The Rays are keeping their ace for the 2027 season.
Tampa Bay exercised its $20 million club option on right-hander Drew Rasmussen on Saturday. The move comes three days after Rasmussen started the final game of the season -- World Series Game 5 versus the Brewers -- and said afterward that he hopes to remain with the club.
“This organization, man, it's the best,” he said.
With his option picked up, Rasmussen will indeed stay in a Rays uniform and look to build upon his tremendous 2026 campaign.
The 31-year-old pitched to a 2.67 ERA with 174 strikeouts over 172 innings and 30 starts for the American League champions. He earned his second All-Star selection, led the AL with a 0.91 WHIP and allowed three runs in his first three postseason starts (21 innings) to help Tampa Bay capture the third pennant in franchise history.
Rasmussen’s 2.74 ERA since the start of 2022 ranks fourth among pitchers with at least 500 innings during that span, trailing only Tarik Skubal (2.64), Blake Snell (2.69) and Chris Sale (2.71). And by Statcast’s run value metric, Rasmussen (+41) was the third-most valuable pitcher in baseball this season, behind only Jacob Misiorowski (+52) and Yoshinobu Yamamoto (+44).
“That guy is a stud,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said of Rasmussen after Game 5, in which the right-hander allowed one run over four efficient innings while pitching on short rest.
Rasmussen has undergone three major right elbow surgeries -- two Tommy John procedures before the beginning of his professional career and an internal brace procedure that limited him to just 73 1/3 innings from 2023-24. But he has overcome those setbacks to be one of the premier starters in MLB.