Good morning Angels fans. Hope you got something for Christmas. Have some links.
Angels News
Former Angel Simba has retired. Kinda shocked how fast he declined. He used to lead all 2012 debuts in BWAR you know. Now he is 4th and will continue to slip. The SS is currently 24th in Angels history in BWAR and will likely stay that way for a long time as no current Angel is even at 5 BWAR (besides Mike Trout who leads the franchise and has for years).
Around Baseball
Wander Franco is even more in deep legal manure now as even more evidence against him has shown up. This is just ugly and it is very likely he will never play again with a chance he never leaves jail.
Former Angel and Trasho Martin Maldonado is now a White Sox. Surprised he didn’t choose Dodgers but I guess even they have standards when it comes to who Ohtani wants.
Kevin Kiermaier is staying in Canada on a 1 year deal. He must really love those toonies.
You know who hasn’t made a FA signing yet? MFY, Twins, Marlins, Cubs, Rockies. That’s weird.
With the MLB HOF voting being revealed soon, some trends in the tracking have emerged. Beltre is a lock, with the public writers loving Helton and Mauer. Torii Hunter may fall off the ballot as he, 2005 Angels CY Young winner Bartolo Colon, and K-Rod are not getting much love.
Anything I missed? Post below for upvotes!
You can really see how irrelevant the Angels are when a story about Ward was titled, “Los Angeles Angel’s 3rd baseman garnering trade interest.”
OMG……
Yamamoto press conference in 45 minutes. I wonder if Ippei will be his interpreter.
Also is Ippei now a villain, too?
Who is Ippei?
Translator
Sarchasm font.
Isn’t that like a rapier?
😂
I can go highbrow humor once or twice a year…..
Ippei is dead to me too!!
To answer my musing, Yamamoto has his own interpreter
So maybe Arte gets an interpreter so all of Angel Nation can understand what the hell he’s doing.
Halos exist. Thanks for reading.
This just in:
“Arte Moreno has NOT sold the Los Angeles Angels”
Film at eleven.
Darn! So close!
From a purely tax perspective, it’s in his heirs best interest to retain the current ownership structure until he transitions into the great beyond.
Wow, Simba is still so young. But good on him for being able to move on baseball. I think he declined fast during the Covid-shortened season. Didn’t he sit out the last month or so, and was just never heard from by the team again? Depression sucks. I hope he got the help he needed or continues to do so if that’s still the case.
I hope Neto follows Simba’s footsteps but I also hope he takes care of himself. He should realize soon enough that no matter how good he is, he is of no help when he’s injured (Trout).
Yeah, Simba kinda fell off the table quickly.
I thought he retired a few years ago and he was on the well side of done during his last year in Anaheim.
Gene and Jackie are smiling down on chavez latrine.
Saying to them…YOU CANT BUY A CHAMPIONSHIP.
Look I hate the Dodgers as much as anyone but in all honesty their Organization is terrific. They have an incredible farm system that develops excellent players and they supplement with top free agents. They have been awesome over the last decade while the Angels are becoming irrelevant. It sucks to admit that.
SCOREBOARD!!! No championships since 1989.
We are still the current LA World Series champions.
If you didn’t know 2020 doesn’t count nor does 1981.
Bad idea to try and defend blue on the particular site!!
Not defending them. Just being realistic. They are a WAY better Org than the Angels. And I hate to say that more than you can imagine.
They’re definitely really good at being really good
Yep. Agreed. They are going for greatness but we will all wait-and-see (and root against them).
Yes, may the Evil Blue Empire not strike back.
But are we getting better at getting better?
I heard Wash = 15 WAR….
LOL @ 15
define ‘better’
They scout better. They develop players better, they have a better international scouting department, they have better minor league facilities and systems. They have a better Organization with actual baseball people throughout. They analyze better. They build better and deeper teams. They have better ownership. Etc. etc.
Yeah……but we have the nicer stadium.
Two more things.
What really bugged me when he who shall not be named went over to them is that, while made the Angels a lot of money, Dodgers expect to do much better. (The projected numbers mentioned, I forget where, weren’t even close). Given that they have a lot of experience in international marketing, I believe that. So they can market themselves better. Since Arte is supposed to be a marketing guy, that struck me as particularly falling.
The thing that makes the Dodgers especially dangerous is that they are basically TB with money. They run a good org, with good scouts and farm system, but also they can pretty much keep or add who they like. And, as noted above, they can sell the product they build for good money internationally very effectively, which brings us back to the first point.
It’s kinda shocking how quickly and thoroughly they rebounded from the McCourt years while we did nothing useful organizationally besides changing the team name. If the team were run well, we could really have made serious inroads just in terms of marketing, and we had the good luck with having two of the best players in history of baseball in their primes but the organization floundered without taking baseball seriously, forgetting that they are ultimately in the business of selling baseball.
No lies detected.
The Angels also haven’t won shit since 2002 which is now about to turn 22 years old. Meanwhile, the Dodgers have been consistently one of the best teams in the league for the past decade while the Angels haven’t won a playoff game in 14 years about to be 15 years. If someone had told me the Angels would only win a Mickey Mouse ring that no one respects but is consistently one of the best teams in the league for the past decade, I would drool all over it. Take your anger on the man responsible of not even matching Ohtani’s offer and sinking this franchise to being the laughing stock of SoCal sports.
Or should the team spend like the Padres and not accomplish much more?
The team should take a page out of the book from their cross town “rivals” the Dodgers and invest heavily into player development, minors, front office staff, etc instead of cutting corners and offering minimum salary like Arte had done during his tenure. Then supplement their strong farm system with trades/free agent acquisitions like the Dodgers and Braves have done. Not trade away one of your only top 100 prospects for a 1 month rental with hopes that Ohtani stays here.
And the record books all count ’81 & ’20, they should check in here more to learn truth and justice and the American way, 162 or take a hike. ⚾ 🏆
Other than their very upper management (Kasten & Friedman) have choked way more playoff chances than every other franchise combined over the last 50 years . Their oversized ego and hubris have definitely been their downfall
I don’t disagree. But that very upper management is pretty important.
I would like to be in the post season every year like they are with an opportunity to succeed. Things that generate regular season success and post season success don’t always line up though. Years ago, Bill James wrote an article about the two factors that correlated most to a team’s postseason success, and the results were their slugging percentage and their bullpen. I think the Dodgers weakest link over the last 10 years has been their bullpen.
And if you look at the Angels championship team they slugged well and had a lockdown bullpen. It’s correlation, so it’s not the same every year. Obviously, if you have starting pitching that’s so good it mitigates the need for a really good bullpen then you can win that way like the Diamond Backs with Johnson and Schilling or when teams have a guy who could win 3 games in a 7 game series almost by himself. From my 4K games of observation, it seems that a team’s bullpen is more important than starting pitching in the post season. It doesn’t mean starting pitching isn’t important, just that the bullpen is more important. That’s just my opinion though and teams win all sorts of ways.
Recognizing what the Dodgers have attained isn’t difficult. But apparently what is difficult is for the CtPG community to stop bringing it up at least once every few days.
You mean every few hours?
depends how often one checks the site
Fair that. It just becomes too frustrating to watch the contrast in organizational trajectory over the past decade or so. We are in the same market, so we can’t unsee things easily.
rangers literally just bought a championship.
Yes c_b!
Can it rent one?
Nah, you go out and get “two 8-7 pitchers”
Arte is approaching 80. Anyone who has experience with successful men as they approach that age knows that they become more stubborn and reticent. Control becomes the key issue in their life – they will exert it at every opportunity to stay relevant. Control becomes at least as important than success.
Owning the Angels keeps Arte relevant. I am certain he held onto the team, at least partly, for that reason. Ohtani also kept Arte relevant and it is likely he did not trade him, at least partially, for that reason.
Unfortunately Arte’s clinging to relevance is hurting the value of his franchise and its success on the field. Not selling the Angels last offseason has likely cost him at least $500 million and maybe more. Not trading Ohtani has put the team in the position of only receiving a compensation pick between the 2nd and 3rd rounds of the draft.
If Arte continues to own the team, I suspect we will all have to continue to live with the decisions and eccentricities of an aging billionaire who is clinging onto relevance via exercising control. That does not bode well for the on-field success of our beloved franchise.
Don’t blow your horn at old people ‘71…..
https://x.com/CatchUpFeed/status/1705347075523719511?s=20
I’m not blowing my horn. I love old people but have watched the control thing happen in older men over and over.
I’m not YELLING!!!!!!!
That old man is me in 13 years.
OLD GUYS RULE…you go Pops.
Reliable as ever. No matter the topic, you’re singing the same tune.
You coming out with any new stuff soon or do we need to wait till the teams in new hand and Ohtani is no longer playing.
I’ll come out with new stuff when Arte sells. Until then it’s the same thing different day. At least I’m consistent.
In the mean time we get the same annoying tune 24/7/365?
So much for my New Year’s resolutions
Yep! You can thank Arte for that!
So says Alex Forrest
Don’t like it-don’t read it. Not much to talk about right now anyway.
He’s going to be stubborn like Jerry Reinsdorf, wouldn’t be surprised if those two did some blood pact and promised to hold on to owning a dysfunctional team until death.
Agreed. I think it’s kind of like speaking truth to power. Until Arte sells (which may be a long time from now as you say) I feel the need to speak the truth about his many failures that have really hurt this franchise.
Hopefully more fans can unplug themselves but we will see
Simba’s decline was very surprising to me as I was a big supporter of his. But the reports surface of severe depression which was very sad indeed. Angels MVP in ’17. His glove work was just simply amazing. Enjoy retirement Simba.
Not just glove work. He had an uncanny knowledge of where everyone on the field was – a bit like Magic Johnson.
Would you give up your #17 on your Dodgers uni so your wife could drive a Porche?
Happy wife, happy life.
I hope Porche has a recall….
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Is the new 911 Targa ugly, or is it just me?
I wouldn’t kick it off my driveway for leaking oil. 😀
That was a cool story regardless of who Ohtani plays for. Her video casting out all the #17 stuff is really funny. Comping a teammate for their number is a time honored tradition but Ohtani took it to another level.
BTW: I refuse the former #17 reference as I think it’s silly and myoptic to cast Shohei as a villain.
Shohei Ohtani is dead to me…blue dagger in the heart!!
….and a subscription to Popular Science….
…:or give up your wife for a Porsche ????
Unfortunately it’s the circle of life. Time for young Neto to step up.
Halo Power Baby!!!