Heading into the 2025-2026 offseason, can you name how many players the Rays will have in free agency?
There are a few trick question type answers in there, as Brandon Lowe (age 31) has an $11.5 million club option with a $500K buyout, and Closer/MLBPA player Pete Fairbanks (32) has a $7 million club option with a $1 million buyout.
That remains normal An Rays 2025 player to review: SP Adrian Houser (33).
Yandy Diaz (34) is under contract for $12 million in 2026 with a $10 million club option for 2027, and Drew Rasmussen (30) is under contract for $5.75 million with an $8 million club option for 2027. After that, the Rays will no longer have any players under team control outside the limits of their rookie contracts. (Except he-who-shall-not-be-spoken of.)
Will the Rays try to re-sign Houser?
Houser isn’t a household name, and you’d be forgiven for missing the fact that he was a starter for the Tampa Bay Rays if you were even casually tuning in to the 2025 season. He was a Milwaukee Brewers starting pitcher who was sent to the Mets in 2024 while making just $5 million in his final year of arbitration. Then in free agency, Houser signed a deal worth just $1.35 million (prorated) with the terrible Chicago White Sox.
What happened next exceeded expectations, with Houser posting a 2.10/3.34 FIP ERA over 11 starts in 2025, leading to him being acquired by the Rays for Curtis Mead and two prospects.
Tampa Bay needed Houser after dealing two starting pitchers (Zack Littell and Taj Bradley), and only Joe Boyle (part of Jeffrey Springs’ return) was deemed ready to fill their shoes in Durham. Houser also seemed ideal because he induced a lot of groundballs, which could help a team playing in a minor league ballpark.
However, Houser didn’t produce the same results for the Rays, posting a 4.79 ERA/4.38 FIP over 10 starts.
Heading into next season, it also seems unlikely he will return to the Rays – with Rasmussen, Boyle, Ryan Pepiot, Shane Baz and hopefully Shane McClanahan filling out the rotation. If one of them isn’t ready for 2026, the team could look to stretch Griffin Jax (the return for Bradley), use other Durham arms like Ian Seymour, or hit the market looking for another arm to fit the team’s return to Tropicana Field.
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