The Major League Baseball Rule 4 draft is fast approaching so I figured it was time to cover some of the names that we might possibly see fall to the Tampa Bay Rays who have the 25^th pick in the first round. For a few reasons I feel it is best to focus solely on college bats in this article. One reason is for sake of length of this post. I mean, who wants to read 2000 words from me? Second is that the best college arms will likely be gone when the Rays pick so I will stick with just the bats. A third reason is that you will likely get more articles focusing on other players in the draft here at DraysBay.

And the last reason I will focus on college bats, and most important on in my opinion, is because the Rays have the fourth lowest amount to spend in the first ten rounds of the draft this year with only $3.871M to spread amongst their first ten picks. College bats in this draft could be more likely to sign for slot or slightly below slot and allow the Rays go for more upside picks that may fall in later rounds and demand more than slot.

I also believe there will be a few suitable college bats available when the Rays select at the end of the first round. Of course, I could be completely wrong and the Rays could go in the exact opposite direction. But, to cover all the draft basics, I felt it was necessary to profile some of the best college bats that could fall to the Rays.

I listed them in order of the likelihood of them being available when the Rays pick and I did not include Mike Zunino because there is absolutely no way he falls to the Rays at pick number 25. Now that I have bored you, please take a look at the college bats that we could see taken by the Rays in the first round.

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Rays superstar Evan Longoria has not played a single game in May thanks to an injury on the final day of April that forced him to the disabled list. In Longoria's absence we have seen the likes of Jeff Keppinger, Sean Rodriguez, Elliot Johnson, Drew Sutton, and Will Rhymes spend time at the hot corner, and we have even seen one inning of Chris Gimenez at third base.

The revolving door of injuries has even forced some of the revolving third base door options to miss some time. Keppinger is on the disabled list with a broken foot suffered while sitting in the dugout and Rhymes missed some time after he passed out on the field after being hit by a pitch. Ben Zobrist has barely seen time in the infield and has pretty much been the starting right fielder with Desmond Jennings also hurt.

The plethora of injuries has forced Maddon to use an infield, most nights, that consists of Sean Rodriguez, Elliot Johnson, and Will Rhymes. Elliot Johnson has started 15 games in a row. Think about that for a moment. But, you know what, it has worked. And since Longoria hit the disabled list, we have seen these players step up their game.

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Carlos Pena's return to our beloved Tampa Bay Rays came with warm smiles and nostalgic memories of past greatness but also a hope that he still had some of that ability left and that he would help power the Rays to another postseason birth and into the World Series.

After all, Pena is the second highest paid Ray at $7.25M, just a mere $250K behind rotation anchor James Shields. We knew the glove and the clubhouse presence were still there but we wanted to know if there was still some juice left in that bat.

It didn't take long to remind Rays' fans everywhere why they loved Pena and to put our minds at ease that he still had some power in his bat. His very first game back with the Rays was dramatic. It was Opening Day and the Rays were hosting the hated New York Yankees and Pena came up with the bases loaded in his first at-bat back with the Rays and launched a grand slam off of ace pitcher C.C. Sabathia. If that was not enough, Pena included a storybook ending walk off opposite-field single to the wall off of the best reliever that the game has ever known in Mariano Rivera.

Pena's first game back was a success: 3-5 with a homerun, walk off hit, and five runs driven in and he would not stop there, hitting another home run in game three as the Rays swept the Yankees to start the 2012 season. Welcome back home, Carlos Pena.

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The Tampa Bay Rays gave a guaranteed $14M to Matt Moore this off season despite the fact that he had only one career start and 9.1 regular season innings under his Major League belt. But Moore was, by all accounts, a top three prospect in the entire game and was armed with the command, control, mechanics, and arsenal of a potential staff ace.

The guaranteed money given to Moore was a given that he would penciled in to the rotation and one of Jeff Niemann or Wade Davis would have to be either moved to the bullpen or traded. Davis and Niemann have both flourished this year while Moore has been a bit of a let down.

Through Moore's first six starts he owns a 5.71 ERA, 5.23 FIP, and 5.00 xFIP while walking nearly five batters per nine innings and allowing over one and a half home runs over the same span.

Moore's breaking ball has surprisingly been worth -1.3 runs, mainly due to poor location of the pitch.

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Tampa Bay Rays left-handed reliever Jake McGee came into the sixth inning last night having to bail out Jeff Niemann as he, once again, started to unfold after crossing the 75 pitch plateau.

McGee inherited a runner at second, in the form of former catcher John Jaso, and threw a first pitch in the dirt that allowed Jaso to move to third base. That was pitch number one. What would ensue next would be a beautiful 29 pitch sequence that would allow Jake McGee to hold on to a one-run lead and pitch his second longest outing in his young Major League career.

With Michael Saunders up in the count 1-0 McGee pumped a 96 mph fastball that screamed "CHALLENGE ME" right over the plate. Saunders fouled it off. Pitch three was a generous call just off the corner. McGee was up 1-2 now. Pitch four was further off the plate for a ball and pitch five was similar to the 96 mph challenge pitch he threw in the 1-0 count and resulted in another foul. Having thrown five fastballs and the count being 2-2, Saunders must have though a slider was coming next. Nope! Instead, he saw the blur of a 96 mph fastball on the outer half for a called strike three. McGee's masterful outing would not stop at this one hitter, though.

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What exactly is plate discipline? Go ahead, give us your definition. You could likely ask ten different baseball fans what their definition of plate discipline is and you could very well receive ten different answers.

A little over a year ago, when I was just realizing that plate discipline was not the same as patience, I asked three different scouts that I had contact with to kindly define plate discipline for me. I received three different answers. Sure, some of what they said agreed with each other but each scout had a different complete take on what the term plate discipline means.

When I asked some of my friends, who happen to be casual baseball fans, what they thought plate discipline encompassed they all tended to agree that patience was a good answer to the question. While patience is a component to plate discipline it alone does not equal plate discipline. In fact, one can have patience without having plate discipline.

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Jeff Niemann, the Tampa Bay Rays fifth starter, took the mound yesterday against the Detroit Tigers and finished with a mediocre line of three runs allowed over five innings allowing four hits and walking two but he did strike out six.

I did not have the luxury of watching the game live but I was able to follow along with the MLB.com Gameday and PitchFX charts from BrooksBaseball.net.

Niemann appeared to have a game plan from the start and it was one that was rewarding him with much success until he abandoned the plan or his arm flamed out and he no longer had control of the game plan or his pitches.

As Tommy Rancel pointed out in his ESPN Florida post yesterday, Niemann is a solid pitcher from pitch one all the way to pitch 75. But once he gets past that 75th pitch he starts to unravel and he becomes completely undone when he goes over 100 pitches. Well, Niemann threw 102 pitches yesterday and the PitchFx backs up the numbers.

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It's finally here. The 2012 season preview that you all have been waiting for... and Bradley Woodrum gave it to us when he revealed his Matt Moore season preview at 10am today.

But the second most anticipated season preview belongs to none other than Fernando Rodney. I mean, the Tampa Bay Rays would not give him $2M guaranteed with a 2013 option worth $2.5M if they thought he would post his fifth straight season with a FIP over 4.00 and xFIP over 4.25, right?

Rodney has not exactly been the model of excellence over the past four seasons with an ERA of 4.46, FIP of 4.34, and xFIP of 4.47, all of which are below the league average over those four seasons. This is in large part thanks to a BB/9 of 5.58 which is the third worst mark (min 210 innings) in the Majors over that time period, bested only by Oliver Perez and Carlos Marmol. His 7.88 BB/9 in 2011 is simply laughable.

Pitchers with those types of numbers do not get guaranteed Major League contracts, let alone ones with an option and guaranteed $2M. The Rays must see something beyond that and the DraysBay staff may have figured out what that is.

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The injury bug has hit the Rays. Bossman Junior will be hitting the disabled list with back pains. There is a good possibility that Super Sam Fuld will miss a big chunk of the season. And Reid Brignac is supposedly playing through some pain.

Luckily, the Tampa Bay Rays signed infielder Jeff Keppinger for some depth and it looks like he will get a shot at some decent playing time with the recent injuries.

The outfield looks like it could shift to Desmond Jennings in center with Matt Joyce and Ben Zobrist playing the corners. This leaves a hole at second base, assuming Sean Rodriguez gets the bulk of playing time at shortstop, that Jeff Keppinger would be more than happy to fill when he his not playing first base.

Keppinger did not appear in a game until May 27th last year after undergoing surgery on his foot in January. Now, more than a full year since his surgery, Keppinger should have no problems.

His 2011 season saw a step backwards in the patience department after three straight seasons of increased walk rates, going from 6.0% in his first full season to 7.8% the next and 8.9% in 2010. Last year's abysmal 3.0% walk rate is not from chasing too many pitches outside the zone but from being less selective and simply not taking any pitches. Take a look at his Swing Pitch Types from Pitchfx.TexasLeaguers:

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A few weeks ago I took a look at some of the lesser known players that were invited to Spring Training by the Tampa Bay Rays and one of the players I chose to highlight was outfielder Jeff Salazar.

Salazar, now with his sixth organization, was an 8th round draft pick in 2002 by the Colorado Rockies and played with the organization up until 2006. He played the next two seasons in the Arizona Diamondbacks system and then all of 2009 in the Pittsburgh Pirates organization. This was the last year he would have a cup of coffee with his organization's parent club.

Salazar would then spend 2010 with the Baltimore Orioles before splitting time between the Detroit Tigers and his first team, the Colorado Rockies.

Salazar, now 31, has played seven seasons in Triple-A and has posted a .269/.355/.434 line in 2427 plate appearances and has walked in 11.5% of those plate appearances while playing all three outfield positions and spending most of his time in center field.

Salazar was granted free agency on November 2nd of last year and waited until February 14th to sign his next contract, a minor league deal with our Tampa Bay Rays, that included an invitation to Spring Training.

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In 2010, right-handed reliever Joel Peralta had to settle for a minor league contract with the Washington Nationals, and rightfully so. Peralta came into the 2010 season with a career ERA of 4.61 and he was allowing 1.4 homeruns per nine innings pitched. He was no more than a mopup reliever.

The Nationals were rewarded with a terrific season by Peralta as he posted a 2.02 ERA and struck out 49 batters in 49 innings while allowing only five unintentional walks. But the Nationals decided to non-tender Peralta a contract after his success and the Tampa Bay Rays signed him two weeks later to a one-year $925K deal.

To thank the Rays, Peralta would go on to post a 2.93 ERA and strike out 61 batters in 67.2 innings and walking only 15 unintentionally. Peralta's success allowed Joe Maddon to work him in some high-leverage situations and Peralta post a +1.39 WPA.

Peralta's success in back-to-back seasons was enough proof for the Rays to sign him to a one-year $2.175M deal. Peralta's newfound success relied heavily upon his success with the fastball. Prior to 2010 his wFB was a pathetic -28.5 and a pitcher who cannot work successfully off of his fastball is not a pitcher for long in the Major Leagues.

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Few, if any, non-roster invitees make it on to the Opening Day roster of a Major League ball club. The Tampa Bay Rays have only had 17 such players make the jump from non-roster invitee to Big Leaguer on Opening Day, and 15 of those 17 were before the Rays ever made the playoffs. Here is a quick list of the 17 players that have made the jump:

1998: Rolando Arrojo

2000: Dave Eiland, Herbert Perry

2001: Ken Hill

2003: Rocco Baldelli, Jim Parque, Steve Parris

2005: Chris Singleton, Hideo Nomo

2006: Jason Childers, Ruddy Lugo, Luis Ordaz

2007: Carlos Pena, Al Reyes, Gary Glover

2008: Eric Hinske

2011: Juan Cruz

As the Rays have grown into annual contenders they have had less openings on the Opening day roster for non-roster invitees. At one point in time it may have been a good idea for a professional ball player to take a minor league deal with a Spring Training invite from the Rays in hopes of cracking the parent club's roster but those days have fleeted into the back of our memories.

Taking a look at the 2012 non-roster invitees, there really are not any names that jump out at you besides the top prospects who we all know are not going to make a jump a la Rocco Baldelli in 2003. Tommy Rancel did a good job highlighting some of the better invitees and I want to touch up on one of them as well as a few more intriguing names to keep an eye on that I believe could help the Rays down the road.

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About one month ago MrNegative1 gave us a good look at both new power hitting acquisitions, Carlos Pena and Luke Scott, and how they performed against left handed pitchers. I came away noticing the huge difference in power numbers between the two sluggers.

Pena's power dropped significantly from .571 back in his incredible 2007 season to a career worst .333 last season while Luke Scott had only slugged below .480 once since 2007. And, for Pena, it looks as if it were a gradual decline that started after his 2009 season.

MrNeg has tables with every one of Pena's seasons against left handed pitchers but I wanted to focus on the major decline over the past three seasons. Here is a quick look at his triple-slash stats versus left handed pitchers each year since 2009.

The trend is a bit alarming as he has become a strictly a platoon player over the past few seasons but is it possible for him to reverse the trend, even as he approaches his mid-30s? I think it is possible but he will have to learn to hit the ball up the middle and to the opposite field again.

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When the 2010 season started there was little-to-no knowledge of David Price's curveball. Scouts raved about his slider and he used it more frequently than any other pitch outside of his 4-seam fastball. But in 2009 his slider was hit pretty hard, to the tune of -8.5 runs, and it lead to Price using his curveball more often than his change up the following season.

Price did not throw a single curveball in 2008 and only threw one 3.7% of the time in 2009. But in 2010 he threw his curveball 15.6% of the time and only threw his slider 4.9% of the time. His slider was worth +1.2 runs in limited duty and his curveball was worth +1.5 runs as his favorite off-speed pitch.

But in 2011 Price's curveball had the misfortune of running into too much hard contact and was worth -5.7 runs while his slider was worth +1.2 runs. His curveball had the highest line drive rate on balls in play of any of his pitches at 23.73% while his slider was by far the lowest at 9.76%.

He finished the 2011 season using his slider slightly more than his curveball but that wasn't the case until a change in approach after his August 7th start when his results based stats were at their highest since April.

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Evan Longoria is not your typical young hitter, that goes with out much explaining. Playing through the 2011 season at the age of 25 he has already amassed 113 career homeruns and 147 career doubles. He is one of only 33 players to hit at least 110 homeruns and 145 doubles through their age 25 season.

In each of his first three seasons he amassed 60 extra-base hits or more. He had exactly 60 in 2008, 77 in 2009, and 73 in 2010. 2011 was the first season he fell below that mark with 58 extra-base hits.

We know that Longoria was a bit unlucky in 2011 by looking at the .239 BABIP he posted despite a career mark of .321 prior to the 2011 season. In 2011 his walk rate rose for the 4th consecutive season and his strikeout rate decreased for the 4th straight season. If a player can claim to have done both of those for four consecutive seasons it usually comes with a jump in his BABIP which in turn causes a jump in most, if not all, of his triple-slash categories.

Longoria, though, cannot make that claim. One would think that a player with a career high walk rate and career low strikeout rate wouldn't have posted career lows in batting average and slugging percentage but Longoria did thanks in large part to that horrid .239 BABIP led largely in part to an unsuccessful season of taking the ball to the opposite field.

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As Jason Collette pointed out yesterday, the Rays have seemingly lost all of their former first basemen to the American League Central. All three also happened to be 2011 Triple-A Durham first basemen.

The Durham Bulls played a couple of guys at first base in 2011 that have since moved on from the Rays organization. Dan Johnson signed a minor league deal with the Chicago White Sox. Russ Canzler was traded to the Cleveland Indians for cash considerations. Casey Kotchman turned his magical 2011 season into a guaranteed $3M with the Cleveland Indians.

This leaves the Rays with Leslie Anderson as their lone first baseman in Durham. Why is this a problem, you ask? Because the Rays have no depth in case Luke Scott or Carlos Pena succumb to injury. Anderson is good organizational depth but there is little-to-no evidence that he would be able to handle Major League pitching if he were next on the depth chart to replace Pena or Scott.

The Rays still have plenty of arms to deal but it likely will not be for a Major League ready first baseman. Besides, with Pena and Scott on the active roster there really is not a lot of room to carry another guy relegated to first base duties alone.

If a trade occurs it will likely be for a player who can handle a few positions or, like Mr. Maniac pointed out yesterday, for an upgrade at catcher.

It may not seem like a big deal but imagine if the Rays did not have Casey Kotchman in Durham last year when Dan Johnson failed at the Big League level. Would the Rays have made the playoffs? What if it were Leslie Anderson who got the call? The Rays need to add a first baseman to Durham and who better than Russell Branyan?

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Last week I decided to take a look at a few of the Tampa Bay Rays pitchers and try and find a pattern in the way they pitch and find some rhyme and reasoning in their approach. I took a look at Alex Cobb's approach and came away a bigger fan of his and really want him to be the Rays 5th starter in 2012.

Another pitcher that I have always liked and decided to take a look at was left-handed flame thrower Jake McGee. I've been a fan of McGee since he debuted in Rookie Ball at the age of 17 and he has had a fantastic minor league track record with nearly a 3:1 strikeout to walk ratio and 10.4 strikeouts per nine innings.

He was simply overpowering hitters in the minors but due to a lack of a third pitch and Tommy John surgery he has been relegated to the bullpen where he has been lights out in his minor league career.

McGee has absolutely nothing to prove at the minor league level and will be in the Rays bullpen for all of 2012. McGee only has 33 innings under his belt in the Major Leagues and 28 of them came in 2011. He has maintained the high strikeout rate in his small sample of innings in the Majors with a strikeout per inning but he also has a newfound trait that the Rays would love to get rid of and it's his proneness to the long ball.

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The Rays are apparently heading into the 2012 season with seven viable starting pitchers and an eight in top prospect Alex Torres. Having too many starting pitchers is kind of an oxy moron. There really is not such thing, right? And if having too many starting pitchers is a problem then it is one the Rays are happy to have.

There has been much speculation that the Rays would be dealing an arm for a bat but that has yet to happen. The front four of James Shields, David Price, Jeremy Hellickson, and Matt Moore is pretty much set in stone. That means the fight for that fifth starter's job comes down to Wade Davis, Jeff Niemann, Alex Cobb, and Alex Torres.

If the Rays go into the regular season having not dealt a starting arm then I feel same stating the front office will likely be sending Alex Torres and Alex Cobb to Triple-A and moving one of Wade Davis or Jeff Niemann to the bullpen.

While just about every team in the Majors would love to have Niemann or Davis as its fifth starter, the pitcher that I believe has the best approach, and also had the best groundball rate of any Rays pitcher with more than eight innings pitched, is Alex Cobb and he is likely going to start the year in Triple-A Durham.

Cobb may not have the best pure stuff of the four pitchers fighting for the fifth starter's job but he has a four pitch repertoire that includes a 4-seam fastball, 2-seam fastball, change-up, and curveball. His fastballs averaged just over 91 mph and his change-up was his main swing and miss pitch, getting whiffs nearly 17% of the time he threw it. But it's how he uses those pitches that really caught my eye. Take a look:

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The Rays have two gaping holes in their current roster. One is at the first base position and the other is at the designated hitter role.

Most who know me know that I hate a full-time designated hitter. I think it is a waste of a roster spot unless that hitter is posting at least a wRC+ of 130 or higher. I would rather reserve the designated hitter role (I do not consider it a position), especially for a team that plays half of its games on turf, as a revolving door to give the players a rest.

Johnny Damon was the full-time designated hitter for the 2011 Rays and he posted a .261/.328/.416 line with a wOBA of .328 and wRC+ of 109. He was an above-average hitter and stole 19 bases but it was an underwhelming performance and one we did not expect from Damon who has not posted an OBP that low since 2001 when he posted a .324 OBP with the Oakland A's.

To me, it looked like Damon was pressing for the first 4+ months of the season, trying his hardest to put the ball in play and get that much closer to 3000 hits. His line from the start of the season to August 28th was .263/.313/.407 and he had a mere 33 unintentional walks in 535 plate appearances. That is a far cry from a player who had five consecutive seasons of walk rates at 10% or higher and came off of a career high 11.3% walk rate in 2010.

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Most fans will relish in the fact that they have one of the games top 10 position players on their respected team. They will talk about that player as if he were the best player in the game, debating it without hesitation.

Rays fans already have one of the consistently best players in the game in Evan Longoria to back the fans up in this debate. The Angels just spent upwards of $260M to land one in Albert Pujols so Angels' fans can join the debate. The Tigers fans have Miguel Cabrera. The Rockies fans have Troy Tulowitzki. The Reds fans have Joey Votto. You get the point.

But, the one guy who rarely, if ever, seems to make the argument for best player in the game also plays for the Rays and his name is Ben Zobrist.

Zobrist did not come with high praise or star potential already attached to his name. He was a 6th round draft pick by the Houston Astros who was later dealt to the Rays as a weak hitting shortstop with patience for Aubrey Huff. He did not play for a big college or earn top prospect status while in the minors. He was, and still is, a laid back kid who happens to play for the Rays and does not smoke, drink, or do drugs.

Simply put, Zobrist has never been in the spotlight and has never dove head first trying claim his spot in the limelight. That is not who Zobrist is but he does deserve to be there.

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It has been reported that the Rays have been in the mix on free agent outfielder Carlos Beltran. Buster Olney has also mentioned that Beltran would like to be closer to his home in Puerto Rico, although it is not a major factor in his decision making process, it does bode well for the Rays.

Carlos Beltran has been one of my favorite players since I pulled three of his rookie cards in a box of 1995 Topps Traded baseball cards when I was much younger. I remember reading that he ran a 60 yard dash in 6.1 seconds and took a look at his high school stats and I had to know more about this kid from Puerto Rico.

Beltran would then go on to start what might end up being a hall of fame career and this fan would like nothing more than to see one of his favorite players in a Rays uniform, even if it is toward the end of his career.

Heck, Wade Boggs and Jose Canseco were two of my favorite players when I first started watching baseball and I would go to Rays games just to watch them play and try and score an autograph from them while waiting outside the player parking lot at the Trop. Now, as an almost thirty year old father and husband I can still see myself doing the same with Beltran. Pathetic? Some will say so, but the fan in me will never die and I love the thrill of watching and hopefully meeting my favorite players.

The best part of this is that the Rays need an impact bat added to their lineup. This is not a secret. But is Beltran, even if he were to drop his price tag a little, really a good fit for the Rays? As a Beltran fan it saddens me to say that I'm not so sure he is a good fit here.

Let me explain.

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