Good morning Angels fans, have some links.
Angels News
Jeff Fletcher gives some updates on the health of the team. Yes, there is that little news right now.
Oh and Walsh was on Hot Stove. So that is nice.
New Angel Brett Phillips admits he had no idea he was facing Rendon last year. When you go out there to pitch when you don’t normally do that, yeah, that can happen.
Around Baseball
Oh hey, Carlos Correa just signed! With the Twins. Seriously, he even got through the physical.
Seriously, this saga is weird, as the Mets lowered their offer when the leg issues popped up. Guy has had more physicals in a few months than most of us had our whole lives.
You can maybe feel bad for him as Correa went from 13/350M to 12/315M to 6/200M. But, then again, he is a former 2017 Astro, so, I am not feeling bad at all.
The Twins DFA Ortega. Maybe the Angels can get him back again?
A’s staying or to LV is still unknown, but they lost a potential site in LV. They need to stay in Oakland. Which is getting harder due to a blow to funding.
Top 10 RP right now according to MLB network. I know some of these names.
Trevor Story has not Tommy John but mostly Tommy John Tommy John surgery. Hey, maybe if the Correa deal falls through with the Twins the Red Sox can nab him.
Mets payroll is now under 300M again.Whoever the new Angels owner will be needs to be more like that and less like the A’s.
Corey Dickerson to the Nats, who is also still not sold yet. Get on with it!
Anything I missed? Post below for upvotes!
Dodgers doing what it takes to get a SS…
I feel really bad about Trevor Story. Maybe we could help the Red Sox out by offering them Rengifo in a trade. I wouldn’t play Luis at SS for all the tea in China but many on this site seem to be in the other camp. So what do you think we could get out of them?
Who’s big on playing Rengifo at SS?
Is it the 80%ers?
Not Shohei’s mom.
Even if he’s had wrist surgery twice in the last 4 months.
I liked Rojas for Anaheim, and folks said pricey. lol. He made sense then you deal Rengifo for a closer or SP. Oh well
The Angels did another crash and burn this past season, but they are not alone. Dodgers, unexpected quick ending, but, as afavorite the Dodgers had good company in USC and UCLA Football Bowl games with bad endings. The Rams choked the chicken but hope rests with the Chargers going all the way, oh boy. UCLA and USC can look good in March until they don’t. Lakers choose to go the way of the Halos, down the drain. The Clippers are similar to the Chargers in that the second favorite team in a professional sport is holding up its end of the bargain. The Ducks are rebuilding, and the Kings are trying. Maybe in just a few short years all our teams will be winning at the same time.
I am not sure being so pro SoCal as I am that I am for UCLA and USC leaving the Pac-12 is sure a good idea, but it does show that College programs of Football and Basketball are all about the Big Bucks. While thankfully basketball will stay Pac-12, how long until those changes go down?
FiveThirtyEight has an article on the Angels that’s kinda positive:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-the-angels-small-moves-might-finally-add-up-to-big-success/
Except that isn’t the NBA.
The Giants won 3 World Series championships in early 2010’s without a big name cast.
Especially position players in the field sans Buster Posey at catcher.
Good find, there is hope for us yet. I don’t see Fletcher losing in the battle for playing time with anyone if he returns to hitting, his glove will keep him in the game at either SS-2b. Catcher and Bullpen are going to be iffy though. Good article you found; I like the positive take.
I know some of us have/do live in the Bay Area.
Do any of you have the slightest faith that the A’s will actually get a stadium built there before we’re all dead?
Do you think the team and City of Oakland will be making improvements in and around the current stadium while the A’s are stuck there?
Does it seem, given their past statements, that the MLB offices feel like just giving it a few more years?
Does anyone who has lived in the Bay Area really think the A’s will still be there in the future? I can remember reading in the Oakland Tribune (which is also now mostly dead) about efforts to get a new stadium site…. in 1997. That’s pretty much before the internet guys. They have made basically the same progress in ALL the time that most of us have had internet…. which all adds up to a fantastic collection of artist renderings.
When the A’s weren’t allowed to move to San Jose that was the death blow but no one wants to admit it.
The city of Oakland needs to fall off the face of the earth.
I liked Oakland. It’s just like 80% of the rest of California, gone to shit. And it had a big head start on the rest of the state. But the East Bay could be really awesome if it just completely changed almost everything.
If you ever want to stare into the dark abyss and really consider whether the old school qualifications for who was allowed to vote might have had zero merit or if maybe requiring some skin in the game is a good thing look to Oakland.
Let’s discuss baseball.
wahhh
When an editor refocuses the conversation towards baseball that is not an indication of our preferences.
We prefer to chat baseball here is all.
Sorry. i just meant that when everybody gets to choose where we eat you end up with a list of eight restaurants everyone desperately wants to go to…. and no one wants to pick up the tab.
Not trying to be mean.
The City of Oakland is among the worst run in the state, which is really saying something.
They will red tape any potential stadium site to death while paying tens of millions of dollars they don’t have for the bonds still owed for the Raiders remodel of the Coliseum.
The A’s owners offered to pay off those bonds, give the City some much needed cash, and redevelop the entire area around the current stadium. Offices, condos, retail, parks…the type of thing that would have greatly improved the area and generated a ton of property tax and sales tax revenue.
When the City blew that, the writing was on the wall.
Man that bugged me. Basically Oakland decided that, since the A’s owners had the money to bail them out of bad financial straits by buying the stadium site etc etc then they should totally be willing to pay more money for…. just for the sake of paying more money since they obviously could. Plus, those evil owners will build useful shit and expect to make money off of it. Can’t have that. Better to leave the place a Snake Pliskin waste land than let rich people build something nice, create a bunch of jobs, and then make some money.
I’m one of the Bay Area people, and I agree that the collapse of that San Jose idea was a huge setback. And then it looked like they were going to have that fancy waterfront thing with the grass on the roof, and that seemed to fall through too.
I’m not sure what to expect at this point.
Neto for Royce Lewis. Who’s in?
no thanks
I thought he played first not Shortstop?
Terrible idea! Why trade our gifted young stud prospect for a guy who can’t even stay on the field?
I don’t trust Lewis to play SS and keep his knee intact. At this point, no.
I do like Lewis as a potential CF replacement for Trout, who needs to move to a corner. However, I want to see him play a season on the grass first.
It would be a big gamble, and we’d have to look at medicals, but he looked great last year when he came up. He’s a legitimate everyday SS that has All-Star potential if the knee holds up. Everything is a gamble. If the Angels are as high as I think they are on Neto, I doubt they will pull the trigger. But he went 1/1/ for reason. (And yes, I’m still bullish on Moniak.)
Well…well…..well
So the sell your soul’s people (80%ers who else) like CB26 who constantly rail against Dave Dombrowski, the Lakers, and now good looking Ram’s HC Sean McVay is seriously considering leaving the sidelines for the broadcast booth now that the Rams have no draft picks till 2099. So the answer is to keep on losing with bad coaches, and front office execs forever I guess. Unless even Alabama FB, Geno Auriemma’s Lady UConn basketball, John Wooden’s UCLA, and the 1927 Yankees ain’t good enough..GOOD GAWD!!!!!
💩 💩
Well this pile of goop be part of your IIWPM? We are still waiting to see thoughts and stuff. Gued Gawd!
Hey Toots it looks like you finally got your mom a new Blackberry so you wouldnt be the only one to Guest 👍 your own comments.
Man you’re pathetic.
A little surprised it wasn’t mentioned, maybe this is put together the night but before.
Allegedly, Jo Adell took “Angels LF” out of his IG bio yesterday. Could be nothing, could be something. I’m sure Perry’s comments about the OF being solidified did not help so he’s probably frustrated.
PTP essentially said that Moniak and Adell will be in SLC, and that Phillips is the 4th OF’er on the ML roster. If I’m Adell and Moniak, I’d be pissed if Phillips was signed because the team no longer considers me ready for major league at bats at the 4th OF’er. Adell has a choice: either he steps it up to take playing time from Phillips, or he can go in the corner and sulk.
While we should be continuing to upgrade last year’s weak offense, the Phillips signing doesn’t make much sense to me. He seems more like a coaching candidate, a great character and clubhouse guy.
Inexpensive and 1 year deal are the criteria.
Tons of defensive value. I seriously doubt that Phillips will see a dozen at bats in a row, even if he’s playing because of injury. Unless, of course, all the coaching he’s getting this off season helps him.
He allows for flexibility though. If injury/rest demands it they can do a funky OF with Ward in CF and a guy like Rengifo in LF, then if we have a lead, replace LR with Phillips for the last three innings, etc. Play him hitting lefty against right handed pitching to rest Trout and he’ll be OK for a day. That type of use.
I think Phillips real value lies in allowing Adell and Moniak to get regular playing time in AAA.
When the inevitable OF injury pops up, one of those two will get the call and Phillips will continue to be the bench guy.
It is basically a $1.2 million investment into the development of two young guys who were both first round picks.
That’s exactly what I saw Jeff. Hopefully one of those two figures it out and reaches their ceiling.
I’d be pissed too. Another Squid-like bat is one step away from a starting role in an offensive first position. Albeit RH, I’d take Adell and his stone glove as the 4th.
Well, what hypothetical you should do is pull up bref and see that your slash lines, stone glove and all, are pretty much the same. Oh, except Phillips actually has positive WAR because he can play defense. And steal bases.
Then get pissed at yourself and stop striking out so much.
Say what you want about Phillips but his career splits against Right handed pitchers are a helluva lot better than Squids and even Rengifo’s
2 busts……next stop, Japan
Speaking of busts, when are you gonna bust out that IIWPM? Can’t wait to see what will come when you take all these insights you have and focus them like a laser at the team’s issues.
Sayonara.
So When are you actually leaving?
Well Jo, we’re all frustrated. You should probably go hire a hitting coach and spend the off season talking it out with him.
A year ago, or so, the Players Union was complaining about the “Older” players getting the short end of the stick when it came down to hauling in the dough. That was then and this is now. 13-year deals are just flat out over the top dumb. Oh sure, I know it is not the same dollar and the ceiling will rise, but it still will, like it or not change the dynamics of a team for the worse. We will find out; we will have 2 maybe 3 or 4 of those deals in play then. Just ask the Rams if it was worth it to mortgage the future by winning a Super Bowl last year. I’m glad that I don’t have to make those decisions as it looks like you don’t keep your job as long as you might like.
I think the Rams would still say it was worth it despite their current struggles.
I doubt the MLBPA was worried about the elite free agents getting “underpaid” as much as it was about the mid level guys that were in late arbitration years and entering free agency at 30. I Guess Gio or Hunter Renfroe would be example of this type of player so it will be interesting to see how each player does in free agency. Considering how much more teams value their prospects more than before some group of players will be feeling the “pain”
Perry, despite his walnut sized brain, was able to identify this remaining value in the market and strike quickly before the frenzy started ( One could argue it really started right before the lockout last year)
I believe It is the pitching contracts where we have really seen the crazy with the long term deals in what seems like a total disregard for a players age or injury history.
That’s the first and only LA Rams Super Bowl win, matching the Angels championship total. I’ll take it every day of the week.
Don’t forget, they won one in 2000 when they were the St Louis Rams of Anaheim.
The L.A. Rams also won a NFL championship here in 1951.Hopefully we don’t have to wait another 70 years for the next one.
Both true, but this was the one and only LARams Super Bowl and I was happy we got it.
As a Rams fan, I say it is worth it.
You can bet that Royals fans say that it was worth it as well for 2015.
It’s worth it…the Rams raised the bar in front office aggressiveness.
The Royals didn’t scuttle their farm for the next six years though…..
They just suck
Yeah. They don’t engage in tactical suck. It’s all natural.
He says Yes, definitely to both the Lakers and Rams.
But GPB. Don’t you understand that NewOwnerz the Unicorn will just solve this by having a 400M payroll? You see, he will already have spent 3 Billion on the team. But he still will have more billions. He’ll thus surely spend a half billion a year on payroll while also building us a new stadium in Southern California. It’s the only wise way to invest wisely for him, and also, he won’t even care about pissing away 100M a year on shit contracts. Cause he a billionaire don’t you know, and that’s how billionaires are, really stupid with their money.
Also Mets Cohen. We’ve seen one guy do it for two years. So you can pretty much count on all billionaires acting the same way…. not driving a used Toyota for 12 years and looking for every angle to generate unrealized value and efficiency. No one becomes a billionaire that way.
Plus, Arte has already shown that spending on huge layer contracts is the rout to huge profits and team success in the not quite LA market so NewNicorn is sure to follow the same general plan but bigger.
And you can take that to the bank.
Good morning to everyone, yes that includes TT. 😀 Well, I guess that MLB teams are not as popular as NFL or NBA teams for Billionaires, bummer.
Why did Eppler call off the Correa deal, Cohen told him too. There is no way that Correa should be pulling down 33 million a year. But that is the going rate for good hitting SS for teams that don’t have good hitting SS. But the real truth behind the Mets just saying know is, why pay Arenado money when you are not getting an Arenado. Lindor was not going to 3rd because Lindor is a better SS than Correa.