Earlier this offseason, we learned that the Rays, pursuant to the trade that sent right-hander Jake Odorizzi to the Twins, planned to use a four-man rotation for the early weeks of the season. The unstated motivation, in part, was that a four-man arrangement would allow them to keep top prospect Brent Honeywell in the minors a bit longer and thus manipulate his service time to the club's advantage. Well, since that time the Rays have learned that Honeywell needs Tommy John surgery and will miss the entirety of the 2018 season. 

As such, it's time for the Rays to update their plans, which on Wednesday they did ... 

Before you get excited about the possibility of Chris Archer making 40 starts in decidedly old-school fashion, let's note the qualifier at the end. "[F]illing in with bullpen guys when needed to start" is doing a lot of work here. The Rays have a lot of off days early in the calendar, which means they can go with four starters rather easily. After that, though, expect reasonably frequent "bullpen games" and/or piggyback starters.

In other words, it would be surprising if Archer, Blake Snell, Jacob Faria and Nathan Eovaldi wind up tallying starts at any kind of clip that seems out of step with contemporary starting pitcher usage. Probably this results in heavy use of options on relievers from Durham to St. Pete throughout the season. Or maybe Anthony Banda makes it a traditional five-man corps at some point. 

Anyway, a four-man rotation? That's interesting, right? No, not really.