Yes, we know that this is taking a while!

As many of you know, we at Notinhalloffame.com are slowly generating the top 50 of each major North American sports team. That being said, we maintain and update our existing Top 50 lists annually.  As such, we are delighted to present our pre-2025/26 revision of our top 50 Tampa Bay Rays.

As for all of our top 50 players in baseball, we look at the following: 

1.  Advanced Statistics.

2.  Traditional statistics and how they finished in Major League Baseball.

3.  Playoff accomplishments.

4.  Their overall impact on the team and other intangibles that are not reflected in a stat sheet.

Last year, the Rays finished fourth in the American League East with a 77-85 record.  As this is a young franchise that constantly overhauls talent, there were new entrants and multiple elevations on this year’s list, especially with the new algorithm.

As always, we present our top five, which saw a change due to the new algorithm.

1. Evan Longoria
2. Carl Crawford
3. Ben Zobrist
4. David Price
5. Kevin Kiermaier

You can find the entire list here.

Infielder Yandy Diaz moved up two spots from #10 to #8.

Pitcher Drew Rasmussen makes his first appearance, skyrocketing to #18.  We admittedly failed to rank him last year.

Notably, Pitcher Shane McLanahan, who missed 2024 and 2025 but returned in 2026, fell by one spot to #21.

Infielder Taylor Walls had a huge jump, moving from #45 to #29.

Pitcher Zack Littell, who was traded to the Cincinnati Reds during the 2025 campaign, debuts at #49.

Greg Vaughn and Steven Souza Jr. fell off the list.

We thank you for your continued support of our lists on Notinhalloffame.com.

When Zack Littell arrived in St. Petersburg in mid-2023 as a waiver claim from the Red Sox, he was seen as a journeyman middle reliever. Having bounced through Minnesota and San Francisco, few expected him to become a Tampa Bay pitching success. Yet, the Rays saw elite strike-throwing potential they could develop into more.

Faced with a severe influx of injuries to their starting rotation, the coaching staff asked Littell to step up and take a starting role—a challenge he accepted with notable efficiency. Throughout the latter half of 2023, he stabilized an underperforming pitching staff, delivering precise, high-leverage strikes to achieve a 3.93 ERA across 14 starts, thereby providing Tampa Bay with the essential mid-season boost necessary to secure a wild-card position.

He demonstrated that the transition was not merely a transient occurrence by consistently occupying the role of a full-time starting pitcher throughout a resilient and highly reliable campaign in 2024. Utilizing a precisely aimed four-seam fastball, a formidable slider, and a newly refined splitter, Littell established himself as the definitive "strike-zone filler" for a team that emphasizes pitching efficiency. He made a career-high 29 appearances, covering 156.1 vital innings, and achieved 141 strikeouts while only issuing 31 walks, resulting in an impressive record of 8–10 and an earned run average (ERA) of 3.63.

Littell returned to the Tampa Bay rotation for the 2025 season, maintaining his role as a reliable strike-thrower. As the Rays began retooling, they traded Littell to the Cincinnati Reds before the July deadline, ending his productive stint in the American League East. With the Rays, he posted a 16–21 record, 3.76 ERA, and 1.20 WHIP. He ate up 299.1 innings, striking out 257 batters while walking only 51.