By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

The Tampa Bay Rays find ways to win. That has been their modus operandi since they dropped the “Devil” and changed their color scheme.

Without much in the way of payroll and in a consistently competitive division, along with some giant franchises like the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, the Rays have always scrapped, scratched and clawed their way to September and even October from time to time over the past 11 years.

Last season was no different, though one of their bold strategies has courted no little amount of controversy – the “Opener.”

If you have not been following the Rays, the Opener is basically – as you might imagine – the opposite of a Closer.

“But TJ! Isn’t a starter the opposite of a closer?” You might ask. You might very well think that – but an Opener is something a little more specific and a little more parallel to what a Closer does at the end of a game.

Basically, when reliable pitchers like Blake Snell aren’t starting a game, Rays manager Kevin Cash begins the game with an Opener; a relief pitcher in any other context who is slotted in as the starting pitcher but is only ever expected to pitch an inning or two.

Then another pitcher comes in to eat up innings and hopefully (since the “starter” would not have pitched the requisite five innings) pick up the win.

Tampa started using this strategy in May of last year, starting with veteran closer Sergio Romo but primarily using pitchers Ryne Stanek and Hunter Wood in the role. Then guys like Ryan Yarbrough would enter the game and (ideally) shoulder the bulk of the work.

It was 2018, so obviously reaction and opinion on this strategy was divided, though Tampa’s success can hardly be argued against.

Their ERA dropped after they started using Openers, and had the team not played in a division that saw not one but two 100-game winners, they would very likely have seen the playoffs again.

The past few weeks in particular have seen a rise in anti-Opener rhetoric from Major Leaguers in particular, including Giants ace Madison Bumgarner, who said he would leave the ballpark if San Francisco manager Bruce Bochy tried to use an opener before MadBum entered the game.

More damningly, Bumgarner’s teammate and fellow pitcher Jeff Samardzija called the concept of the Opener “a load of crap” in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle. He also criticized the Rays’ pitchers for what he perceived as their lack of “moxie” in failing to push back and demand that they go seven innings.

The irony in the vitriol coming from Samardzija is that the Giants won a paltry 75 games in 2018, 15 less than the Rays, who sat at 90. This is not to mention the fact that the Giants hurler has managed a 22-31 record in his three seasons in San Fran with an ERA of 4.33 – much higher than the 3.97 ERA posted by Tampa Bay’s Openers last year.

The Rays have made it clear that they aren’t turning away from the Opener and after Snell, Charlie Morton, and Tyler Glasnow, Kevin Cash will indeed be penciling in a pitcher to throw just an inning or two.

Despite the negative reaction from some players, the notion has actually been spreading.

The Milwaukee Brewers opened up a game in the NLCS by have having Wade Miley throw to just one batter and the Oakland A’s put their entire season on the line in the AL Wild Card Game by using Liam Hendricks as an Opener.

The new General Manager of the Giants, Farhan Zaidi, even said that his team might consider adopting the practice when it makes sense. Though I get the sense that it will be over Bumgarner’s and Samardzija’s dead bodies.