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The Rays spent the past two Octobers as a bystander while the Orioles, Yankees, Red Sox and Blue Jays played a combined 44 postseason games, including 12 in the World Series.
The outside world expected more of the same, especially from the Yankees and Blue Jays. By the time the Rays finished their celebration inside the visiting clubhouse at Yankee Stadium on Sept. 22 and began getting ready for the joyous bus ride to Manhattan, one thing was rather apparent.
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The obvious takeaway is that reality is vastly different than expectations of something similar to a 77-85 finish in 2025 when the Rays made seven trades in a four-day span at Yankee Stadium around the July 31 deadline.
How the Rays claimed the AL East
The Rays are AL East champions for the fifth time, and this time around, they controlled the division for most of the season. After their clincher, it will mark the 110th day they spent time atop the division, counting only a day the Rays played a game.
Five years ago when the Rays set a team record with 100 wins, that number was 88. In 2010, that figure was 86 and two years earlier when the Rays enjoyed their first winning season and dropped the Devil Rays as a nickname, it was 98 days.
This time, the Rays seized sole possession of first place following their 5-1 win over Arizona on June 28, the same day the Yankees were walked off by the Red Sox in a four-game sweep at Fenway.
The Rays let the lead slip to 1 1/2 after getting in Fenway during Boston’s historic 15-game winning streak. Nine straight wins against Colorado, Seattle, and the A’s helped send the lead to 6 1/2 games, and following a brief lull, Tampa Bay began rolling again, culminating in the champagne party inside the same room where the Blue Jays rejoiced on Oct. 8 and the Dodgers partied hard on Oct. 30, 2024.
“We played really good baseball up to this point,” said Drew Rasmussen after taking a no-hitter into the seventh and winning his 16th game. “We got off to a little bit of a slow start in April, but to play as we have since the beginning of May, this group’s different. We have a lot of fun together. We love being together, and we’re trying to spend as much time as we can together.”
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Division title caps eventful regular season
The Rays are still playing in their original stadium, oft-maligned Tropicana Field, and made a triumphant return home by winning 55 games.
Last year, they played home games at Steinbrenner Field because the roof at the Trop was damaged by Hurricane Milton in Oct. 2024, after the Rays finished 80-82 following five straight postseason trips.
The Rays will spend at least the next two seasons at the Trop, but last month got county approval for a $2.3 billion ballpark project near Raymond James Stadium, where the Buccaneers have played since 1998.
Which is why chief executive officer Ken Babby was beaming as he spoke to reporters in a corridor outside the raucous clubhouse.
“Sitting there in the ninth inning, watching that with ‘Tampa Bay’ across our chests, with all that this franchise has been through in this past year, man, it’s a great time to be a fan of the Tampa Bay Rays,” Rays CEO Ken Babby said. “So proud of this group.”
“Everything the franchise has been through to have the Tampa Bay on the chest tonight, the staff, the players for Tampa Bay. All of it, just it’s really special,” president of baseball operations Erik Neander said in remarks following Babby’s comments.
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Differences between this team and 2021
Anytime a team wins a division for the first time in five years, it’s natural to wonder what the differences are.
For the Rays, that answer is a lot of changes. Of the nine players in the lineup for the 2026 clincher, only Yandy Diaz and Taylor Walls appeared in 2021.
Diaz was in his third season with the Rays, who acquired him from Cleveland following the 2018 season, and sealed the clincher with a pair of two-run singles.
Walls played 54 games for the Rays in 2021 and fielded the final out.
Not including position players, those Rays used 39 pitchers, and the only remaining arms are Shane McClanahan and Rasmussen, who underwent elbow surgery.
In between division titles, the Rays acquired star third baseman Junior Caminero from Cleveland in Nov. 2021 drafted Chandler Simpson in the second round of the 2022 draft, acquired Richie Palacios and Jonny DeLuca in trades following the 2023 season.
How often has a team celebrated a clinching at Yankee Stadium?
While the Yankees have done their share of celebrating in their home clubhouse, the visiting side has seen 10 celebrations since the current stadium opened in 2009, with celebrations for the AL East, AL Pennant, and the 27th World Series title.
The first visiting party was the 2011 Detroit Tigers winning Game 5 of the ALDS and ending that series with a strikeout of Alex Rodriguez. The Astros also celebrated their 2022 ALCS sweep when Aaron Judge made the final out, and their party occurred four years after the Red Sox clinched the AL East and ALDS on the way to a fourth World Series title.
Of course, who can forget the Blue Jays partying after ending the Yankees’ season last fall?
By seeing the Rays sweep, the Yankees will face some difficult challenges to avoid seeing other teams enjoy themselves at their expense while wondering if and when Aaron Judge will play again this season.
“Everybody asks the same question,” Caminero said.“Nobody cared if it was at Yankee Stadium or not. What matters is just winning. We won today and we’ve got to continue.”
The world will find out if there are more celebrations in the future, but the Rays are certainly in a less perilous position by holding home field through at least the ALDS and avoiding the pressure cooker of a best-of-three wild card series.
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This story was originally published September 23, 2026 at 12:33 PM.