Jorge Soler and Reynaldo Lopez were both suspended seven days for their fight on Tuesday. They are both appealing. Well, Lopez settled his appeal at 5 games. Robert Stephenson underwent season ending elbow surgery. Fangraphs extolled the virtues of Jose Soriano in this article.
The Phillies acquired Steward Berroa from the Brewers in exchange for cash considerations. The Reds just designated Christian Encarnacion-Strand for assignment.
Zach Eflin underwent UCL Surgery. Astros right-hander Christian Javier left his start due to shoulder tightness. Right-hander Johan Oviedo has a flexor strain and will be shut down for six weeks. Victor Robles is going on the IL with a pectoral strain.
Davey Lopes passed away at the age of 80.
Here is your Roto Riteup for April 8.
Photo cedit: Rex Fregosi
RiP Nick Adenhart
Wild debut at the moment in the Quakes game, as they have Alton Davis II starting. 6’6″ lefty beanpole, wiry and wire-thin, long levers, socks pulled up to his knees.
Was the most curious of the “day three” picks in last year’s Angels draft, as the team paid him way overslot (400k) in the 11th round, more than any other college player signed in the 11th-20th rounds. Relief-only profile at the time – he had very little collegiate success, but good velo in the MLB Draft League, and the draft room saw something in the kid.
Struck out 2 of 3 on 11 pitches in the first inning, then simply fell apart in the second. Three HBPs in a row, walk, bunt single – the ump wasn’t calling the high strike, but he also just kind of melted down.
That is brutal haha. Rocket City blew their game, but at least Raudi finally got off the schneid !
He looked like New Coke in inning one – far out frame and delivery. But in the second, he was trying to work low and in and just kept plunking batters. And when he was working top of zone, the ump conceded him nothing.
And yeah, good to see Raudi finally hit something. AA is a fierce jump in talent level – it’s often where kids playing above their tools hit their ceilings. We’ll see if he can find himself and catch a train.
BTW, you probably know this, but an MLB.TV subscription gets you all MiLB games these days. If you have a Roku, the MLB app lets you watch most any game on your television.
I just toggle my favorite team from team to team, and all the games for that team’s affiliates are accessible in real time. Watched the Jamie Arnold start today, then the Davis II and Olejnik starts this evening.
Good looking out, TT! I get MLB.TV thru TMobile and completely forgot it comes with Milb.TV too.
With the Angels barely keeping my attention — it’s really just Adell, Sori, and Neto atm — I’ll need to get my fix and join you in following the pitching down on the farm. However I’ll wait for tomorrow and skip the 20-0 drubbing going down in Lake Elsinore. Wtf 😭😂😂
Moniak and Hegret playing well for the rockies so far this year. Both are playing against the padres tonight.
I always liked Moniak, glad to see him doing well. I wonder if he is truly getting better or just enjoying the altitude. His advanced metrics his last full season with the Angels were a lot better than his results so I was bummed when we let him go.
I took a quick peek and his strikeout numbers have steadily improved – now they are actually pretty solid. He had a disgusting 39% strikeout rate the season we traded for him. His two full years with the Angels he went to 35% and then 27%. Last year with Colorado it was 24% and so far this year its 17%.
Just saw that 15 years ago today, 4/9/2011, was a 14-inning game vs Toronto where the Halos won 6-5. Haren got the win after pitching an inning.
My first ever game with a 14th inning stretch.
I guess you’ve all seen the facebook meme asking which was the biggest robbery, any of Jo’s 3 catches or Rendon’s Angels tenure. Ha…Although Rendon gave us more than Stephenson at a greater cost, of course. Speaking of Jo, I saw what’s probably an unofficial Jo bobblehead of Jo’s third catch. Ah…still awaiting approval but anyway, her it is. https://www.foco.com/products/jo-adell-los-angeles-angels-home-run-robbery-bobblehead
I’m sure P12 already pre-ordered 5 of them!
I hate talking Dodgers! But with Davey Lopes passing, I realize the hatred I had for the Lasorda 1970’s Dodgers is very different than the red-hot hate I have for the new Dodger$.
Those 70-80’s teams were built by their farm and they stayed together. I hated them because they were good and stable and there was no change, and I see now how cool that is.
These new Dodgers? Yes, good…but bought with corporate money. Other teams’ best players are collected. I don’t ever want to hear about their great prospects. They toss them out to buy a free agent All-star. Am I jealous? Yeah, I guess. But just don’t tell me money has little to do with their current success because that is a trash argument.
I liked all the other guys but I couldn’t stand Lasorda or Garvey.
My dad used to do a great Steve Garvey impersonation. It simply entailed him tugging on his shirt sleeves in that fussy Garvey way.
Couldn’t agree more. Last year I made a comment almost identical to yours and I was attacked with “no, it’s not about money, they are better at every level” etc. I was told how good their scouting is, development etc. That may be true compared to us, but look at their starting lineup and tell me how many of those players were home grown :
1) Ohtani NO
2) Betts NO
3) Tucker NO
4) Freeman NO
5) Hernandez NO
6) Yamamoto NO
So, of the best 6 players on the team none of them were drafted and developed by the Dodgers. Maybe you say Will Smith is better than Teo but still that is only 1 of 6. So don’t tell me their success isn’t about money…. We can then add Glasnow and Snell to this list.
And their new closer – a Mets castoff – Diaz.
During spring training my kids asked me why I never play the baseball game that they bought me for my birthday years ago (MLB the Show 22 – with Ohtani on the cover). They regret that decision, because I started a franchise and now they have to compete with me for the Switch.
My first act was to extend Ohtani during ST for way cheaper than Arte could have done (I even had to “overpay” him to make myself feel like I wasn’t cheating too bad), Trout might win the AL MVP and is absolutely clutch with RISP, Rendon is what the Angels hoped he would be, Ty Buttrey doesn’t have mental health issues, and Kurt Suzuki is (very unrealistically) hitting over .300.
I play one game every 1-2 series and sim the rest. I just got through the all-star break and the Angels are leading the division. The CPU refused to trade me O’Hoppe for Marsh, but I was able to trade Lorenzon (instead of Syndergaard) for Moniak, and I skipped the salary dump trade of Iglesias to the Braves.
It’s like living a fantasy of what could have been, very therapeutic.
I recently started playing MLB The Show 2022 again as well. Its the last version of the game I bought. Been playing online a bunch, its been fun (although sometimes I have to wait a while for an opponent since its such an old game).
Its also funny to see how the game rated players back then, I noticed last night that Skubal is ranked at like 84 or something. I’m sure he has a 99 card on this season’s version of the game.
We have 2 copies of that game, the standard version that my son would play, and an unopened, still sealed deluxe “anime cover” version. That one sits in my office at home and will hopefully, one day, bring a little payday to my son or his kids.
Let’s be real folks…
The White Sox are giving away a Pope Hat later this season (against the Reds)
Last year I was driving to the CTPG meetup game against the White Sox. There were two guys on State College Blvd in pope outfits blessing the cars. That was definitely not on my bingo card.
No new City Connect for this season for the Angels. Only Braves, Orioles, Reds, Royals, Brewers, Pirates, Padres, and Rangers
Thanks for link I’m a jersey collector. Most of those city connect don’t look as nice as the first editions, except that Pittsburgh is crazy gold on black. I’m hoping next yr Angels do something retro with dark navy colors.
I don’t understand the reason for most of these.
-San Diego ruined what used to be the coolest CC jersey in the game.
-Cincinnati’s is basically a red version of what they already had
-The Pirates jersey is just a pirates jersey with a spooky font
-Texas is fine but completely lacking in any sort of character. Better than being gaudy I suppose.
-Milwaukee’s is a double A jersey
-ATL, BLT, and KC are all pretty cool though
C’mon Trojan. You know the reason. Nike is on the ropes and they desperately need more jersey sales!
Lol I meant other than the obvious reason!
RIP Davy Lopes. I hate to admit it but I liked the 1970s Dodgers. The infield of Cey, Russell, Lopes, and Garvey was together for a long time.
I wonder if we’ll get a taste of Rada when the Soler suspension manifests. Dude is heating up in Salt Lake.
Considering our horrible lineup, I’d like to see him get a cup of coffee up here.
Rada and CMo will be starting in Anaheim by June.
Correction.. guzman will be here playing for moncada
CMo has started at 3rd in the 4 games. Guzman has been at SS
I like cmo at 2nd, but we’ll see how it plays out.
CMo and Guzman are currently hitting .179 in AAA, and Rada doesn’t really have a lot of value unless he plays CF. I like them all, and I would rather watch them hit .100 than the veterans, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. Why waste their service time. People would get tired quickly of them too. I would lean into that more if Rada was going to play CF and Guzman played 3B just because of the defensive improvement even if they don’t hit, because the guys they would be replacing aren’t hitting anyway and are also not providing defensive value. I am assuming Trout would move to LF.
Unfortunately, I believe this year is going to be pretty ugly. You have to realize that even thought the players and coaches are playing to win, the rest of the organization is not, at least not this year. They’re just treading water until after the work stoppage.
they’ve moved CMo to 3rd. Once he strings together 2 hot weeks, Perry will call him up.
I agree with all your points. Most of all, I would accept watching the young guys struggle and be fine with it. Service time is the only reason to keep them down
Service time is the exact reason to keep them down. Otherwise we will keep running into a situation where guys start hitting their stride and we immediately we have to pay them a lot of money. That’s happening with Adell now.
If they aren’t completely ready AND simultaneously won’t elevate the MLB team to playoff caliber, then leave them in the minors.
You can’t manage a payroll when you don’t have at least a few non-veteran contracts that are worth several times their value.
You’re most likely right. I’m just bored watching us trot out the listless bats of Moncada, Lowe, Peraza.
My irrational side wants to watch the the young guys.
I think CMo is far away from being a major league ready player. If we keep bringing him up to fail, he will turn into Jo Adell 2.0 who took years after he was first up to develop. This was another bad pick by Minasian if the objective was to draft a major league ready player. Maybe three years from now he might be usable. Let it play out over time.
Adell was a Billy E pick. Wash and Torii unlocked Adell
I know Adell was picked by Billy. I’m not sure who unlocked Adell, maybe he unlocked himself.
The Angels have struggled to develop prep bats in the post-Stoneman era, so coaching is definitely a factor. But Adell was also f*cked by the timing of the pandemic.
A whole minor league season was canceled in his age 21 season, so the Angels had to put him on the MLB club, or risk him idling for a whole year. That definitely screwed with his development and confidence – he should have spent most of his age 21-22 seasons working on pitch recognition and defensive gaps in the minors.
With better seasoning and coaching, you probably get Adell’s 2024 season two years earlier.
Moore has to start hitting before that happens. He’s taking plenty of walks, but a .179 in the PCL is the definition of ‘slow start’.
We’re only a dozen games in though, so there’s still time to wake up.
If he can give us better defense in CF than Adell on the days Trout doesn’t play, why not.
We have Bryce T for that on the roster already and the offense would be the same, imho.
Teodosio cannot hit the ball.
Don’t you DARE besmirch my sweet little Teo like that
They seem unwilling to give T a chance. I’m cool with doing that. I just never want to see Adell in CF again. That’s why I suggested Rada.
10 innings, $33m
There clearly are no limits to the charity Arte and his minion Perry will give the lame.
Yet another to add to the long list, where they gambled and rolled “snake eyes”
That one was fairly predictable. Marginal MLB guy gets “fixed” by Tampa Bay staff by throwing a high stress pitch more often and then breaks down at his next stop. Never buy a stock at it’s all time high.
The Angels are masters at buying high-priced stock just before it tanks and at buying low-priced “value” stock that never recovers.
It feels like someone buying stock randomly would have better luck.
Hard to blame King Arturo for not wanting to spend money when looking at the recent failings:
Trout extension, Rendone contract, Fletcher extension, Stephenson contract
🤢🤢🤢
I’m sure I’m missing more
I don’t think you’re missing anything. For most mortals, making expenditures that “breakdown” would certainly limit our willingness to make the same expenditure again. However, in my opinion if one has the money to buy a sports franchise and employ athletes, it should be part of business model to plan for expenditures on athletes who get injured and can’t perform. If as the owner you decide to restrict spending on talent because prior signees got injured, it’s really time to sell.
At some point one needs to realize that this all happened because whoever was making the decisions was making bad decisions. Nothing will change until the owner or the people he hires make better decisions.
It’s nice if you’re a subject matter expert and the smartest guy in the room, but You don’t have to be, you just need to hire the people who can make your business successful.
Arte could completely turn things around over time if he simply hired competent people and invested his money in scouting, coaching, and player development instead of expensive free agents. He would save money and have a much better product. And it doesn’t preclude adding a free agent here and there when the time is right.
Everybody and every organization make mistakes and bad decisions but Arte and the Angels have made it a way of life and repeat the same bad mistakes over and over.
Nothing will change until Arte either sells the team or hires a competent baseball person and allows them to do what is needed.
yea if only he would realize the problem is himself by being such a pain to work with that he can’t hire anyone worth their salt because they’d rather make less money and have more control. Remember John Carpino said Arte had a right to make the roster because it’s his money. So he basically wants a GM to finish GM’ing after he’s spent most of the money. His contracts are the ones that have hamstrung us the most. Hamilton and Rendon. And there is a pretty easy path to the Angels never signing Pujols if he hadn’t of hired a DEI intern hire who couldn’t it even make it to the winter meetings on time when Beltre wanted to sign here.
I think Arte wanted Puljos and it didn’t matter who the GM was or wasn’t. Puljos was coming to Anaheim and nothing was going to stop Arte.
Jared Walsh?
Fortunately (for the Angels) he got hurt while he was still in his arbitration years. We never extended him but OMG would that have been another huge bottomless pit.
That one was a bummer regardless. Loved the guy and the player.
So he should pivot and invest tons of $$$ into scouting and coaching. Has he done that? Maybe he has and I’m just not aware. Its what I’d do though if I were him. I’d focus on outspending every other team on scouting and development, both internationally and domestically.
1000%! One area Perry has actually been somewhat successful in is our international presence and getting the new facilities built in Arizona.
My comment obviously wasn’t very clear by everyone’s replies. Arte holds all the blame here — my point was that it makes sense why he’d be gun shy on opening up the wallet for extensions/FAs based on being burned by almost every move made since Rendone.
Arte makes the shitty hires, the shitty hires make terrible decisions, Arte is too self unaware to realize he’s the pit of the problem.
Justin Upton extension, Pujols contract, Cozart contract, Stassi extension
The list is endless lol
Jared Walsh didn’t quite hold his health together long enough to be another massive entry on this list
Jesus Christ 😭😂😂
Re-upping Moncada. Trading for Soler’s bad contract. Im sure I’m missing someone too.
You call him a minion, I call him the intern.