Our boys host the local Diamondbacks while some of them have to get on a bus and drive clear across the Phoenix metro area to take on the Royals.
Follow both games here.
Our boys host the local Diamondbacks while some of them have to get on a bus and drive clear across the Phoenix metro area to take on the Royals.
Follow both games here.
Mr Doyle the Volunteer had a better night than Mr Bremmer the Gaucho.
Doyle delivered his fourth straight elite start for the Vols. He struck out 13 in 5⅔ innings and walked two. He retired 17 straight batters after a leadoff walk.
Bremmer gave up 3 runs on 5 hits to Northridge in 5 innings.
College guys aren’t performing well enough right now for Holliday to drop to #2
Making the majors before throwing a pitch in the minors would be a new one, even for us.
“Ryan Johnson, a.k.a. George Clinton, has made the Angels tertiary spring cuts for big league roster — most other top prospects were reassigned to minor league camp this morning”
https://x.com/TaylorBlakeWard/status/1898431923665666439?t=kf-WkbYCo6SZGlyNF9zbxQ&s=19
Lip service or is this truly a redemption story in the making?
https://www.ocregister.com/2025/03/07/angels-tim-anderson-willing-to-do-what-it-takes-in-new-start/
Looks like the OD lineup minus Trout and Ward.
TA x 2 today.
👑 Luis’ return!
Adell in center.
A bevy of fun pitchers on the card — Zeferjahn, Ryan Johnson, Klassen, McDaniels, TGA.
It’s a great day to have a great day
Rengifo scratched with hammy tightness. CMo replacing him
Hereafter hermano Giffy hampered by his hammies.
hrumph
RF
NODA-RADA
This game is dispiriting. This past week of games has been dispiriting.
Good thing these games are meaningless. Now if this continues in April/May/June sigh
The games are indeed meaningless. It’s the lack of depth on the roster, and recurrence of bad tendencies among some of the more critical prospects, that is dispiriting.
The only positive I see from the spring games thus far is the emergence of what could be a strong bullpen. The offense looks anemic, and as ever, highly dependent on the health of aging players. The rotation looks fringe-average. Top prospects like Dana and Moore look like they need another year or so of development (in a system largely devoid of good developmental parks beyond Rocket City).
If there were more than bullpen pieces marching toward the MLB, I’d be more optimistic.
Truth
Giffy’s hammies. Neto’s not ready also.
Only positive is Mike and Soler look good. Logan does too.
And Ward has been hitting.
Trade him now.
There’s the beginning of a 1-4 up top of the lineup, but when I look at the five names who could reasonably rotate in those four spots (Ward, Neto, Rengifo, Trout, Soler), three are recently banged up, and the other two are thirty-somethings who could easily succumb to injury any day.
Meanwhile, CF is a bakeoff between two failed prospects (Adell/Moniak), one of whom can’t play CF to save his life, and who gave up a position he was good at (RF) so Trout could learn it on the fly. And at the corners, Moncada is seeking a late-life reinvention, and Schanuel largely looks like the same singles hitter he was last season, with one XBH (2b) in his first nine games.
It’s a tough sell.
I agree but you said it much more elequently.
Giffy is not helping himself in his walk year. His inability to stay healthy is very concerning. We need to trade him as soon as he heats up.
That is a very nice summary up to this point.
Dispirit in the Sky?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2msh0jut2Y
We’re Crying Now.
It looks like it was Home Run Derby, but not in a good way.
At the tickets will continue to be cheap! 5 dollar Big A tix are the only thing inflation proof. Cheers 🍻
If you are willing to purchase and eat spoiled food – that can also keep costs down. It’s a lot like Angels baseball. It looks like chicken, tastes basically like chicken (maybe a bit funky) has an off consistency and isn’t very good for your health. But it’s cheap!!
😆 you ain’t wrong. Last year I was all puffed out and said, “No more! I’m done with this team.” I then proceeded to attend 10 games. It’s a head vs the heart argument for me. I know us diehards get what we deserve when we financially/emotional support inept and morally corrupt owner.
“This game is dispiriting”
Well it’s good to know that at least you are getting into mid-season form.
That’s five straight Ks for Moore, going back to yesterday. He now has a 39% K rate in spring training, and that last one was square in the zone.
Not good.
But But he was the best bat in the College World Series last year
Fine by me. They don’t need him this year so stash away for a year and buy us a year of his service time.
AA or AAA?
AA. Better park and I want to see him dominate there for a month or two before moving him up.
When have the Angels ever been that patient? The first sign of a four game hot streak and he’ll be called up.
I think we’re seeing at close hand what Longenhagen saw with repeat looks last year:
Moore is most dangerous against pitches in the lower part of the strike zone, but he gets beaten up around the belt pretty regularly. His combination of breaking ball chase and vulnerability to high fastballs is what largely drove my bearish pre-draft hit tool projection and overall ranking (23rd in the class). Moore did a ton of in-zone whiffing at Tennessee and then again after the draft. He slashed .322/.378/.533 at Double-A, but struck out at a 30% clip and posted a 72% in-zone contact rate, which would be among the bottom handful of big league hitters. There are only a few productive second basemen who strike out as much as Moore did at Tennessee (20% K% during his career) and most of them hit left-handed.
His K rate ballooned in AA in the final weeks as pitchers learned his tendencies.
Will 400 PAs in AA improve Moore’s pitch recognition and swing decisions? Maybe…? He’s a pretty high strung personality – how will he respond to coaching during sustained adversity?
But But at the draft he guaranteed all of us a ring.
Well according to Torii who has actually worked with Moore in previous minicamps he felt he is very coachable and wants to continue to learn to get better so at least that concern from Longenhagen would seem to be unfounded.
Longenhagen, to my knowledge, has never said that Moore is uncoachable – is there particular commentary of his you’re referring to?
His concerns are his poor defense and high K rate, due to inconsistent offspeed recognition, vulnerability to the high strike and general swing decisions.
The high-strung concern is my own – having watched him as a Vol, and watched all his minor league games last year. He’s quick to argue with umps, gets angry at perceived miscalls, gets roused easily. It’s clear he views himself as a future star, and that swagger works when he’s winning, but he can get surly when he’s not.
I’ve heard from most of the coaches that they feel Moore is coachable. But that was the narrative on Jo as well. It’s just tough to coach guys into an average or better hit tool post-college. Maybe it happens, but we’ll see.
Huh?
Emphasis added by me.
That’s my commentary – not Longenhagen’s. I italicized Longenhagen’s excerpt.
Your commentary is the same shade and similar font style as Longenberry’s so my bad.
But I’m glad then that Torii could alleviate your concerns about Moore’s coachability.
Hopefully, he eventually works out, but if he doesn’t it’s just another example that we just don’t know how to evaluate young players effectively.
It may be a gross generalization, but so many player acquisitions feel like they’re based on select video clips of high exploits (going back to the Gary Matthews Jr catch) as opposed to more comprehensive modeling and projection. That, and the personal individual fetishes of a small group of regional scouts w/o the benefit of crosscheckers (most fired in Moreno’s purges) or data analysts (too expensive to hire in number).
I imagine Arte and John with a few “but did see when x did y” observations each offseason and draft prep cycle that translate into questionable business decisions.
But who knows with this group. Beyond the fact that the primary weaknesses seem chronic and sustained, and most ‘improvements’ year to year are just tweaks to the bench and bullpen.
There have to be plenty of people like Longenhagen who could actually provide thoughtful input, or you could just read what the smart people say to at least get multiple viewpoints. Making better decisions when you draft could save you tens of millions later because you don’t have to buy a player.
WordPress doesn’t make it easy to change font shade in the comment section with its limited editor, unfortunately, so text color often carries over from copypasta.
I honestly don’t know about how coachable he is – as opposed to being humble and deferential in the presence of veteran elders he respects. Does that translate to swing refinement? We’ll only know by the outcomes.
Drive to Survive S7 dropped today – excellent series
*nice for a rain out
I see a lot of Lewis Hamilton in CMo. I see a perfectionist who probably is hard-headed but is driven to excel above all. He seems sharp and confident, and learning all the time, but is kind of reserved. He was friendly too – I spoke with him a couple mornings.
from what I saw in camp, he was definitely seemed eager to learn and wasn’t at all flashy. And he knows his place as rookie (stfu).
between his drive and athleticism, I am very hopeful of big things, but he’s got to learn and grow and master his craft. no rush – keep Kingery
SEC baseball season hadn’t even started a year ago yet. He’s more a candidate for Futures Game MVP in 2025 than ALROY (but ya never know).
Are we going to set a record for strikeouts in the Cactus League this year?
( And I’m not talking about our pitchers)
they say Moncada got his first hit.
if there is no video, do you believe it?
NRS now 2-for-2
I just tuned in as Schanuel was limping off the field. What happened?
tuned in how, radio?
MLB.TV, Gameday audio.
well, no offense, but how would anyone else know what happened through the audio? lol
Because maybe they heard the PBP on the play that led to him limping off the field? As I said, I tuned in when he was exiting the field. I didn’t hear what led up to that.
thrown out at second so maybe that was a sliding issue
Maybe he Limped off of the field due to the shame of getting thrown out at second trying to stretch a single into a double ( he got Hunter Renfroed) I dont think he leftthe game so hopefully hes ok.
Given what we’ve seen with Fontanelle and Trout on baserunning mishaps, hard not to anticipate the worst.
But yeah, he appears to be still in the game.
It’s raining though, so you get the sense that maybe the game is not long for the day.
he’s still in the game (on a rainy day) and had the RBI, so not too bad. Gameday says he tried to stretch his single into a double, but was out. So’ I’d guess that play at 2nd.
Is the game vs the Royals not in Phoenix somewhere? How is it not also canceled?
in Surprise, NW part of valley.
its mainly wet here, not a lot of rain. there are games across the Valley today, some are cancelled, some are not
Interesting. I get that Phoenix is a huge spread out area but just kind of figured rain would be rain anywhere in the valley.
they are playing now in Maryvale and Mesa – Tempe is between them – they could have played a game
The Angels had already pulled starters from that game I suspect the D Backs were doing the same so they probably said screw it.
game in Tempe cancelled and no video from Surprise
No TV? So John Sherman is even cheaper than cheap Arte?
its kind of amazing to see how little ST games are televised each day. Angels are about the only team that broadcasts all of them. Hardly any other teams do this.
Dbacks game canceled do to weather