MLBTR discussed Shohei Ohtani early in episode three of their podcast. Specifically, they were discussing what his likely future contract might be like. Former Angel Dave Frost just passed away.
Max Scherzer got himself ejected over the sticky stuff on his glove. They had asked him to change his glove but that apparently wasn’t enough.
Transactions
The Giants acquired outfielder Cal Stevenson from the Oakland Athletics for cash. They designated Sam Long for assignment. The Guardians promoted middle infielder Brayan Rocchio, apparently as a backup plan for if Ahmed Rosario goes on the injured list due to his back issues. The Reds promoted Levi Stoudt. He is expected to make a spot start. The Reds also extended Hunter Greene for six years and $53 Million guaranteed. The Athletics will recall bat-first infield prospect Jordan Diaz. Jake Faria cleared outright waivers and was sent to Triple-A.
Rob Manfred thinks limiting the length of contracts would be a good thing. The MLBPA disagrees.
Injured List
The Giants placed lefty Alex Wood on the 15 day IL with a left hamstring strain. Miguel Rojas also has a hamstring strain. Edmundo Sosa has a back injury although the Phillies are hoping they can avoid putting him on the injured list. The Marlins’ Trevor Rogers was removed from his start with the dreaded forearm tightness. Ramon Laureano (groin) and Trevor May (anxiety) are both now on the injured list for the Athletics. The Angels do not appear in this list of teams that might need to panic over their injuries. The Yankees get a high anxiety rating. Garrett Mitchell has a shoulder injury. Ji-Man Choi will miss two months due to his Achilles tendon injury. The Rockies reinstated Daniel Bard from their injured list (anxiety again).
Photo credit: Rex Fregosi
Remember how many of you were bitching that cheap Arte should “at least” have signed Madison Bumgarner as a cheap free agent option if he was gonna totally not even try to sign the better arms?
I do.
I hope this is part of the Weekend links but the Angels lost one of their family members from the past. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2023/04/dave-frost-passes-away.html Frostie was probably our best pitcher in 1979 even though that was Ryans last year. He was also part of one the Angels best heists in club history when we acquired him , Brian Downing and Chris Knapp from the White Sox for Bobby Bonds, Thad Bosley and Richard Dotson.
Sorry to hear about your relative, Jack. RIP
From Rotoworld:
Yankees signed OF Kole Calhoun to a minor league contract.
The Yankees officially lead the league in Calhouns, as the club also has Willie Calhoun on the active roster. As for Kole, he opted out of his minor league deal with the Mariners after failing to make the team out of spring training. The 35-year-old makes for useful depth for New York at the very least, but not much should be expected here.
A Rengifo sighting
1 Ward LF
2 Ohtani DH
3 Trout CF
4 Rendon 3B
5 Renfroe RF
6 Drury 1B
7 Rengifo 2B
8 O’Hoppe C
9 Neto SS
1 for 15 with RISP was the stat of the day.
Yankees were 0-for-9.
And the Yankees got NO HITS in extra innings
Wouldn’t have been extras if we could cash in on our numerous chances.
“BALLS,” said the Queen; “If I had two, I’d be the King”
If the queen could have gotten one more hit with a runner in scoring position, we could’ve won the game.
If douche bags were Porches we’d all drive faster.
Wow, that’s a very fast porch you’ve got. I sit on my porch.
Heeee HAWWW! Said the donkey.
But they did get the sac fly from Torres with the guy on 3rd and less than two outs to win the game… Our guy/s could not come through in that situation (specifically Renfroe)..
The OP on which we’re replying:
“1 for 15 with RISP was the stat of the day.”
Sounds like the stat of the day was “3 runs to 2 runs” and your comment speaks to that
For Rendon? Or is that the team?
LOBs
5 Renfroe
4 Ward
4 Ohtani
3 Trout
3 Ursheia
1 Drury
1 Rendon
Heart of our lineup did most of the leaving, sans Rendon. And his LOB was at first.
Ha ha.
The problem with Rendon, besides his injury-risk, lack of power, and declining fielding skills is that his enormous contract gives Arturo a great excuse to not re-sign Ohtani, or address other team needs. Like the Lakers having Westbrook. Once they off-loaded that contract, the team instantly got better. Same would happen with Angels. We slide Gio in at 3B and have the resources to address other needs.
he also did something mean to that homeless guy in oakland.
Can’t…. let….go… RENNNNNDOOOOONE!
Rendon’s OK. You’re the one with a problem.
You do you and I’ll do me.
Just looked at the standings. We could be in trouble and very soon… We are already 3 games behind a hot Texas team who has won 4 straight. And guess what? They open a three game set against the A’s at home on Friday. That will make 7 straight wins… Then Cincy… Could be 8 or 9 in a row.
If we are not careful we could find ourselves 5 or 6 games out by the middle of next week!
This could indeed be over early… On top of that due to Arte’s greed and wanting to make a few more bucks the Halos brass has moved Ohtani up in the schedule to pitch Friday. This means we’ll waste his next start on a very beatable Oakland team on 4/27, just so Arte can sell a few more tickets. The wise move would be to allow Shohei to start on 4/28 or 4/29 against a very good Brewers team, who will be throwing Wade Miley and Corbin Burnes on those respective days… That series is a BREWERS SWEEP waiting to happen… and when it does you can blame Perry and especially ARTE…
Then the nail in the coffin comes a week or so later when we face the Rangers at home on May 5-7th. Again, as a result of Arte’s greed Shohei will not pitch against the strong opponent (this time a Divisional foe we are looking up at in the standings..). If Texas sweeps that the AL West and essentially playoffs hopes could be gone and over by mid May !!
It is not the Astros we have to be concerned with in 2023 but yes, the Rangers.
This is a very realistic possibility the way things are lining up. This is what happens when your owner cares more about making money than winning ball games.
Game over. Why bother.
Yep.
You’re right. Why bother.
BOTHERATION!
https://youtu.be/KouY-4Yr4eA
A new day, A new crisis…..
Stupid Arte should have spent. at least as much as the Padres and Phillies and their combined 17-22 record.
Nobody was asking him to pay Trea Turner or any other expensive FA, rather asking to him to just stay the F out of the way when the team he has needs to be put in the best position to win games ……BTW, his business preference need not even be explicitly stated… This kind of thing could easily be implied to Perry so he gets the message…”We like this… we like that” etc…
Thanks for your Arte assessment but I have no idea what relevance this comment has to mine.
Did you not say this ?
Is your brain froze? That was sarcasm jack. I was pointing out that it’s not all about what you spend and when you spend it.
He has a permanently broken detector
The spectrum is a magical place.
Okay. Based upon the mood of the reader, the weather and a bunch of other things sarcasm may or may not hit the mark. I guess that is why they created the sarcasm font.
But no harm, no foul.
Well, admittedly, I was asking Arte to pay Trea Turner.
So not “nobody”.
Please, outline the instances where Arte has been “in the way” here in 2023. Or are they all “invisible” instances that only The Shadow can see?
Okay, we’ll start with the Angels moving Ohtani’s start up so he gets two starts at home instead of one (4/22 and 4/27) instead of pitching against a really good Brewers team on the road where we really need him and then again vs Texas on 5/5 when we could REALLY use use him.
The reason for that switch? Arte could make a few more bucks.
Source? Other than your The Shadow powers?
Common sense.
The Phillies have been destroyed by injuries, but do you think for a second the Angels will end up with a better record than the Padres.
Thanks for your unsolicited excuse making ML.
I really dont care.
If you don’t care, just ignore it.
I not ignoring your comment. I’m saying I dont care about making excuses about injuries. You know what other team has also been affected by injuries this year?
Tne Angels .
So Bryce Harper, Rhys Hoskins, Ranger Suarez, and Andrew Painter is equal to Stassi, Jared, and Tepera?
I’ve suckled at the teet of CtPG guy wisdom for years now so I know. Injuries are no excuse. Dombrowski should have had a plan for all those injuries and had depth for his depth. Cheap Phillies. Meddlesome…. who ever owns them.
Dang – snippy today. All you need is a Tootie exchange to complete the mood. 😁
I think the only universe some fans would be happy in is one where baseball is a Daily Fantasy League and “owner” is a guy who spends $1000 a month researching the very most best players to pick every day…. and then Doom Donkey would still make a bunch of noise because we’d still lose 50 games, even if we have the best 10 going every single day.
Its like my dad used to tell me, win 60 then lose 60 then lose all the 1 run games and probably just wait until spring training.
Play good until last out
i like to imagine this was filmed by one of us:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlvqSAtPmi4
I wish. That dude does all he can to contain his laughter
😂
Oh no!
should we release Rendon? Would that help?
That will only help Marine Layer…. it will also not actually help Marine Layer, who spends his evenings seething about some guy who looked like Rendon while cleaning he rifle and angrily over applying lipstick.
Wow. I’m shocked. You have found something to be concerned about. amaze my balls off.
Gee, I wonder how many teams have started fast in the past and then faded. Let’s see I seem to remember an Angel team last year that started pretty fast, many here were talking about the play-off’s and they faded just as quickly. I’ll work about being 5 or so games behind when we have about 10 games to play in the season.
Right now is not the time to worry about how many games teams are front or in back. Let’s just worry about getting hour team set, figuring out who can play and who can’t, who is ready to call up or not and what holes do we have that we can’t fill via the minors and what we might need to trade for.
Right now (before today’s Yankee Spanking) the Angels are ranked #18 in MLB in OPS, 9th in ERA and 13 in WHIP…. pretty much adds up to a team that will slip over/under .500 as time goes by and they have good/bad days.
If guys like Walsh and Stassi come back strong, if Anderson figures out how to pitch, if Loup gets it together or is effectively replaced, if Neto turns out to be good, if Drury and Rengifo hits better we’ll move a little further above the meh line. Oh. If there are no huge injuries. A slight uptick for every IF that turns up green.
IF. This word terrifies CtPG guy. He wants, nay angrily demands, that IF gets fixed before games get played. He is also very offended if a team ever allows an IF to play out. He needs his blanky, and some mommy’s milk, and a song that’s just for him before he’ll be fooled again. Otherwise all he can do is talk about what makes him feel vulnerable, like a French student nebulously protesting about “the future”. But with less style. Or a Doyers fan with fewer child support payments to make. Or he’s one of those smooth crotches who likes both teams.
You are correct. Because I’m not an actual smug asshole I assume you understand that losses in April count the same as losses in September. At the same time, I also get the sense that you understand that you can’t really judge how normal some losses will be for a team until they’ve played a fairly large number of games. You also understand that other teams will also lose some games, and if they don’t, we weren’t gonna beat them out.
Congratulations, you are on to something.
What you are suggesting is what we have done EVERY YEAR for probably a decade. And just where has that gotten us?
That is the perennial cry here… Not sure how new you are to this site, but this was even an ongoing joke. It was referenced with the phrase “It’s still early.”
And people would repeat in June, July etc “It’s still early.” The point being, you are what you are. If your team is undisciplined, lacks fundamentals and fails consistently in the clutch in April there is a pretty good chance they’ll be doing that in May and June, with slight movements in the graph.
So, even though you could point out a few exceptions those are the outliers. It is usually pretty easy to see in May who the good teams are, who the average teams are and who the bad ones are..
I mostly lurked on Halos Heaven for about 5 or so years, posted once and a while. I am trying to post here a bit more, I have been an Angel fan for a long time, been through all the ups and downs. I went to my first game when they played in Wrigley Field in 1961 when I was 5 to be honest don’t remember much except I think Wagner hit a homer, but not sure.
I guess that what I am saying is that teams get hot, then mostly they cool of, the season is going to be full of winning streaks and losing streaks, So right now getting all worked up about how many games you are back from 1st does not concern me. The Rangers have a history of fading when the long hot summer days start, I more worried about the Astro’s so I believe as of yesterday we were up a game or two on them so as long are ahead of them I feel comfortable.
I would like to see a fanpost that actually shows this with numbers and dates and stuff.
Times are changing. Teams not wasting time to see if guys can turn it around
MadBum has had a lot of time to turn it around. Not surprised, really.
I know he’s not the best example…thought he had more years left on his contract. He’s had plenty of time, more that it’s April and they aren’t waiting. Thinking Perry will follow with the demonized Tep and Loup if they don’t improve quickly.
Sign him for league minimum and maybe catch lightening in a botlle over here in the AL.
No thanks. I prefer Suarez.
maybe Lincecum will pitch well for us
Minasian talks and Arizona acts. Fletcher was a false start, Loup/Tepera need to go today. Other moves should follow.
Tepera’s headed to the “you’re hurt till you don’t suck” zone. It’s too early to give up on Loup, if he can fix his sinker location he’ll be good. How many innings has he pitched this year?
Just $24 million owed this year. And $12m next.
dbacks will be hurt by Bally, still need to fix stadium like ANA too.
on the bright side, they are playing well and Zac Galen is NL Player of Week
They are going “young rebuild” so it’s worth paying money to free up MadBum’s starts. He is white and gritty though, so we probably need him to teach us, I mean the angels, how to be men and stuff.
i suppose he could come over and teach Ohtani and Trout to ride bulls in rodeos, which would help their off season income.
i know if Shohei were to compete in a rodeo, i’d sure he’d be really good, and i would tune in to see it.
Interesting. I am not sure I can ever remember an athlete being placed on IL/IR for phycological reasons. So far this year we’ve seen Walsh with insomnia and now Trevor May with anxiety.
Glad that this is becoming less and less stigmatized. I think it sends good messaging that athletes are people too, and it’s ok to not be ok and to get help or take time if you need it.
Daniel Bard too.
The seasonal problems continue. These include (1) hitting when the pitching is not good, (2) lack of hitting when the pitching is good and (3) a problem with timely (clutch) hitting when runners are in scoring position.
Why this has become a yearly problem is unclear to me. Part of it is the game of baseball which is inherently frustrating with hard hit balls going straight at defenders in key situations or those defenders making great plays to deny runs. Yesterday was a prime example, Judge made two great plays which denied the Angels the win.
Odds say that this will turn at some point in the Angels favor which is good. That said, to not score Trout from 3rd with 1 out in the 10th is incredibly unclutch. The number of times that the Angels do not get the ghost runner to score since its implementation is very unclutch as well.
Offenses will sputter, great defensive plays will be made – all of that is expected. But not getting a runner in from third with less than two outs with significant frequency is simply a failure to execute. Playoff teams consistently execute.
We seem exceptionally bad at ghost runner RBIs. I wonder if there is a metric somewhere on conversion rate. I would be interested.
It’s no different than any other clutch hitting. We were 1 for 15 in RISP and the ghost runner is just another one of those.
I disagree that it’s not different.
RISP in the 3rd with a 5 run lead is not the same as RISP tied in the 7th is not the same as RISP tied in extras. I think it would be interesting to see ghost runner conversion rate because that is among the most critical RISP scenarios.
Ghost LOBsters. Scary stuff.
Is clutch hitting different from grit, cause if they have grit, do they need to be clutch or do clutch hitters automatically have grit, I’m very confused. Do we prefer clutch to grit, how about big boy pants do those fit into the equation somewhere. I did not know baseball was so hard
I watched the game last night (from DVR) and I admit that I got frustrated with that one. A couple of times I actually yelled at the TV (like “oh come on” and “give me a freakin’ break”). The lack of offense is not OK. With the first 5 names in our lineup, there should be 3 runs a game minimum.
I remember my dad telling me when I was a kid, that you must score a guy from 3rd when there are less than 2 outs… fundamental baseball.
Bad Ju Ju. The answer is magic.
Looks like the A’s are officially moving to Vegas? They’ve signed a binding agreement to buy land near the T-Mobile arena and Allegiant stadium: https://www.reviewjournal.com/sports/athletics/major-league-deal-as-to-purchase-land-near-strip-for-new-ballpark-2764701/
Edit: then there’s this tweet: https://twitter.com/EvanDrellich/status/1648956177592532993?s=20
So it’s a “We’ve bought land. Oakland, it’s your move…” Ugh. Let them leave.
I’ve read where the entire city of Oakland is making plans to relocate to Las Vegas.
I heard the sewer system is better there.
Couldn’t possibly be worse!
Oh yeah, they are gone. That dilapidated stadium will become a rat infested sea gull sanctuary for years before the city politicians get out of their own way and do something about it.
It’s a possum sanctuary
as my favorite 1968 Cleveland Indian says…
’they gone’
All I can say is remember 6-14. 🙂
Or 8 and 16…..How did we ever win 8?
The Hyundai key to the game for the Angels today is “Bathroom Dance” by Hildur Gudnadottir.
You have just been beaten up by a bunch of Gotham thugs who are now chasing you and want to finish the job. Don’t worry. Find a safe place where you can catch your breath. Let the cello swells fill your heart with emptiness and loss. Wait for the deeper underlying cello to rumble through you and fill your heart with hope. Work that emptiness and loss over in your hands like a lump of clay that you can shape into something else, into a plan for how to rise above, how to take control, and then emerge from your solitude with courage and purpose.
Let’s go, Angels, let go.
https://youtu.be/BBY4zUFxUjA
I see your sad bathroom dance and raise you a more upbeat ditty…..without the ChatGPT.
F the the Yankees. Win the series!
https://youtu.be/Tl5zk46i0Bs
What does the Joker have to do with the Angels ? Or the Yankees ? Other than maybe the story took place in a city that is supposed to be NYC…
Just curious.
I have no idea…I thought it was a great movie. Thinking his bot was focusing on the sadness of playing the cello in a dank lonely bathroom.
The Angels have a winning team, Starting pitching -check, Great lineup, – Check, decent Bullpen, – check, decent fielding -check, winning record -check, playoff bound – well not so fast.
Todays Space X launch is a little like the Angels .500 season so far….we’ve cleared the tower.
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1649043715686793218?s=20
My other topic post on Corvair Center Forum earlier this morning.
Space exploration is exciting…it put a roof over my head for thirty years.
This is the biggest rocket ever developed and has twice Saturn V’s thrust.
No need to bring up how you feel about Twitter or Musk…nobody cares.
The primary goal was to clear the tower and that was a complete success.
Exciting times!
Hopefully for the Angels too
We lived in a Mobile Home Park on the south end of Santa Maria near VB Space Port in 1962/63.
Anybody else remember those Titan II slightly off couse detonations…I can still feel the heat today.
Only memory I have is a picture of me and my family during the moon landing. Probably with a full diaper. 😄
Also, SpaceX doesn’t view RUD as failure, but as a learning opportunity
I don’t think I foresee a Rapid Unplanned Disassembly in our future, though. SpaceX needs to figure out how to get the entire rocket to light up. Might help.
Angels go the route of R.U.S. – Rapid Unplanned SUCKAGE.
Is .500 a winning record?
In general grandpas have more lenient grading curves
Maybe yours! Mine made me clear an entire 30 foot hedge of blackberry bushes once. Good God. Might still have the scars.
Here at CtPG we know how to vent, just read the after the game comments. My excitement for the new season is waning a bit. Very soon I hope we go on a roll of wins that my interest will be returned and I once again get excited.
Last nights loss was tough for several reasons. Let me list the ways;
You don’t have to agree with everything listed but believe me I see it all happening. The Stars of the team lead by example and that becomes catchy and good things happen, if they are not coming through then you simply and not a tight team focused on the same objective and are out there just for themselves.
I’m done now, what do you say, I’d like to hear it and honestly I do care about our team, losing stinks when you havr the horses to win the race.
Mike Trout is absolutely not swinging for the fences every pitch. His launch angle is below career average and more than 6 degrees lower than last year and he’s hitting more doubles than HRs for the first time since 2016.
In other words, he’s actually less focused on hitting HRs than he has been for years.
He seems to be less focused on hit the ball at all. Are we starting to see the steeper level of decline.
What? He’s hitting .302/.436/.540 with a wRC+ of 178, which places him in the top 10 hitters in baseball right now, above Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani. He’s also tied for 13th in position player WAR with about 10 other guys and is on pace for a 7 – 8 WAR season if he stays healthy enough to play in at least 140 games.
I have always been in fear of the Andrew McCutcheon Syndrome hitting Trout — rattle off year after year after year of AS/MVP/SS caliber seasons and then fall off a cliff and suddenly, out of the blue, post a 104 OPS+ season, never to return to being an elite player.
It’s like when I go to the dentist and get one of my broken molars crowned — I wince at the vibration the spinning drill creates in my head, not because it hurts, but because I’m afraid it’s going to hurt.
I’m not as concerned. The game was blacked out here, so I only saw the pitch charts online, but my one niggling worry is Trout this season has been getting fooled on sliders low and away; I don’t remember that being an issue previously.
Plus the continuing problem with the high heat. It feels as if holes in his swing are developing. He is somewhat streaky at this point, so he won’t be this meh all year, I hope.
Its funny that a .302 avg and .971 OPS feels meh. Speaks to how unfathomably elite he has been throughout his career.
I hear you, but he’s one guy and only can do so much.
he’s currently at 171 OPS+, if that helps
DFA that fat little beast
I’m concerned.
Good morning my friends, it is going to be beautiful today for most of SoCal today. I am not at all despondent that the snow has almost all melted away as Spring is here.
The gophers have done so much damage to my property along with California Ground Squirrels that I think that even TNT won’t help.
Everyone have yourself a great day today and remember early game set for today, 1pm PCT. 😎
https://youtu.be/_cUKCLbfK5w
have you tried to DFA the fat little beasts?