The Angels got swept by the Orioles but at least Nolan Schanuel found his power. Shaun Anderson cleared waivers and elected free agency. It looks like Mike Trout is settling in to the role of designated hitter.
The Orioles claimed right-hander Kyle Tyler off waivers from Philadelphia.
The Red Sox unloaded Rafael Devers over the weekend. In exchange, the Giants sent back Jordan Hicks, Kyle Harrison, James Tibbs III, and Jose Bello. The Padres placed outfielder Jackson Merrill on the concussion IL.
The Rangers released Gerson Garabito. He’s on his way to pitch in Korea. The Diamondbacks signed Anthony DeSclafani to a major league contract.
Photo credit: Rex Fregosi
Remember when I wished the Angels had drafted Keston Huira? I do. And Nick Madrigal. I wanted him too.
Man, the baseball gods hate Lance McCullers Jr. Or he’s a cancerous asshole who loves collecting money and not playing baseball and keeps getting injuries and surgery to avoid playing. Let’s find the dumbest Astro fan and let him decide….
Moore back in the line up,
https://www.mlb.com/gameday/angels-vs-yankees/2025/06/16/777487/preview
On the positive side Newman is not in the lineup !
Hooray !
and what was Wood’s response afterwars?
“I shouldn’t have hit the guy,” Wood said on the ESPN broadcast. “That’s it. That’s all I got to say.”
He did it.
18 Ks.
Oh…19!
I forgot the miscalled HBP was officially a K.
Gutsy overule but I thought that was the right call, he stuck it out there, as gamers do to get on base
I thought that was a bad call. To me he turned to not get hit and put his elbow down to not get hit.
It definitely will cheapen the no-hitter for some. But I suspect he would have pulled it off regardless.
welp. one crazy thing happened. time to throw away years of scouting and research and draft this guy with the number 2 pick. splash.
LOL
That was pretty impressive
No hitter – 19 k’s. Wow.
I have to admit, I’ve been pulling for Murray St. But I have got to pull for this kid to get the no-no after watching this gem.
That dance off the mound with K #16!
That HBP barely hit the toe.
Wood is perfect through 7 folks. 14 k’s.
Hit the lead off hitter in the 8th with a curve ball on the foot. Perfecto gone.
The expression on his mom’s face. He’s up to 100 pitches now, still throwing gas at 97.
15 Ks.
Still with so much late life. A thing of beauty.
Hard not to be impressed, big stage and elimination game
With that juice, you gotta think he wishes he did not throw a breaking ball to a left handed hitter but gee, what gas.
Gage Wood might have been around for #2 – no way now. He’s looking electric and going to shoot up the board. He’s making some money today.
Honestly, I think it was a stretch that he’d be around at #47 even before this start. He’s being regularly mocked to the Mets and Yankees in the late 30s (and he seems like a Yankees pick to me).
But yeah, he’s looking top 30 now.
He started this year in the pen, do I have this correct?
It’s been all starts this year (though he was injured most of the season). But he was a reliever the first two years at Arkansas.
The knock on him is he has a majestic fastball and a solid curve but no third pitch (as you might expect from a former bullpen guy).
He was the closer as a freshman, middle reliever as a sophomore, to weekend starter as a junior. He missed roughly 50 days this season due to a injured right shoulder.
His longest outing in his career was 6 innings (with 13 K’s) on June 1st against Creighton.
The last two pitchers to throw a no-no in the MCWS were Jim Ehrler of Texas in 1950 and Jim Wixson of OK State in 1960.
“Woo Pig Sooie”
Gage Wood bring the heat for the Razorbacks today, 1-0 over the Racers from Murray State. Draft stock is rising.
Yeah, he has more helium than most in the draft due that massive FB. Getting mocked regularly into the back half of the first round right now.
If GMs are really altering draft decisions based on a player’s performance in a CWS game and not by the full body of college season and college career work, then they deserve to be vociferously ridiculed when high draft selections flame out.
He was already a top 50 prospect.
I dunno. So much of the regular season college teams are playing against lesser competition. I think it makes plenty of sense to want to see players you have mixed information on perform against the strongest competition at the highest levels. Seems reasonable to potentially shift a player up or down the board based on what they do against the best, especially if it’s a question of, say, a round or two.
I mentioned yesterday that Ben McDonald’s CWS performance was, to me, an indicator that he was overrated. So I think how they do on this stage is pretty important. In a different sport I’m reminded of Joe Montana engineering a Notre Dame comeback in a bowl game and how that showed something special that could (and did) carry over to pro ball.
It’s not just this game. I’ve been hearing the chatter on multiple Baseball America podcasts over the past month or so, this guy was rising. I honestly did not bookmark what team he pitched for until I turned on the tube today and saw him on the mound.
Yeah, he’s been featured on three straight BA draft podcasts. The miss rates on the FB are marzipan for stats nerds.
He’s better than Doyle to me. But still, if we took him, I’d shrug my shoulders and see what happens in two years. Maybe he learns a change up and his arm doesn’t fall off. Cool. Maybe he’s Zeferjahn.
I didn’t even see this before posting. It’s quite impressive.
Because lame ass thoughts exist on the internet everywhere, I was on boards reading about the Devers trade last night. Plenty of “of course BAHSTUN trades the Dominican guy” BS. Cause the Sawx don’t love Pedro and Ortiz at all. There was also a big pile of Chowds basically crying about “Cheap Henry”. Because, yes, John Henry is actually the source of all evil in the world to these guys…. they’ve only been bitching about it for about five years now instead of twelve. He wants to be the Rays is the common refrain.
Christ I would love it if the Angels openly wanted to be the Rays.
we are like the Rays. we are cheap!
what we don’t have in common with them? two things
Man. Those Angels just got moated. Amazing.
and we don’t win nearly as many games.
I would actually say that payroll is also what we don’t have in common with them. Rays are 26th in total payroll. The Angels are 11th.
The Angels are consistently in the top half of the league in spending. They don’t have Dodgers/Mets money but cheap is a bit of a stretch. The money has been spent but unfortunately it was pumped into Trout and Rendon and we have nothing to show for it.
I wish we could be the Rays!
Rays have more more games than the Angels since 2017 (the year when both Angels and Rays won 80 games.
2016 was the most recent year in which the Angels won more games (74 wins) than the Rays did (68)
Being swept in Baltimore epitomizes the inconsistency and impotence of the Angels offensive line-up.
When Nolan Schanuel, a good but not great player, leads the team in hits (68), doubles (13, tied), walks (34), BA (.282), OBP (.376), and is second in OPS (.770), you realize the futility of hoping for the Angels to actually be a contending team.
After Nolan and Neto (.276), the next highest BA on the team is O’Hoppe at .231. Think about that for a second.
The K rates (other than Nolan’s) are off the charts and are a major contributing factor to the ineptitude.
While the pitching has also been irregular, it has generally been good enough for the team to compete (not including yesterday’s meltdown).
So, where does this leave us? “On the road again” to another below .500 season and yearning for a hitting coach who can somehow break the spell of batters who whiff on outside sliders and quit staring at pitches right down the middle.
The team’s still gonna suck. But if Nolan, Zach, Adell and Logan all end the season with an OPS over .750 I will take that progress and smile. If Trout does the same, goody. Then we need to get two more guys who will do the same, at least, and have some pitching develop or get bought and we are at least a competitive team.
Keep on building baby.
90 games of CMo too!
Curious at what point we can begin to scribble the name, Nelson Rada, for 2026? What he’s doing in AA is nothing short of amazing. How much can he really learn in AAA?
Arquette at 3B in September.
I tried to stay neutral and nonchalant about that pick, but he’s the one.
You really think they will just play him after they draft him?
the likely path is to make him a Panda in August and go from there
Yup. That’d be most likely. If we can’t get Hernandez I’m in on Turk’s idea of Anderson in round 1 and Turley in round 2 for us….
One part of the fun of this year’s version of Omaha is that you have two teams that each contain a couple players who make some sense going 1-2 to the Angels in the top 50 picks.
If the team goes position player, Oregon State’s Arquette and Turley are reasonable selections at #2 and #47, with a good likelihood that both will be available. And if the team were to continue its pitching emphasis, LSU’s Kade Anderson and Anthony Eyanson would represent the best 1-2 option available to them.
Though now, I think the Nats may have Kade very much on the table, alongside the three top preps (Holliday, Willits, Hernandez), and depending on how Eyanson’s start goes, you could see him selected in the 25-40 range.
But fun to think about those teams going head to head in Omaha as proxy for Angels draft room decisionmaking.
Arquette + Eyanson would be 🔥 🔥 🔥
I was thinking about the Arquette/Turley combo last night. It could happen. I’d prefer to go pitcher but Arquette hits all of Perry’s boxes.
If the Angels could add that CBA pick and go Arquette, Eyanson, Turley, that would be a well rounded haul.
And probably an affordable one, with a bit of discount on Arquette to apply to a pool-savings prepster down the line.
But this is probably still fantasy. We can cook up all these rational scenarios, and then Perry will just draft JoJo Parker or Ike Irish, and then some big fastball guy like Chase Shores or Patrick Forbes in the second. And half the Halos fanbase will fête him when Irish and Shores are in the MLB in a year (and subsequently struggling through uneven development for the next 3-4).
C’mon, you’ve read this script. 😉
But just to play along, there are *so* many fun “well rounded haul” scenarios with a CBA pick in the mid-30s. Good chance, for instance, that’s where someone like Alex Lodise ends up.
Then you have a potential Anderson-Lodise-Turley haul, which looks like a lot of upside as well.
My fave three round scenario is that one where the Angels get CBA picks in round one and two, and go deep on the bats after pick one:
#2 Kade Anderson
CBA Quentin Young
#47 Gavin Turley
CBA Mitch Voit
#79 James Quinn Irons
Diversified college crop with strong batted ball data, and with a prep bat with massive power upside thrown in.
Never happen, but that’s my dream and I’m sticking to it!
I don’t think there is any scenario where Perry passes on a college arm with the 2nd pick, nor should he
Yup. If Anderson goes to the Nats then just take Witherspoon…. then it’s on to position players.
Really? Perry has so biased his drafts to college pitching that the system is devoid of any impact bats at every level above the complex league. Why *should* he draft two college arms in a row if the choices available to him at #47 among the positional options are superior?
Or maybe by “second pick” you meant first pick (at #2), and I’m misreading you.
Even then, I wouldnt begrudge him selecting Arquette or Holliday, even if I think Anderson is the safest pick.
Arquette is a quick to the majors infield bat.
Like Schanuel.
Like Neto
Like Moore
Granted, not many thought Neto would be fast tracked and succeed at this level, but Perry obviously did.
As much as I prefer the college arms at 2, Arquette fits Perry to a perfect T.
Yeah. If he takes Arquette it’s pretty clear they really are trying to build fast and skip levels with the first picks. Which, honestly, I don’t hate. I have no idea if it will work, but at least the guy would be trying something instead of signing 33 year olds to ten year deals to spark something or what ever.
Anderson at #2 is the right decision.
Eh. I kinda think CMo is going more the Paris route. I think he can be good later, but he looks overmatched as hell right now.
Agree, it is such a weird promotion. I might understand it better if it was to come up and backfill someone on bereavement and then go back down. But management is wanting to see if he can fix himself on the fly in the majors. With this logic, why is Rada not here?
Aaaand, you are basing that on two whole games?
Thus far, yeah. If he actually starts hitting then I’d say something along the line of “oh, I guess he just needed a little while to adjust” or something. Some of us are capable of adjusting our thinking, hell even admitting we were wrong. We don’t all make dying on every hill our hobby.
But thus far his ABs have looked pretty meek and overwhelmed. Yep. That’s what I’m saying.
I would just caution that there is a difference between being over taken by nerves of playing in your first one or two big leagues games and actually being “overmatched.” I mean Moore himself said it was “the best day of his life.” Not sure I expect him to be grounded/be himself at that moment.
If the whiffing continues for two months I think we could then fairly say that. Right now, not so much…
Two games plus quite a few spring training bats. Kid has issues with breaking stuff and the MLB level is not an ideal place to work on those issues.
I’d love to be wrong here, but keeping him at AA where he was pretty mediocre this season would have been a good idea.
That’s a different question. I am not saying it was or wasn’t the right time… but his lack of success in those two games is not necessarily because he was “overmatched.” I mean, the guy was not a first round pick for nothing.
I noticed the BA thing too. We just don’t have hitters.
And Adell is right behind Logan which is good for Jo but not the rest of the team.
Devers to the Giants, and Chapman eventually coming back, makes me happy because it makes the Doyers life harder. That’s alright with me. The Giants likely lost the trade via Devers needing to be a DH, costing a ton for the position, and the Giants eating his whole contract. THAT was the win for Boston. Crochet’s contract is manageable. Story is off the books in 2028. That’s all they have over 20M next year other than Bregman, who they can easily afford to bring back.
What’s crazy is Story may turn in a 20/20 season and get his OPS over .700 if he heats up. That’s not great for the money at all, but it’s not a total disaster either.
Tibbs and Harrison are strong young pick ups. Bello is wildly talented but young. Hicks could be very useful down the line. But the most useful thing is that they have a lot of money to use if they want to and Boston is a place guys like to play.
This trade is a total win if they sign Cease or Gallen or Valdez this off season with Devers money.
Bregman has optouts so they can use the saved money to lock him up. Now Devers in Frisco’s problems,. $260 million for. DH only is a bad contract.
you won’t out slug the Dodgers. You need to do what the D-Backs did in 2023
– have a couple of bad ass mofo pitchers that will shut down the line-up. it can be done.
Boston pooped their pants on this one. Mishandled from the get-go, Bregman was on course to invoke his Opt-out and still likely will even after the lengthy injury. Devers go back to 3rd. Yankee killer. A middle of the order bat. Yes, the defense is shaky but the bat plays and you just hope for the best. Like the Angel defense.
Giants executed their objective and got him early before the deadline. Sure, the last few years of the contract will sting but that is the price to pay if you want to compete.
Devers stated he didn’t want to learn first base on the fly in the middle of an MLB season. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he puts in some time over the off season and becomes somewhat functional at the position while DH’ing often.
I’d love nothing more than to see the Giants beat the Dodgers. If they could end the Dodgers season in October, I’d be ecstatic.
I too would prefer to see the Giants beat the Dodgers, but I wouldn’t bet on Devers doing as you suggest, Jeff. Why would he? He’s apparently far more interested in sitting on his butt and taking three or four at-bats per game than working on anything to improve his game. He was a poor third baseman when he arrived in Boston and still was when Bregman arrived on the scene.
We’ll see. He says he put in work at third but like you I didn’t see any evidence of that.
Most guys prefer being on the field and Devers came across that way in the wake of the Bregman signing. His comments about moving to first also imply he didn’t want to go out there without practice first.
Excited to see Ohtani back on the bump today. I may dislike the jersey he dawns now, but I’ll never get tired of watching the greatest baseball player I’ve ever seen perform his 2-way magic on a baseball field.
I am looking forward to it too. my animosity is a lot less this year, but he’s a Dodger so I hope the Padres rock him.
Yep.
He worked hard in his recovery. Good for him. But I suspect he will only pitch one inning tonight as an Opener. It is the next step before he returns to All Star form as a pitcher.
I’m excited to see anyone in a Doyer uniform get get horrible yet survivable dysentery every day. Or maybe attacked by pigeons.
As the excitement of the College World Series ramps up so does the excitement around here ramp up regarding our first pick. The college games are at their best right now.
other teams have minor leaguers of promise.
we have the College World Series! That’s exactly why we dig it.
Our future stars are in Omaha not SLC or the IE.
Did you have a nice Father’s Day? Yes, I did, thank you for asking. The good news is while we had a fantastic day, we missed another loss. But there is a silver lining to our losses and that is we will more likely than not be sellers. Why is that important? Because the team has proven one thing is constant, staying stagnant, the more seasons pile up with the same old results of being losers.
As it stands now our SELLER position will be a good test of the “sims” that people like me like to use and other people seem to hate. We are gonna need some serious “ignore the sims” luck to get what I wish for in trades right now. Anderson, Soler and Jansen have negative trade value at this point, due largely to time left vs money owed on their contracts. Rengifo and Soler are also minus value due to sucking.
So we’ll have to see if any of those guys move for much of anything.
Our trade assets with an emphasis on ass.
Ward is the only one maybe worth a damn, and you just know Perry will have to fight Arte in order to trade him.
Pumped for the draft! Significantly less pumped for the deadline.
Shockingly, Moncada has a little value too….
A good player, but he’s made of glass. Now I understand why the league left him unsigned for us to grab right before ST.
everything the Southside warned us about turned out to be true.
Boston got hosed in the Devers deal. By taking on the full salary, the Giants got away with giving up nothing of consequence near term.
The NL West is loaded.
Devers turned out to be a cancer, while I think they should of held out for more, there are 8 years left on his contract and the future is cloudy as to where the owners are going to go with the upcoming lockout/strike and possibly the R/S were more than smart to jettison this guy now rather than later, we’ll see.
I consider Devers more of a prima donna than a cancer. The GM jerked him around when they signed Bregman, and Devers called “bullshit” when they wanted him to play another new position.
Personally, I would have just manned up and played firstbase when asked. The team is paying “me” $300M, so I’d do what they want and not create a scene. However, I’m a “boomer” and a bit anachronistic. I realize that the younger generation tends to confuse ego with respect.
The “my way or the highway” approach is rarely effective. The Sox will likely regret giving away Devers much in the same way they gave away Betts for nothing.
I consider Devers more of a prima donna than a cancer.
Sounds like they’ve found a replacement for Barry finally. I think it will take two years to see that the Red Sox won this trade in a landslide – that’s a lot of money but the NL west isn’t like the rest of us.
It was anything but unreasonable to think that Devers would be a team player and change positions for the team by being in a better fielder and a proven power hitter and expecting Devers to try something new if that move was helping the team. Through the years every team at every level has asked players to change from SS to 3b or 2b. McCovey and Cepeda worked it out and the Giants won a lot of games. Biggio switched from C to 2b, history is full of these switches Prima donna or cancer, sometimes one and the same. Bonds had issues with Bonilla, Mitchell, Kent and Williams that did not work out always the best on the team. But while no doubt the Red Sox will miss his bat, his sulking and not showing he was willing to help the team by changing positions at the same time making demands showed very little class. So while Devers was showing the “Mt way or the highway” he can now be another teams problem 3b.
Anachronistic, I love that. 🙂
I’m another anachronistic boomer. I have always believed in the idea that participating in team sports is one of the key steps in the development of responsible and productive adults. The current climate in the games I still love leads me to believe that our society is in deep trouble. A pox on them all, starting with childish, selfish Devers!
Good thing for us we already played the Giants. And we still have three games left with Boston at home so it helps us in a way …
They are giving up $260 million for a DH. Boston got a dirst rounder. I’d take that gfor Trout any day of the week.
The difference is that Devers is a top ten hitter in baseball right now. And he’s 28 years old. And unlike Trout, after he got his huge contract the magic hasn’t left him and he hasn’t fallen apart. Say they get a solid OPS+ out of him through his next 5 seasons…. not too bad.
I’d take this Devers trade for Trout in a heartbeat. Hell, I’d trade Trout for Tibbs at this point.
The Angels would be lucky is someone would take Trout and Neto for the acceptance of Trout’s remaining salary.
Trout is a shadow of his age 28 player/performance. Unless there’s a GM out there willing to give up talent for the player Trout used to be, the future value of Trout is very, very limited even if the Angels pay down his salary.
Players being paid $37M annually and hitting .220 while being unable to play in the field have no market.
Devers is 28, has already produced 2.3 WAR and on track for a 5 WAR season and was an All Star last year.
Trout has produced 0.2 WAR, is 33 years old and is batting .220.
There is no comparison. Trout would generate nothing in a trade. If a team were willing to take on his contract, the Angels would have to give that team prospects.