Can Canning can the Astros? Or will he be canned? The Canning man can, but will he?
That is the question of the day, and the answered turned out to be a solid no he can’t. Canning lasted just 3 and 2/3, giving up 3 runs and leaving the game with the bases loaded. Sure, a lot of the issues was the defense unable to make plays, but he was wild and lost out there. That Jimmy Herget allowed 2 of those to score also did not help his ERA.
As always, the offense would have to save the day, can they do it? Again, no they can’t. Angels lose again, going 2-4 vs the Texas teams the last 6 days. Can we please kick them out of the AL West soon? They are 2 time zones away!
Highlighted Recap
Canning threw a can of corn right over the plate and it got crushed to right to give the Astros the lead.
Angels came back thanks to Renfroe hitting one to LF.
Unfortunately, bad defense set up a sac fly for Houston to tie the game.
And a not good enough throw gave the Astros the lead.
Yeah, can Canning do it? No he can’t, as he was pulled shortly after with the bases loaded. Jimmy came in and cracked corn cuz he did not care, as a bloop got another 2 runs in to make it 5-2 Houston.
Besides that hiccup, the Angels bullpen kept the Astros from making it worse. Sadly, the Angels did not get even a hit to make it closer and it looked to be for naught.
That is, until the 9th inning when Ohtani blasted one into the seats!
2 more singles meant the tying run was now on 2nd. After a Drury strikeout, Thaiss was up. He popped up. Now down to their last out, it was all up to Gio Urshela. He grounded out to end the game.
Upcoming
Not Texas is next, in fact, the Angels do not face Texas teams until June! But, at 20-18, the Angels seriously need to do well on this trip to Cleveland and Baltimore. No game tomorrow, though, so they will stew in this for a day as will we all.
Arte should’ve sold. He’s going to be known as the guy that wasted Trouts prime and let Ohtani walk, hopefully not to the Dodgers. This team is just not coached well and bad decision making by firecracker Phil. It’s been 9 long years of painful Angel ball. Right when you think they’re at the cusp of turning things around, you get butter cupped. Is there really a way to fix this team with this ownership? Each year, it’s the same optimism because on paper, it should work. It just seems like Groundhog Day for the last 9 years.
The real question is does the whole “sad boy” thing ever actually get anyone the girls?
Yes, yes it does
Do you have to be sad all the time or can you lure them in by moping and swatting your bangs out of your eyes and listening to shitty music and then BAM! you become an actual man who is awesome?
Nice job of changing the subject, lol.
Donkey need more lick lick?
Willlllburrr, please scratch my baseballs
Baseball is a game of little things adding up. The Angels fail to execute when they need to. Consider last night. Despite the failures that got them to a three 9th inning deficit, including Rendon’s fielding and Nevin’s horrible decision to bring in Jimmy Herget in the 4th, Ohtani brought them to within one run, and the next two hitters got on. Nevin then failed to replace Rendon with Phillips at 2B and did not ask Drury to bunt them over so the game could be tied with a productive out. Instead, all three hitters failed, and another winnable game was lost. Groundhog Day 2023 version. There still needs to be a top to bottom fix.
The one questionable decision I would put squarely on Nevin on this game is why put Herget in in such a high stakes situation when Devenski would have been the much better option?
You know Canning is losing it. You know you’re probably going to take him out with runners on base. So why not put in the guy who has been excellent in stranding runners so far? Why put in the guy who had just come up from the minors where you stashed him there earlier because he sucked? Herget should have been used in low stress/mop-up duty until he proves himself capable.
Other than Herget, bullpen was great this game. Maybe Tepera is really getting his mojo back. Good bounce back games from both Devenski and Tucky.
Totally agree. Good analysis.
Devenski? This guy is due for a meltdown, his past 5 years says so. Imagine, allowing 15.8 hits per 9 innings last year. Every time out there thus far, Angels have gotten lucky. He should not even be rostered. I give him until the end of May.
I would think so. Thing is, friggin bullpen. Maybe he will be good. But even if he only lasts through May and then his head pops off that’s cool. AA arms will be another month into the season.
What I’ve witnessed here on this site, 2-3 unscored upon outings and a reliever becomes a hero. Hard to overlook his warts. Just ugly years. This is the issue I have with Minasian, signing guys like this.
Agree, get some hard throwing arms from the minors, keep Silseth in the pen as a 1-inning guy and the pen takes on a pretty decent look. Tucky D, Herget and Devenski are on the fringe.
If they do their job, why wouldn’t they be the hero? Bullpen is a crapshoot. One year you sign highly regarded guys like Tepera and Loup coming off great years, then their wheels fall off, and everyone’s ready to throw pitchforks at them. Herget himself had a good year last year and then promptly got demoted to the minors the first month of the new season. No one wanted Estevez to be the closer 3 months ago, now everyone is riding high on him.
Lightning can also be caught the other way.
My point was, ride the hot hand until it (eventually) falls off. Regardless of his past 5 years were, if he’s good at some situations (stranding runners on base), then use that to your advantage until he shows he can no longer do it. I never said Devenski is the next great bullpen savior, but in that specific situation that Nevin saw the team in when Canning was losing it, why not use the guy who has done the best job so far?
If Devenski eventually sucks, like you 100% predict, it won’t be that hard of a DFA. No one will be crying tears here.
I’m not picking at your post but these bullpen decisions are made every day in today’s game. Bullpen should not be a crapshoot. Need talented arms but most times, is just comes down to talent. Phil only has few good arms to deal with Moore, Estevez and Wantz has been good thus far but far from feeling comfortable.
Herget got demoted after 7.2 innings pitched this year. Not exactly a long stretch of games to get his stuff right but sent down nonetheless. First game back, right? To me, even with the good year in ’22, Hergret is still and unknown commodity, but I’d give him the ball before I would Devenski based on pure stuff. I had no issue with it.
“Bullpen should not be a crapshoot.” Yeah, not sure which sport you’ve been watching.
Even still, as it stands, our bullpen is 3rd in the MLB in WHIP, 6 in ERA (for what that’s worth) and avg against….. and Holy Ballz! Look at that! We’re second in the MLB in saves and hot buttered magic we still have seven blown save opportunities, just like a few days ago when that was Huge Wank #1 and now I know of at least 10 teams with seven or more.
Almost like that whole moist fit was devoid of meaning here in May.
Our pen actually isn’t much of a crap shoot.
Wantz looks good because all he allows to score on him are baserunners from previous pitchers. He would have been the worst guy to put on yesterday after Canning’s meltdown. Yordan would have probably hit that grand slam.
HOW DARE YOU SAY THE WORD FRINGE NEAR MAH TUCKY DEEEE!
Ha ha. That is really top flight analysis, lol.
“This guy is due for a meltdown (.)” That’s classic stuff.
So I guess we should put crappy pitchers in because they are “due” for a good outing? …And the guys who have actually pitched well, we don’t need them because they’ve just been lucky. Gotcha
I hope in your work you don’t make any decisions of consequence for the people around you, lol.
Not sure why the 4th inning is so sad for us…this will be higher tomorrow. Is 30th out 30 good?
https://www.teamrankings.com/mlb/stat/opponent-4th-inning-runs-per-game
The 4th inning…. our enemy.
I fear/hate Yordon Alvarez.
This was not the score that I wanted. Who do I yell at? Obviously someone’s not qualified because there was a baseball game and we lost.
We are obviously well under .500 by now, right?
What I learned this series is we are 4 total runs scored or prevented from sweeping Houston. Yes Donkey. I know it doesn’t really work like that.
But it shows that we are STILL where we’ve been. A little short of good. That number, 4 runs, is actually a fair amount. They’ve got to do a few things slightly better if they are gonna regularly take a series from play off bound teams. Can they do that? sure. Will they? Don’t know. What’s the date? May 10. We’ll find out later. All I know is caught the yellow end of Houston’s rotation banana and they beat us, but not by much, so let’s keep getting better shall we?
Tepera. I saw him with my eyes. I feel OK. Is everyone else OK? I saw some other bullpen guys be guh. I still feel OK. Trout and Rendon are making contact, just need some roids. Renfroe can stay. 5th starters are gonna fifth starter…. Filth Silkseth gets a shot next week. Arte still owns the team. Fart fart toot toot who cares? Turd the page.
Godspeed to anyone who thinks this team will actually be competing for a playoff spot.
I do, they will be competing
Godspeed You Black Emperor
The car’s on fire and there’s no driver at the wheel
And the sewers are all muddied with a thousand lonely suicides
And a dark wind blows
We’re trapped in the belly of this horrible machine
And the machine is bleeding to death
The sun has fallen down
And the billboards are all leering
And the flags are all dead at the top of their poles
Sometimes My Balls Feel Like Tits….. that song’s rad. That song is also the official CtPG theme song…. I’m bored and hungry, almonds were a lame lunch.
It was weird when Godspeed got singing….
Nothing seems to kill me no matter how hard I try
Nothing is closing my eyes
Nothing can beat me down for your pain or delight
And nothing seems to break me
No matter how hard I fall
Nothing can break me at all
Not one for giving up though not invincible I know
Too damn many brain farts.
At this pace we’ll finish 20-142
But, we are getting real close to earning our Black Belt in sucking against anyone that’s good.
They lost this series, but I feel like they’re not that far off from the Astros. I know a loss is a loss, but it’s not as deflating as the Rangers series where they were just wiped clean. Without those two bad innings the Angels win this series. Nevin has to clean up the defense, and his pitchers need to figure out the hits after the 0-2 count.
No team is running away with the AL West yet, so if they can keep it close, they have a fighting chance.
They’re missing Altuve and Brantley and basically whipped the best our rotation can offer including Ohtani is looking vulnerable pitching in less rest.
Well, we’re also missing Walsh. I know we don’t know how he’s going to come out of injury, but that’s the same with Altuve and Brantley. You just cannot assume they will come out of their injuries red-hot, especially considering the two are no longer spring chickens.
Also, IMO, our rotation didn’t get “whipped”. Ohtani was undone by ONE bad, stupid pitch, and Canning was mighty unlucky with all those errors, albeit one of them is his own. It’s not like they hit around our pitchers like a pinata, like the Rangers did. Even with the bad inning today, they got it close enough and almost tied/won it against their closer.
And I know it’s easy to forget because it’s before the sting of these two losses, but we hit well against their ace rookie and chased him out of the game, despite facing him for the first time. (Cy Rookies have always been the bane of the Angels)
Good teams find a way to win and bad ones find a way to lose. We’ve been finding ways to lose… Not a good sign.
A cow is a cow…. till it’s a delicious steak and some shoes.
Never forget that they make FANTASTIC wallets too
Screw the the F-bomb after a Texas 2 Win home stand
https://youtu.be/m3FxU6D8NcA
I agree. And this Houston series might be more frustrating than the Rangers series because it was one bad pitch and one bad pickoff throw that lost this series for the Angels, IMO.
My point was that this team is not horribly unmatched with the Astros this year, unlike the years past. The team has improved and it has gotten close to them.
Whether you lose by 8 runs or by 1 run a loss is still a loss..
A win is also a win, and even when winning there’s lots to whine about.
Ummmm, we didn’t win.
Still plenty of whine either way, huh jack?
A passive, complacent fan base is a pathetic fan base
You’ve got the donkey thing backwards.
So….. Still plenty of whine either way, huh jack?
Lost a fight
?1290486102
Lost a fight
Different
This is the most idiotic comparison I have ever seen. I was talking about two potential results for the same event, A BASEBALL GAME…
And genius gitch brings out a picture of a bruised and beaten boxer and an old skull ? Yeah, boxing matches pretty regularly end with someone dying…. Right.
You take two completely different reference points like a boxing match and death in general and compare them to an event with a binary outcome.
Brilliant..
Good take. The difference is not that great and the same situation with Texas and Seattle. If Halo’s can tidy up the pitching, Angels are right there. Would love to see some of the young arms take a huge leap.
Angels need to win these close ones and that will come with a winning attitude.
Our core hitters need to hit a little more too…. and seriously, just like 2 fewer errors per week…. we wouldn’t be GOOD but we’d be goo.
Gawd I hate the o-2 count hits… that’s gotta be the #1 pisser.
The Angels already won a game in this series, so they were playing with house money anyway
How do you figure ? The goal was to WIN the series dude, not lose it.
The Astros are a million times better than the Angels, so getting a win is a bonus
No. Wrong. You lose !
Willy Wonka: “YOU LOSE! GOOD DAY SIR!” – YouTube
A “million times” better?
The two franchises are so far apart it may as well be a million times
I think it might even be a gazillion.
The Ohtani trade watch should be hot and heavy in the next 45 days. It’s a shame. The Angels improve their lineup. Then the starting pitching goes into the tank.
How other GMs will lowball us…
Ohtani is a top hitter and a top pitcher but, for the money we’ll pay him we could get one of each and yes, having him would save a spot on the roster so we could add a 26th player but who would that be? Your 26th guy is Brett Phillips
They are actually only going to be negotiating over 2 months of Ohtani. None of those GMs are gonna trade much of anything for “maybe he’ll sign here”.
It actually wouldn’t shock me to see a team like the Twins overpay us a little specifically to get him for a post season run knowing he’ll leave, but a WS run would be worth it to them.
If we end up trading Ohtani we should trade trout too. His timeline wouldn’t match up with whatever prospects we’d get back and with Neto and ohoppe. He’s about to be 32 playing like he’s 38, trade him while we still can get a decent return. Also there’s no way any of the prospects we’d get back for Ohtani turn into a Gerrit cole/Shane mcLanaHan on the mound and a Mookie betts/Juan Soto at the plate. If they somehow did turn into that, it just equals Ohtani now but with trout 3 years older and we already can’t win now. So if trade Ohtani then have to trade trout and start anew, give up on this era of angels baseball.
Pretty sure Trout has a No Trade clause in his contract. I am not sure he would even agree to being traded. Though there is some logic in what you’re saying…
Without Ohtani on the squad Trout becomes less meaningful …
I think trout would be upset if we didn’t trade him in that scenario. He wouldn’t want to start a rebuild going into his age 32 season and never having won before. He’d want to go back east to the Phillies or Yankees or Mets. Maybe the Braves
Dude if he wanted to go to the Phillies or Yankees he would have done it a few years ago when it was exceedingly easy to do so as a FA … He likes it in So. Cal and apparently his wife does too…
I don’t think he’s going anywhere. I feel bad for him, but it is what it is.
Things change. He’s a loyal guy and $426 mil is a lot to turn down. In March 2019 when he signed that extension he was 27 and we just signed Ohtani a year before. He probably trusted the plan. Didn’t realize 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 would all also be losing seasons and, if we trade Ohtani, means 2023 was losing season .500 at best. Hes gonna be 32 in august. I don’t think he would want to be part of a rebuild
I don’t feel bad for him at all. He signed a huge extension knowing the team was garbage
Bingo. I don’t recall Arte holding a gun to his head saying “either your signature or your brains will be on that contract”. MNT knew EXACTLY what he was getting when he signed that contract….which is one of the reasons why Ohtani won’t be making that mistake.
I never suggested he wasn’t responsible for his decision to stay. Presumably his expectation was that the organization was committed to winning. Pretty good bet that Arte and the red pollo crew conveyed that. And I mean, it wasn’t like he’d never been on a winning team in Anaheim. In his rookie season that team was pretty damned good, but Scioscia shot them in the foot with his managerial stupidity..
So, in summary, Trout is indeed responsible for his decision, but it was not like he decided on planting himself in Pittsburgh for 10 years to play with the Pirates.
why do we have to rebuild if Ohtani is the only player that left? I mean, yeah, we gotta sign someone else, but we don’t suddenly become the 2020 Tigers…. nor are we getting a “rebuild” pile of prospects for Ohtani at this point.
Ohtani would be 2 players that left, a top 5 hitter and pitcher, our best hitter and pitcher. Imagine this team without him, ugh. Whoever we sign ain’t nearing his production on mound or at plate. I mean we don’t have to rebuild we can just continue to suck even worse when he goes. We should be so lucky as to be a team like the 2021 Diamondbacks and orioles both 52-110 and by 2023 already better than us. If we trade trout and Ohtani that can happen. If we just trade Ohtani then whoever we get back won’t matchup with trouts timeline. Keep both and try to win now or trade both
Soooo… why do we have to rebuild if the only guy we lost is Ohtani? I mean sure, we’d have to continue building. But why a rebuild?
I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’d be glad to watch a down to the studs rebuild, watch the farm grow, watch a bunch of pussies type about their PTSD on a baseball board, eventually have an exciting team, probably a new owner too. Cool. I can enjoy that.
But we don’t have to do that to eventually win.
Eh I just think it makes more sense. All the prospects we’d get would be young and come up together along with Neto ohoppe maybe Adell, all early 20s grow together like 2014 Astros, 70s dodgers Garvey the penguin that infield, this years orioles. My number 1 option is we make playoffs this year with trout and Ohtani so hopefully that happens instead.
I’d be down for it…. but we’re not getting six or seven big time prospects for Ohtani, or even Ohtani and Trout. So development windows? Who cares?
Who are you getting rid of with this ‘rebuild’? Do you only mean replacing Rendon? Trout? We aren’t full of veterans blocking at positions with overpriced salaries really – it is either young upcoming players (O’Hoppe, Neto) or placeholders until others arrive (Renfroe, Urshela, Lamb).
And their defense.
Buttercup. When you take a Win probability from 2% to 50% in the ninth inning and then lose, its buttercup.
why do you build me up? just to let me down.
trAdition?
For a second there, I thought they were going to invalidate all the complaining I did in the GameThread.
But no, and now we can continue to complain.
Time to cheer everyone up:
Who wants a bag of Salty Nuts???
How I feel about this team:
Me.
Got home just in time for the 9th. I am unwell.
Time to go back to the office and put in a couple more hours in zoom calls
I think i’d rather watch the 9th again
Why? Because Thaiss.
Because Ass —- stros
Well we’ve won every series against bad teams and lost every series against good teams. Sounds like we got an 81-81 season on our hands.
Pollyanna much? 🏳🏳🏳🏳
I’m OK with Pollyanna
Does Polly catch or pitch? We need both.
Buttercup