The Tampa Bay Rays usually use baseball’s winter meeting to lay the groundwork for trades and signings later on in the off season. The theory is that as spring training approaches, other teams will get desperate to fill holes in the lineup and low level free agents will get nervous about having a job in February.
The results will be better deals and cheaper free agents for the Rays. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t work. Let’s take a look at what might happen if the Rays changed their approach this year and made some deals at the winter meetings.