Good Morning Angels fans. Being bummed is a natural part of the fandom. Please drink responsibly and have some links.
Angels News
Mike Trout is out 6-8 weeks with a calf strain. We cannot have nice things.
The Angels played yesterday, and lost despite the best efforts of everyone except for bad Heaney and Claudio. Who both blew it. No 3 game winning streak for the Angels.
Shohei Ohtani is a magical unicorn flying through the sky, as Brent puts it. He pitches tonight, so do not miss it!
Around Baseball
Tony La Russa, former drunk driver, has had enough of unwritten rule breakers on his team. So much so that he applauds his player getting thrown at and has not stopped talking. This could cost him the clubhouse.
Mercedes for his part has dug in, which is good for him. Bauer has his back, because of course he had to get involved. A reliever for the White Sox has liked a negative tweet about La Russa, so there may be some more trouble in Chicago that we all saw coming. And Tim Anderson backs up Mercedes as well. And also Lance Lynn, seems like it is everyone vs TLR.
So after Kevin Pillar got drilled in the face, he tried to play the next game. Athletes amaze me sometimes.
Yelich is back. Again. Maybe he can stay healthy for more than 2 days this time.
Maybin gets traded to the Mets for cash. How much? 1 dollar. The Cubs could have gotten more, I am pretty sure that Arte has some paperclips and a Subway coupon he could spare.
The Rays join a long list of teams opening capacity up. Which, well, isn’t going to make much of a difference for them, but they are used to that.
Joey Gallo got trolled by his teammates. Nice harmless fun, that is a bit funny.
Anything I missed? Post below for upvotes.
More than Trout being hurt, where the hell is scaredy cat Perry Minasian? The team was sucking before Trout got hurt, but let me guess that he wants to blame the season in that and Pujols. Perry has literally missed on every single acquisition from the off-season. Quintana and Cobb over Walker and Kluber? The god awful bullpen he constructed. Paying Fletcher. The horrible OF signees that have failed. The random IF guys they found off the heap instead of Rengifo. It started with saving Luke Bard instead of a prospect. Perry is in hiding and appears to have 0 clue on how to GM.
Anyone find it interesting that just as Sho is having his coming out party, Mike suddenly finds himself in the shadows of his success?
I’ve seen more tweets, articles, videos, tik toks about Sho in the last week than I’ve ever seen of Trout. Personally, I feel like that would bother me on some deep level.
To be clear, a lot of the blame goes to MLB and the Angels for failing to market the fat kid properly for the last decade
It would probably bother me just a bit, yeah. Normal human emotion.
And now the team is really the Ohtani show for the next two months, probably climaxing in an All-Star game start.
But I think Mike has a good head on his shoulders. Everyone knows who he is.
/\ now the team is really the Ohtani show
for the next two months…so now we can open trade talks for Trout.
It would bother YOU. That does not mean it bothers Mike Trout.
The doofus homer in me wants to entertain the idea of Ohtani, Rendon, and Walsh keeping this team within striking range, but the realist in me the knows that’s a pipe dream at best. May 19th and my playoff hopes are already all but dashed.
Without Trout in the line up we will need more Doofus Homers
19 days into May and i’m already rationalizing the rest of the season as at least I’ll get to see Ohtani do Ohtani things. Not a lot of hope for much else.
Just sucks, man.
I should just move to the east coast so that i’m not awake to watch.
maddon selling trout as one of the “best august additions” has got me PUMPED.
So he can give the fans a show, because we definitely won’t be in contention.
NEXT! Keep that quantitative needle at 11.
Taylor Blake Ward (@TaylorBlakeWard) Tweeted:
Angels have signed veteran reliever, Tim Peterson, to a minor-league deal and assigned him to AAA Salt Lake; Peterson pitched in 28 games for the Mets in 2018-19
https://twitter.com/TaylorBlakeWard/status/1395097661687046145?s=20
Yea, but can he pitch??!!
Jeff Mathis was DFA. Can we keep the sub par catching acquisitions going well Stassi is out.
Lost Kruger for nothing. He should have been given a look over Butera.
We could’ve had Kruger back. The fact that the org doesn’t think he is worthy of a roster spot now is telling.
I don’t trust anything this front office is telling me. I’m not sure they’re competent to wipe their own behinds.
YEAH, WELL, YOU KNOW, THAT’S JUST, LIKE, YOUR OPINION, MAN
I approve of your opinion and they have a long way to go until that changes.
I wonder if Zack Greinke would trust them.
https://mlb.nbcsports.com/2015/06/24/zack-greinke-will-call-you-out-if-you-do-the-number-two-and-dont-wash-your-hands/
…….is he in the kitchen?
Looks like some Hannibal Lecter stuff going on in a basement there.
Combination of Trout news factoring into projections and last night’s loss has dropped us ~10% in playoff probability per Fangraphs, down to 13%
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMRrNY0pxfM
Can I just say that last night’s umpiring was totally horrendous and unacceptable. The 8th inning strikeouts of Rendon and Walsh were a joke (a bad one) particularly in a close and late situation.
How do we know we can trust “UmpScorecards???”
It seems people here saw the calls against Rendon and Walsh in 8th as horrendous, and yet no mention here???
Hmmm.
Because we’re Angel fans. This is the wAy
Without leverage context, 1-2 to K instead of 2-2, with 1 and 2 outs in the inning, no one on, definitely seems less important than the three calls listed above.
(He only lists the top three calls in terms of run expectancy changed each game.)
+1.03 runs to Cleveland is the difference in the game.
I am aware.
To me an umpire is supposed to have no impact on the game. If you have an impact of over a run against a team that is very very bad.
I agree 100%, just confused as to how this subthread ended up under my reply, lol
Excessive – all we needed was 1.01
To them. Late in the game and your first and second out are created by pitches that were balls. That is ending things before they can start.
Once again, leverage does not matter to run expectancy in an inning.
Furthermore, going from 1-2 to 2-2 vs. a strikeout with no one on and either one or two outs does not seem like a more significant error to me than going from 0-2 to 1-2 vs. out with a man on third and two outs, going from 2-0 to 3-0 vs. 2-1 with no outs, or going from 1-1 to 2-1 or 1-2 with 0 outs, man on first.
In both the Rendon and Walsh cases, there are not 0 outs and there are not runners on. It makes sense to me.
Chart says he called 91 of 103 balls correctly. Every damn one of those 12 balls incorrectly called a strike was against the Angels and was 2-4 inches off the plate.
The Cleve got four of them type calls last night, the the two in a row, and Joe just mumbled some dumb shit from the dugout barely wearing his mask so you couldn’t read his lips.
Don’t worry everyone. We have Taylor Ward as our new lead-off batter.
Is the guy in the red shirt (standing up) Ric Wilson?
Yes
Thanks Steel. As for Mr. Wilson, the glee of drafting of Ward in the first round confirms that:
Ha!
He is the reason our pitching pipeline in the minors looks as desolate and bleak as can be. He is no longer with The Angels last time I checked.
Wait, is this about Wilson or La Russa?
Both
😂
I just wan’t to know where the JeDi learned to clap
From this guy:
Perhaps from the Nicole Kidman School for Clapping
Man those are some long fingers. I wonder if she can throw the splitter.
https://youtu.be/S0z2JyMssSo
Her hands look like walrus fins. Must be the angle.
It’s the photoshop.
Ohtani is a straight up superstar. The shock of Pujols or the news of Trout does not shake this guy. The 1-2-3 of he Rendon and Walsh is still very good and takes this team from top 5 offense when healthy to top 12 minus Trout. Upton will give you 2 hit streaks and 2 frigid streaks during his absence. It’s still our pitching that sucks, and this year the defense.
I think they need to flush the organization of all things connected to Skaggs, so Heaney has to go. I imagine him doing ok in another team depending how he’s used. But we need to clean house
Should We also DFA Everyone from that 2009 Skaggs Draft?
Other than Trout we traded all of them, let them walk, or they had a failed life cycle in the minors……holy shit what a draft that was.
LaRussa sounds, acts like and is an idiot! Bar none.
I was at the twin/angels game when astudillo pitched. I get the whole 3-0 taking a pitch thing (how many times have we begged trout to swing at the first one… and he kind of was this year) but once you put in a guy throwing 45 mph that isn’t a pitcher, some of those rules (especially unwritten) go by the waist-side. Fans still pay to see game until the final out, players are paid the same. La Russia sounds like he’d get along well with Manfred, just throw in a mercy rule too so only REAL baseball can be played! *sarcasm intended*
So if LaRussa is such an idiot why did the Twins throw at Yermin? Aren’t the Twins and Rocco the real idiots for not accepting their fate of bringing in a position player to pitch?
Or did TLR’s virtue signaling actually green light Duffey’s actions?
LaRussa drew attention to it and is OKAY with his player getting hurt (HBP) vs swinging his bat (why hadn’t he been pulled if the game was so out of reach?!). LaRussa is a drunk fool.
Twins are just trying to manufacture something from nothing.
Yes! Times 1 billion.
He only cares about Tony. I’m pretty sure he has no clue on what he is employed to do, employed by, or what his employer is paying him. He has a debit card, and all of his savings are deposited into that account.
Tony: “Do you guys accept cards? I wanna go on a date with the redhead … There.”
Cashier: “Sir. This is a Wendy’s.”
Hilarious! 😂
With heavy emphasis on the word “bar”.
I think a lot of people are missing out on how big of a douche Mercedes has been in his career. His talent has been bounced around the minors because multiple teams just got sick of him.
This is a battle of two absolute ass hats.
Mercedes missed or ignored a sign then said “Mercedes plays Mercedes game.” A manager can’t have one player just doing whatever he wants.
The unwritten rules are stupid. So is Mercedes. There.
Well said.
It was about time someone hammered one of those floaters though. We just looked or played catch with an infielder when given the same opportunity. Personally, I would’ve loved to see (in person) Suzuki, rengifo or Fletcher belt one against astudillo on 4/16.
Admittedly I don’t know much about yermin mercedes other than he put on an otherworldly performance opening weekend here.
I would like see Suzuki, Rengifo or Fletcher belt one against any MLB pitcher
I’ve seen Kurt’s lone HR at home this year but exactly… those guys should be trying at that spot.
Which again, why is LaRussa leaving one of this years best hitters in the game in the 9th inning of a 15-4 game? He had a player on the bench or could’ve put a pitcher out to bat in that spot. Yermin is a stud this year. As his manger how did you kinda not expect something like that?! Makes LaRussa look even worse in my eyes by that’s just me.
A 28 year old rookie is always going to be looking to pad his stats. Arbitration matters.
TLR should have simply sat him late in the game. He knows Mercedes is a prima donna.
The team could stay afloat while Trout is out if the pitching just progressed to league average for a couple months.
Ohtani, Walsh, Rendon and some improvement from Fletcher/Ward/Upton would be enough to win games if the pitchers could prevent runs better.
… but we know how it’s going to go.
….And Melinda and Bill Gates marriage could have stayed afloat if Bill didn’t have a propensity for strippers and hookers at his pool parties, or liked hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein.
Did Gates visit the island ???
apparently much of the sexually predatory behavior in the world could be stopped simply by eliminating the name Bill.
Cosby, O’reilly, Clinton, now possibly Gates…there’s something to this.
Probably very true about Gates, its just 1/2 of what we hear isn’t true, but I’m sure we have only heard the tip of the iceberg……
Speaking of sexual predators what are they going to do with Mickey Callaway?
Gates met is wife then a string of others while he was their boss. She can’t really be surprised that he did the same thing with all those other women that he did with her.
The Epstein stuff is simply disgusting and inexcusable for all involved.
Callaway is sitting on a shelf waiting for the never ending MLB investigation to end.
I’ll take ‘Sexual Predators named Bill for $1600 Alex’.
Just remember, in the 60’s comic books loved Dick.
(seriously, there were a metric crapton of characters named “Dick”).
Yep. And Clinton is an underrated culprit.
Didn’t realize it was Bill Epstein
Yesterday showed me this team can still hang in there even with a battered lineup a bit. I kinda agree with Joe. I like what I seen. Felt like Upton and Iglesias might get a little more locked in while Trout is out. It’s just this damn bullpen man. I just can’t..😔 oh and Heaney being Heaney. Love him as our #5 hate him as our #2/#3…
Love him as our #7. Unfortunately we got alot of #7’s
Trout’s injury is the kind you get when your almost 30 and don’t stretch properly before physical activity.
Just say it, Mike is fat. In his defense:
I’m not sure weight is related to muscle tightness.
Can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic……but I’ll play along
Fat, gets in the way of stretching.
He’s just big boned
Husky.
Medium Husky
This is funny but kinda true. Mike always had some pretty intense looking workouts. Maybe this is the wakeup call to get him doing some occasional yoga or some other kinds of “pre-hab” as he ages.
Yes, this. Also – what kind of stretching and conditioning program do they have there??
Only the best:
https://www.sportsmockery.com/chicago-cubs/report-two-cubs-coaches-will-leave-to-join-joe-maddon-with-angels/
Well there you go. Still trying to deter if that is real. If so I’m at a loss for words.
This just in. Angels hire an additional strength and conditioning coach….
Additional? Arte would never pay for extras
If a cat can survive this, he should be able to run from 2nd to 3rd without tearing anything.
https://youtu.be/W01240u1P_c
Didn’t the conditioning staff tell Trout not to wear his plaid shorts and black socks to the stretching session?
Figures
zero zilch nada