Deadline additions not likely for Rays

Remember that frenzied final hour before the July 31 trade deadline last season, with the Rays apparently on the verge of landing Jason Bay from Pittsburgh before the Red Sox swooped in and nabbed the outfielder at the last minute, leaving Tampa Bay empty-handed?

The Rays' deadline return this year could end up being exactly the same, minus the excitement.

With a lack of glaring weaknesses on their roster, some quality depth idling in Triple-A and a serious lack of wiggle room in the budget, there simply might not be much for the Rays to do before the end of the month as they look ahead to the stretch run.

"We're obviously going to work the phones leading up to the 31st as feverishly as we have any other year," Rays executive vice president Andrew Friedman said. "We're trying to be creative to look at different things, but we have supreme confidence in the guys we have here, so if we do something, it'll be because we feel like, unequivocally, we made this team better."

It runs counter to Friedman's deal-making nature to assume absolutely nothing will happen over the next few weeks, but barring a significant injury to a player the Rays can't adequately replace internally, status quo seems the likely outcome.

It isn't the Rays' style to make moves just for the sake of making them, and now that the bullpen has picked it up and the all-Gabe platoon in right field has rediscovered its collective stroke at the plate, there just aren't many holes to be filled. And even if there were, the cash-strapped Rays would probably have to look to Wade Davis, Reid Brignac or Matt Joyce first to fill them.

That's how the Rays handled the slew of injuries they absorbed last season, turning to the likes of Willy Aybar and Ben Zobrist to pick up the load when starters went down. Keep in mind that the only in-season trades they made on the way to the AL pennant in 2008 were the April deal that brought Gabe Gross from Milwaukee and picking up Chad Bradford from the Orioles in August after he had cleared waivers.

So it's fair to say that the Rays' biggest midseason acquisition this year could be a revitalized Pat Burrell.

"Some organizations construct their team in the winter with a few questions marks and they say they'll feel it out and in June or July act on whatever their perceived weaknesses are," Friedman said. "We try to get in front of that in the offseason. Who's to say which way's better?

"I imagine going forward that we'll be one of the least active teams in July unless it's needed," Friedman said. "But our goal is to accomplish that in the offseason and not be confronted with that situation in July, when there's artificially high prices to pay."

If the Rays were so inclined, they probably would be able to meet the asking price for most players on the market in terms of talent to trade away. The question is whether they would want to deal from their coveted stock of prospects for a rental player.

They haven't shown much interest in doing so in the past, and considering the payroll crunch that looms this winter, with so many players already in-house due for hefty raises, that next wave of youngsters in the minors could end up playing a significant role in Tampa Bay in the near future.

The money involved is another issue. While principal owner Stuart Sternberg said he doesn't expect to make any moves designed to dump salary while the Rays remain in the playoff hunt this season, it's clear there isn't much if any room to add on at the moment.

That doesn't mean a deal for an established player will automatically be ruled out, as teams looking to off-load salary might be convinced to kick in cash in exchange for a higher-grade prospect, but at this point it appears doubtful the Rays will look to make a high-impact move, such as Roy Halladay.

Instead, the Rays' hopes will ride on Burrell making a run at his career norms, Dioner Navarro looking to emulate his second-half turnaround from 2007, Scott Kazmir and David Price settling in on the mound and perhaps some September contributions from Akinori Iwamura and Fernando Perez.

Frustrating as it is for Rays fans to sit back and watch the Red Sox and the Yankees splash all that money and minor-leaguers for on-the-fly upgrades, just as they do all winter, the long-standing reality is Tampa Bay just can't play by those rules.

Of course, standing pat worked out OK last year.