The big news out of Angelsville is the multi year extension for general manager Perry Minasian.
It isn’t often the GM of a last place team receives a multi year extension. The Angels are at the beginning of a rebuild, so perhaps ownership is looking at the young core and giving Perry leeway to see the rebuild through.
How is the organizational talent? I spoke with farm guru Taylor Blake Ward about that this week.
Between the trade deadline and draft, Perry pretty much remade the top 5-10 names on the prospect lists. Plus he’s created the young MLB level core that is showing growth and promise. Now we see if he can finish the job and build a full roster.
Speaking of the core showing development, many of the kids are doing just that.
Nolan Schanuel got off to a really tough start to the season. On June 11th he had a miserable slash line of .207/.275/.327. In the two plus months since then he’s producing at a .294/.414/.422 clip. The walks are way up, the contact his harder, and he’s striking out at a very manageable 16% clip.
Jo Adell also got off to a bad start. We’ve seen him limit his leg kick and take off quite a bit. Jo bottomed out on June 29th with a .180/.245/.383 line. In the nearly two months since then, he’s posted a respectable .250/.331/.421 line.
And then there’s Zach Neto catching absolute fire and chasing team records.
Logan O’Hoppe is another Perry addition and is an obvious building block. Jose Soriano has proven he can be an effective piece of the rotation, and Ben Joyce did this the other night:
In short, I like Perry as a trade seller and his early draft picks are showing promise. Given the restraints of the job (cough, Arte, cough) I’m fine with letting Perry acquire more talent over the next couple of years. But at some point his strategy of drafting a bullpen is going to need to pan out.
I could use the highlight of Joyce above as the Highlight of the Week, but I love a web gem almost as much as I love a suicide squeeze. On Tuesday, Jack Lopez was in the midst of both. Which highlight do you prefer?
Or flashing the leather?
So now we watch the kids grow, look for some value plays, possibly make some trades this off season, and build for a brighter future. We hope.
From around baseball:
Joey Votto cracked the code of hitting. The future Hall of Famer retired this week after failing to make the roster of his hometown Blue Jays.
Am I allowed to post that Ohtani is closing in on a 40/40 season and has enough time to possibly get to 50/50? Here’s a piece on the 5 players who have previously hit the 40/40 mark.
White Sox fans have a legitimate gripe about their owner. Jerry Reinsdorf is clearly failing the White Sox. That’s a better read than my buildup might indicate and is your long form reading for the weekend.
Happy trails Mariners manager Scott Servais, who got canned by Jerry Dipoto. Enter Mariners legend Edgar Martinez to turn the offense around.
The Little League World Series is always fun and magical. Team Mexico was down by 3 and down to their last out when this happened:
Enjoy this last summer weekend with perfect weather and link what I missed. We have no plans this weekend and it feels great. Sometimes down time is the best time.
