants to talk about offense - talk about his defense and his stolen bases this year. He's playing a complete game for us right now."

• Joe Maddon probably should have saved his "Delmon Young for tookie of the year" speech for the Yankees series as it likely fell on deaf ears with the Boston Media. The voting members of the Boston are likely to already have their vote cast for Dustin Pedroia. [courant.com]
• Marc Topkin interviews Joe Maddon. We love, love, love the last question " Since the Rays won't be in it this year, who do you think is going to win the World Series?". ON the surface it seems a little ridiculous that Topkin would need to preface that question by informing the manager that his team has already been eliminated from playoff contention. But in Topkin's defense. He is interviewing Papa Joe Maddon, the eternal optimist. [tampabay.com]
• Stacy Long offers his thoughts on the pitchers and hitters that should be named as the top minor leaugers for 2007. Not much to argue with. [Stacy Long's Riverwalk Talk]
  
• The team decided to shut down James Shields for the remainder of the 2007 season, but will not do the same with Scott Kazmir, who will make his next scheduled start, stating that the lefty has looked fresher than Shields recently. [Devil Rays]
• We didn't write it, but we were thinking it. This was one campaign that we are sure seemed much better on the drawing board. [The Serious Tip]
  
• Al Reyes hopes to have his option ($2 million) picked up for 2008. It should not even be a question. Reyes mentions that he would prefer to close but would be willing to be used as a setup man if that is what is asked of him. [TBO]
• Wes Bankston, who was designated for assignment last week, was claimed off of waivers by the Kansas City Royals. [The Raw Feed]
  
• Raymond and Wool E. Bull show their hip hop moves...If you are into that sort of thing. [Deadspin]
• With the Devil Rays becoming the Rays in 2008, devilrays.com will need to change their domain name. The obvious choice is rays.com but that will not happen as the owners of that domain name, Rays Boathouse in Seattle, is not selling. [Seattle Times]
  

Tim Wakefield 6, Devil Rays 0.
We got nothin' today...Enjoy the links while Delmon Young flails and misses yet another Wakefield knuckler by 18 inches. And wake us when Kazmir finally stops throwing pitches in the first inning.

DEVIL RAYS WEBTOPIA...

• In addition to being called up to the majors and getting a walk-off hit in his first at bat with the Devil Rays, Joel Guzman was able to meet his childhood idol, Davif Ortiz. [Devil Rays]
• Joe Maddon says not to expect more than a couple of additional players to be called up when teams are allowed to expand the rosters on September 1. Look for Maddon to go to a six-man rotation to ease the pitch counts of Scott Kazmir and James Shields [tampabay.com]

"We don't need a whole lot of folks up here right now," Maddon said. "We have a young group that needs to continue to play. We're playing to win and we're playing against a lot of contending teams and we set it up to win, so I don't anticipate a whole bunch of people showing up."

• We thought for certain that The Ledger would have fixed THIS headline by this morning, but apparently not. Just to clarify, Joel Guzman had 19 at bats with the Dodgers last year. [The Ledger]
  
• Carlos Pena is the Devil Rays representative on the ballot for the Hank Aaron Award. We have made our thoughts on this award known before and we still think it is a joke. [Devil Rays]
  
• Another blogger weighs in on how to "fix" the Devil Rays. This time the solution is a new stadium. Simple huh? First of all, if we have said it once, we have said it six times, the Trop is not a bad place to watch a game. It is still being penalized by a reputation that is perpetuated by people that have never seen a game at the Trop. Have these people ever been to Shea Stadium? And we know that Fenway is historic, but it is the most uncomfortable stadium we have ever been to. There is more leg room on a plane and most of the seats do not even face towards the infield. For example, if you sit down the right field line, you are facing the monster. Second, the lease the Devil Rays have with the Trop is well-documented and about as iron-clad as any stadium has with a pro team, so the Rays are not going anywhere anytime soon...even if everybody seems to think they should. [Dahmen Daily]
• The Devil Rays have broken ground on their new Spring Training complex in Charlotte County. [WinkNews.com]
  

Red Sox 3, Devil Rays 0.
Well, you saw that one coming. Not only did the Rays not get to their hotel until 6:30 in the morning, but Red Sox fans are so desperate these days that one panicked member of Pink Sox Nation felt that the Scarlett Ho's needed help against the team with the worst record in baseball. That's right, at 8:00 AM the fire alarm at the Rays' hotel "mysteriously" went off.

We never thought we would do this...but we are openly rooting for the Yankees to overcome the last few games so that the 2007 Red Sox go down in history as the team that blew a 14.5 game lead.

With James Shields throwing 6 more innings last night and Scott Kazmir on the mound tonight, the biggest concern for the last few weeks of the season is the number of innings pitched by each pitcher. After tonight, if Joe Maddon sticks to his five-man rotation for the rest of the season, both pitchers will have eight more starts. Kazmir is averaging 6 innings per start which puts him on pace for 205 for the year. Shields is averaging 6.8 innings per start and is on pace for 225.1 innings.

Young pitchers are notorious for having off-years after seasons in which they throw considerably more innings than they are used to. Kazmir's professional career high is 186 innings in 2005, and if he throws 205 this year, that would only be a 10.2% increase over his previous career high. However, Kazmir may have felt the effects of throwing all those innings in 2005 by experiencing a tired shoulder in the second half of 2006.

Shields threw 186 innings last year which bested his previous career high by 43 innings. We may have seen the effects during a recent 8 start stretch in which he went 2-6, during which he may have been suffering from a "dead arm". Still, Shields is on pace to top last years' innings total by 21.1% which must be of concern for Joe Maddon, Andrew Friedman and Devil Rays fans everywhere.

It will be interesting to see how Maddon handles both pitchers down the stretch. We could see Maddon limit their pitch counts with both pitchers being pulled after 80-90 pitches in an effort to save their arms. The other option which may be more likely, is to see Friedman promote Jeff Niemann and go with a 6-man rotation for the final month of the season. Such a move would mean 1-2 fewer starts and 12-13 fewer innings in 2007.

Spring Training 2008 has already begun and several pitchers are auditioning for jobs. Such is not the case for Kid K and James Shields. Those two can already be penciled in at the top of the rotation so there is nothing left to prove in 2007 and no reason to push them too hard. Let them continue to work and continue to improve, but it is time to reel them back a little bit and ease up on their workload as a preventative measure for 2008.

DEVIL RAYS WEBTOPIA...

• Tim Wakefield had a no-hitter through 6 innings that was broken up by Carl Crawford. [TBO]
  
• Both David Price and Fernando Cabrera remain unsigned. Why is everybody all worked up about Cabrera, a pitcher with a 5.00+ ERA each of the last two seasons? We have no idea. Could he be good? Sure. But people are acting like this guy is a savior. Calm down folks. His numbers mirror Chad Orvella. [TBO]
  
• Remember the crazy Canadian that tortured himself by writing about (pronounced "A-BOOT" in Canadian) the history of the Devil Rays? Well he is back today with a look at how things are getting better. [Jack Jock's Thought]
• According to The Pig Pen, the Devil Rays have the worst uniforms in the American League. Certainly they do not have the history of the Yankees or the Red Sox, but the Rays green and grey are not that bad. In fact, we are hesitant to see the change of colors to be presented this fall. [The Pig Pen]
  

AL EAST	W	L	GB	L10	STK	E#
Tampa Bay Devil Rays	2	1	0	2-1	W2	--
Boston Red Sox	2	2	0.5	2-2	L1	159
New York Yankees	1	2	1.0	1-2	L2	159
Toronto Blue Jays	1	2	1.0	1-2	L2	159
Baltimore Orioles	1	3	1.5	1-3	W1	158

Orioles 6, Yankees 4. It was another cold night in the Bronx and as usual, cold weather is harder on old people. The 22 year-old Adam Loewen out-pitched the 38 year-old Mike Mussina to give the O's just their first win of the season, and drop the Yankees a full game behind the Devil Rays. Man, we love the sound of that.

Rangers 2, Red Sox 0. The Rangers picked up their first win in their home opener. Robinson Tejeda pitched 7 innings giving up only 2 hits. Sammy Sosa picked up an RBI single. Oriole's fans must be pissed off when they see Sosa. He looked anorexic in his one season in Baltimore, and now he looks like Slammin' Sammy again. He obviously spent a lot of time in his year off lifting weights and taking dietary "supplements".

• A report shows that the Orioles have a major impact on the Baltimore economy. No word on the impact the team has on the health of their fans.
• It's a good thing the O's won last night, because the fans were starting to get restless after their season-opening sweep at the hands of the Twins.
• Corey Patterson will be the O's representative to wear Jackie Robinson's #42.
• Jonathon Papplebon is back as the Red Sox closer, but the team is planning on using him less than they did in 2006.
• At 13 seasons, Tim Wakefield is tied with Mo Rivera with the longest continuous service with their current teams. Only John Smoltz (19 years) and Trevor Hoffman (15) have longer tenures.
• Jonny Damon missed another game, but reported significant improvement, and won't go on the DL.