Durham Bulls' Headed to an Historical Year

The Durham Bulls finished the first half of the 2026 with a 28-47 won-loss record (a .373 percentage) and on a path to becoming the worst team in Durham Bulls AAA history. How bad are they? At 19 games below .500 they are tied with Norfolk for last place in the Eastern Division of the International League. They are 19 games behind the first place the Washingon National’s Rochester Redwings. Statistics? For the 20 team International League: OPS - .686 (20th), ERA - 5.63 (18th). Recent trends: They’ve lost 8 of their last 12 games, and 14 of their last 18.

This time last year the Bulls were doing fairly well at 15 games over .500 and they finished the year a respectable 11 over .500 and 4th place in the East.

The Bulls have only been around for 28 years and of those years they were typically in the running for a championship. In only five of those years have they finished below .500. This year they are cruising towards a less than .400 year.

Why?

I wish I could find some good reasons. And I also wish that I’d been interested enough to listen to more broadcast coverage this year. But with home stands like last week, where they only won the first game and lost the next five, that’s been hard to do.

They are slightly younger than last year, which might be a factor. 

I’d like to blame the cost-saving schedule, but they’ve been doing that for a couple of years. 

Most of all, I’d like to blame the Tampa Bay Rays, since it is, after all, their team. Or the manager, but he did OK last year. But the facts are that this team does not hit well and, unusual for a Rays franchise, doesn’t pitch well. 

Here’s my guess: The Rays are simply not paying attention to the team. Individual players, yes, but not the team. 

Year	Wins	Losses	Percentage
1998	80	64	0.556
1999	83	60	0.580
2000	81	62	0.566
2001	74	70	0.514
2002	80	64	0.556
2003	73	67	0.521
2004	77	67	0.535
2005	65	79	0.451
2006	64	78	0.451
2007	80	63	0.559
2008	74	70	0.514
2009	83	61	0.576
2010	88	55	0.615
2011	80	62	0.563
2012	66	78	0.458
2013	87	57	0.604
2014	75	69	0.521
2015	74	70	0.514
2016	64	80	0.444
2017	86	56	0.606
2018	79	60	0.568
2019	75	64	0.540
2021	77	43	0.642
2022	86	64	0.573
2023	88	62	0.587
2024	72	78	0.480
2025	85	64	0.570
2026	28	47	0.373

Reset!

 

The Durham Bulls started and ended the first half of the 2024 season with a loss. In between they never managed to get above .500 or even remotely in contention. I am not used to this half-season business and the IL website doesn’t seem to be inclined to provide any information. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Patrick Kinas on the radio, I’m not sure I’d have known about it at all. Starting tomorrow, the won-loss records reset themselves (although the stats do not). That means the Bulls get to try again.

The Bulls ended the first half’s 75 games with a 36-39 record, putting them tied with Norfolk for 5th place in the 10-team IL East, 10.5 (10.5!) games back from Syracuse. They were 10th overall in the entire  20-team IL. Standings

We Bulls fans are not used to seeing a team perform this poorly. We often see a hiccup in the first year of a new manager, but nothing like this year.  The team is weak across the board.

Hitting

The team OPS is .774, which ranks them 11th in the 20-team IL. Plus they are very good at getting on base at .339 (14th). And they strike out a lot -- 713 times so far, the 4th worst in the entire league. Ronny Simon (66th), Kameron Misner (72d), and Tristan Peters (81st) are the only hitters ranked in the top 120 batters.

Pitching

Pitching is marginally better. With an ERA of 4.84, they are 9th in the league. Joe Rock’s 3.86 over 60 innings ranks him 7th in the league. But, he’s the only Bull in the top 30.

Base Stealing: Kameron Misner makes an appearance in the stolen base rankings at #6 with 22 and he’s only been caught once. Ronny Simon is the next Bull on the list, at 60th with 8, but he’s been caught 3 times.

Fielding? Nothing to shout about. They’ve let in 52 unearned runs so far this year. That’s approaching a run per game (.716 per 9 innings). The league average is .516.

Is there hope for the second half? Not much. The team pitching is showing steady improvement as are the run differentials. But overall hitting is pretty stagnant. And in any case, there’s a long, long way to go.

Five in a Row!

 

Are things looking up for the Bulls? Maybe. Certainly, they have a long way to go, but last week down in Jacksonville they did very, very well. And it shows in their numbers. The team OPS improved from .769 to .778 and the team ERA improved from 5.31 to 5.36. That’s still 9th out of 20 on hitting and 13th out of 20 on pitching. 

Nevertheless,  they are 6th in the IL East with only 18 games left in the first half of the season. Standings.

This week they are home against the Gwinnett Strippers, who play in the IL West. Looks like the Bulls have a slight edge in hitting. Gwinnett, however, is 4th in ERA in the IL.

A Slightly Better Week

 

The Durham Bulls are still in last place in the International League East. On the other hand, they did at least split their 6-game set with Gwinnett last week. We saw a slight improvement in ERA as well, so perhaps there’s some hope. But some of that improvement comes from Taj Bradley’s rehab starts and he will not be with the Bulls much longer (assuming that he’s still here).

Nashville is in town this morning. They aren’t have a very good year either.

Dismal Start for the Durham Bulls

 

I haven’t posted anything about the Bulls this year, new manager and all that. But the time has come.

In all the years I’ve been following the Durham Bulls I don’t think they have ever started off dead last. But here they are. Twenty-one games into the season and 5 games below .500.

Why? Pitching, pitching, pitching. 

They do have a team OPS of .843, but that is somewhat driven by that extraordinary 28 run game on April 9th and two 12-run games after that. Nevertheless, they have the worst record of the 20 teams in the International league. 

The pitching is dismal. The team ERA is 639, 19th of 20;  the WHIP of 1.57 is 17th; and the Opponents’ Batting Average is .282 -- 20th.

Will things get better at home (they’ve only played 6 of their 21 games at home this year -- thanks IL schedulers)? We can hope so. But they come home to face the best team in the IL this year. We’ll have to see.

October Begins

 

Summer's End

 John Prine’s great song comes to mind. The summer’s over and the Bulls are coming home (going home might be the better choice of verb).

In the end, however, the Norfolk Tides pretty much owned the Bulls all season. The exception was that extraordinary bottom of the 9th victory on the 4th of July. Otherwise, no doubt after last night's 7-0 drubbing, the best team is off to Las Vegas.

In the meantime, this last month or so we got to witness some terrific baseball. 

See you April 2, 2024, when the Bulls take on the Jumbo Shrimp at the DBAP.

Tides Shut Down Bulls

 

As we all know, pitching matters. Their was better than ours. Box.

Bulls Win Game 1

 

Durham took back the lead in the 7th. Norfolk’s pitching fell completely apart in the 8th. The Bulls scored 5 runs on just 2 hits in that inning. Box. Story.

Game 1; International League Championship

Although little noted by local media, which is a bit odd since a local media mogul owns the Bulls, the Durham Bulls are in Norfolk, Virginia playing the Norfolk Tides for the International League Championship. Although this is far from the first time the Bulls have been playing for a championship, this will be the first time in the new IL Triple-A format.

IL Matchup

The Bulls have played the Tides 21 times this year, and have not done well. They’ve lost 15 games and won only 6. On their last visit to Harbor Park, August 22-27, they won 2 of 6. So history isn’t on the Bulls’ side. Plus, the Rays are not leaving the Bulls alone. They’ve called up outfielder Raimel Tapia and pitchers Calvin Foucher and Chris Devenski. 

The Bulls are 6-4 in their last 10 games, but lost their last 2.

The Tides have been, mostly, left alone by the Orioles. The only recent big transaction was back on the 20th. They were on the road in Buffalo last week. They are 5-5 in their last 10. 

On paper, the Bulls have a slight edge, but ...

Matchup: Bulls vs Tides, September 26, 2023
As of September 24	W-L	Rk	RDiff	OPS	ERA	WHIP	uERA
Durham Bulls (Rays)	48-27	1	129	.828	4.56	1.425	.588
Norfolk Tides (Orioles)	42-33	5	46	.821	4.62	1.465	.432
RDiff-Run differential;  Rk - Rank in International League; WHIP - Walks/Hits per Inning; uERA-unearned runs per 9 innings

Each year as the Bulls go into the playoffs (and that’s most years) what I get to say is that it’s all about the managing and coaching. The Bulls have been blessed with excellent managing and coaching crews over the years and, after a tough opening month, that’s been the case this year. But playoff success is, in my opinion,  about moment-to-moment decisions. For that, we simply don’t know. 

PCL Matchup

Meanwhile, out in Oklahoma, the Oklahoma City Dodgers (LA Dodgers) are playing the Round Rock Express (Texas Rangers)  for the PCL championship. 

Matchup: Express vs Dodgers, September 26, 2023
As of September 24	W-L	Rk	RDiff	OPS	ERA	WHIP	uERA
Round Rock Express (Rangers)	45-30	1	87	.825	4.72	1.48	.507
Oklahoma City Dodgers (LA)	40-35	5	50	.814	4.58	1.42	.603
RDiff-Run differential;  Rk - Rank in International League; WHIP - Walks/Hits per Inning; uERA-unearned runs per 9 innings

Durham Bulls Win 2nd Half

 

The Durham Bulls' brilliant end-or-season run resulted in a championship of the second half of the International League. And what a run it has been. Standings.

Let’s start with game 130 on 1 September. On that date, the Bulls were 11 games over 500 and tied with the Lehigh Valley IronPigs. Starting then, the Bulls played 19 games and won 16 of them. They are now 23 games over .500 with two games to play in the regular season. That’s simply remarkable. In that time the team ERA has dropped from 4.77 to 4.55 and the team OPS has risen from .816 to .829. Again, remarkable. Their run differential soared from +57 to +132, beyond remarkable.

They’ve got two more games down in Gwinnett to finish the season and then off to Norfolk for the first playoff game on Tuesday against the first-half champions, the Norfolk Tides.

My assumption is that we will be able to watch on MiLB.com and listen on the radio. At least that’s what I do, muting the streaming. 

My guess is that today’s storm may disrupt the East Coast games, but will not affect final standings..

Bulls Win; Maintain Lead

 

The Durham Bulls won, but so did the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs. The Buffalo Bisons lost to the Norfolk Tides, dropping them into a tie. Standings.

Bulls Still in First Place; Season Near End

The Durham Bulls had a very satisfying last week in Durham, winning 4 out of 6 against the Louisville Bats. They are now in Lawrenceville, Georgia for their final six games of the season. They are in great shape to win the second half of the International League season, but neither Lehigh Valley nor Buffalo is letting up their own runs at the championship.

Standings

What ar their competitors up to? The Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs (Phillies) (42-27) are hosting the Worcester Red Sox (38-30). They are evenly matched teams, with the Sox holding a remote shot at the championship. Meanwhile, the Buffalo Bisons (Blue Jays) (39-28) are hosting the winner of the first half of the season, the Norfolk Tides (Orioles). The Tides have their own shot at ending in first place. 

Every game by the five top teams this week will matter.

Could not have been happier to see Tristan Gray finally get to the big leagues last week. After 326 games over three seasons with the Durham Bulls, he got his call. He joined the Rays in Baltimore and did his thing, hitting a home run and a single in 5 at-bats. It was a temporary assignment and he’s already back with the Bulls, but maybe later on this season? 

Matchup

Matchup: Bulls vs Braves, September 18, 2023
As of September 17	W-L	Rk	RDiff	OPS	ERA	WHIP	uERA
Durham Bulls (Rays)	44-25	1	104	.829	4.65	1.44	.613
Gwinnett Stripers (Braves)	35-32	11	15	.744	4.92	1.45	.473
RDiff-Run differential;  Rk - Rank in International League; WHIP - Walks/Hits per Inning; uERA-unearned runs per 9 innings

The Bulls match up well against the Strippers, who are not having a good year except as a defensive team. They have undergone a lot of roster turmoil, over 40 transactions just this month. Perhaps that has to do with Atlanta’s proximity, but it has to be tough. In comparison, the Bulls have had 27 transactions this month. The Bulls can close the deal in just a couple of games. We’ll keep an eye out. 

Six in a Row

 

Standings

Six wins in a row. Maintaining lead in International League. Superb work by the bullpen crew. Really fun to watch veteran speed merchant Billy Hamilton (recently hired by Rays) at work — bunt for single, sacrifice bunt moved runner to 2B, roamed center field. 

Stayin' in Front

 

Looking Better

 

Last Durham Bulls Homestand of 2023

Standings

The Durham Bulls had a fine week over in Charlotte, winning 5 out of 6 games and stabilizing their hold on first place in the International League. Solid pitching and exceptional hitting kept the key team metrics moving up. Run differential (+89), Team OPS (.824), and Team ERA (4.68) are the best they’ve been all season.  

With 12 games left in the regular season and a 2-game lead, the key will be to stay focused as Tampa Bay makes a run at the Orioles this month. Meanwhile, their nearest competitors are facing a mixed bag of opponents. Second-place Lehigh Valley has six games against 16th-place Rochester; third-place Buffalo is playing 9th-place Scranton/Willkes-Barre. The season is far from over.

Near-term, the Rays have to figure out what to do to replace Jose Siri, whose hand got broken yesterday. They will surely reach down to Durham. Rehabing Manuel Margot is supposed to show up at the DBAP today. He would be a maybe. The only position player left who’s on the 40-man is Curtis Mead, but the Rays are exceptionally creative about manipulating that constraint and could call someone else up. Billy Hamilton is reportedly lurking somewhere in the Rays' system. It would be a bit ironic if he showed up at the DBAP. He could have been here back in 2013 playing for the Louisville Bats.

Matchup

Matchup: Bulls vs Bats, September 11, 2023
As of September 9	W-L	Rk	RDiff	OPS	ERA	WHIP	uERA
Durham Bulls (Rays)	40-23	1	89	.824	4.66	1.44	.647
Louisville Bats (Reds)	30-33	15	-46	.860	6.15	1.65	.481
RDiff-Run differential;  Rk - Rank in International League; WHIP - Walks/Hits per Inning; uERA-unearned runs per 9 innings

The Louisville Bats are the Triple-A franchise of the Cincinnati Reds. The Bulls have not played them this year. They have not had a very good year when it comes to wins and losses. However, they are the best hitting team in the International League and very likely to challenge the Bulls' pitching crew. 

This is our last chance to watch the Bulls at the DBAP this year. Wish them well. Hope they keep on playing at the end of the month.