ST. PETERSBURG -- The Rays’ “Big Three” -- Yandy Díaz, Jonathan Aranda and Junior Caminero -- became the engine of their offense this season.
For the first couple months of the regular season, Tampa Bay kept searching for the right combination with its lineup.
It wasn’t until around late June that hitting coach Chad Mottola began pounding the table, expressing to manager Kevin Cash that Díaz, Aranda and Caminero in the Nos. 1, 2 and 3 spots in the batting order would give the Rays their best chance to win.
“[Yandy] doesn't profile as a leadoff hitter, but when [he was] younger, through all the years, he had the most professional at-bats,” Mottola said. “So he's kind of grown into that spot, and it's always nice having him come up later in the game. The more times you get him up, the better.
“Where Johnny slots in nicely as a lefty, and then Camby doesn't need any protection, because he hits pitches out of [the] zone hard as well, so it's not like you can pitch around him. So it just kind of fell into place.”
Díaz, Aranda and Caminero emerged as three of the American League’s most productive hitters, each with a different offensive profile but a combination that became increasingly difficult to break apart.
Díaz led the AL with 180 hits and ranked third with a .293 batting average. Aranda ranked eighth with 159 hits and tied for ninth with 92 RBIs. Caminero’s 42 home runs tied Yordan Alvarez for second in the AL, while his 101 RBIs ranked third. Caminero also ranked third with a .524 slugging percentage and fifth with an .884 OPS.
Their production also helped fuel a Rays offense that finished second in MLB with a .258 team batting average and second in the AL with a .728 OPS.
“[As a team], we are combining velocity with strength, but we don’t have a lot of power hitters,” Díaz said in Spanish. “Caminero, Aranda and myself have complemented one another very well and I think that has been key to the victories that we have had.”
Díaz doesn’t fit the traditional profile of a leadoff hitter, because speed isn’t a significant part of his game. That profile seemingly belonged more naturally to Chandler Simpson, who split time with Díaz in the No. 1 spot. Simpson hit .250 (39-for-156) from the leadoff spot, compared with .332 (127-for-383) from the Nos. 5-9 spots.
Simpson has seen firsthand what Díaz, Aranda and Caminero can do together.
“What they do is amazing,” Simpson said. “All three of them together [are] astonishing. But individually, they're very different. They all have a tremendous impact on the team, and definitely it's like the motor to what team gets going and generate[s] a lot of wins, for sure.”
Díaz owns a .299/.369/.462 slash line with an .831 OPS through 2,562 career plate appearances leading off. Their patience at the plate has also been a strength, with Caminero leading the team with 79 walks, followed by Aranda with 69 and Díaz with 56. That gives the rest of the lineup a chance to see how opposing pitchers are attacking them.
Aranda -- who hit a solo homer in the Rays’ Game 1 victory over the Yankees in the AL Division Series on Saturday -- has learned plenty from watching Díaz, both during his at-bats and away from the field. In particular, Aranda has watched how Díaz works his way out of difficult stretches, something that has reinforced Aranda’s belief that Díaz is one of the best hitters in the Majors.
Caminero presents something different. To Aranda, the young third baseman’s talent comes so naturally that his teammates have reached the point where they’re hardly surprised by what he does on a daily basis.
“It is very exciting to be in between two batters who are stars of this game,” Aranda said in Spanish. “It is fun to watch the way they play and prepare. They have immense talent and I am very happy with everything we have achieved.”
For Cash, there’s another benefit to keeping them together: knowing his three most productive hitters will get as many at-bats as possible every game. Their versatility also forces opposing managers to make difficult bullpen decisions when matching up against them in the later innings.
“It makes a ton of sense,” Cash said. “I do think there are some matchups where we run into some bullpen days and some big splits [with] righties facing us to start games, [where] you can sandwich another lefty there with Aranda.
“But it's an impressive threesome they have put together. Their stats back it up. The quality at-bats back it up. ... For the time being, that's what we're going to roll with.”
For the Big Three, it just works together.