Four Rays data points to watch into October

August and September are two of the most important months of the regular season for contenders. Rosters are galvanized in August following the trade deadline, and teams jockey for a higher postseason seed in September. There aren't too many "punt" games this time of the year now that magic numbers are counting down and managers can be aggressive with expanded rosters.

The Rays find themselves comfortable in control of their destiny and in the lead to win the AL East – securing a first-round bye. There are four key metrics I'll be following as they look to maintain their performance into October.

This Rays team is built on run prevention before anything else. Pitching and defense will determine how deep they play into October. So far this year, the Rays have been one of the top run prevention teams in the league. Only the Dodgers (69.1%) convert more batted balls into outs than the Rays (68.6%) this season. However, the Rays have been roughly average in this area since the beginning of August. Some of that is skewed by their west coast trip in which their flyball-to-out conversion rate dipped significantly playing in Denver and Sacramento and should rebound as they've been one of the best defensive outfields in the league this year. The infield has steadily improved throughout the year, and they've had the 9th best groundball-to-out rate since 8/1.

I'd like to see the team converting close to 69-70% of batted balls into outs by the end of the month. They're currently at 67.4% from August 1st through September 1st. This can be accomplished by playing better defense of course, but the pitching staff will need to continue to do their part and manage hard contact.

The back of the bullpen has been solid all year, and the addition of Tyler Wells at the deadline along with Manny Rodriguez return from injury only makes it better. The Rays bullpen has been the best in the league at holding leads since the beginning of August. Their 97.1% success rate for saves and holds is 3% better than the next closest team and about 10% better than league average. It may fluctuate a bit the rest of the season because baseball can be random, but the back of the bullpen is hitting their stride at the right time and will shorten games in October. I expect this to remain in the 90-95% range for the rest of the year and stay comfortably above average.

The overall performance of the bullpen has been negatively skewed by the performance of some middle relief options over the last month. Rather than just looking at just team reliever ERA, it can be beneficial to account for workload by factoring in total batters faced. ERA and FIP miss the workload aspect as they are calculated on a 9-inning basis.

Since 8/1, the Rays bullpen ranks 21st in the league in runs allowed per batter faced. Some of that is brought down by mop-up outings in blow outs, but that can't really happen as we head into October. Despite ranking in the bottom 10 in this metric, the Rays bullpen is only slightly below average. Additionally, there are plenty of internal candidates that could improve the bullpen.

They'll need at least one of Cleavinger, Booser, Sulser, Matz, or Legumina to step up and be the bridge to the back of the bullpen. I'm not concerned about this area; there's currently a surplus in the rotation with multiple players who will need their workloads managed as we approach the end of the season. A postseason pitching staff really only needs three true starters, so whoever isn't starting could transition to a relief role. Jax, McClanahan, and Seymour all make sense to move to multi or single inning relief roles to support the bullpen when fewer rotation spots are needed.

The Rays bullpen is currently at 0.126 runs per batter while the best bullpens are below 0.100. I'd like to see them closer to that number, so it'll be something to watch as the middle relief roles get sorted out over the next few weeks.

While the Rays might not have the roster to out-slug some of the other contenders, they can make up for it by maintaining an efficient offense. One way to measure efficiency is by looking at how many runs a team scores for each base they earn.

The Rays have the 4th best offensive efficiency since 8/1 in terms of runs per base at 0.277 and the league average is 0.255. They move runners well by bunting, stealing, and having productive outs more than most other teams. This has helped them maintain an above average offense for the season as a whole with a 105 wRC+. I'll be looking for them to maintain above-average offensive efficiency through October.

Overall, this team is in a good position with room to improve. I'd like to see the Rays get their outfield defense back to where it was earlier this season. The return of Mesa should help with that. I'd also like them to continue to hold leads and close games at the back of the bullpen while keeping games closer in middle relief. Rodriguez should help in that area, and I'm interested to see which of the current members of the rotation could transition to a relief role in October. I'll also be watching the group of Cleavinger, Booser, Sulser, Matz, and Legumina for those roles. And lastly, I want the Rays to stick to their identity and continue to manufacture runs with productive outs and taking an extra base as much as possible. We already know what we have in this team – they're legit World Series contenders, but performance in these four key areas is what will make or break their postseason run.