Angels fans, we can walk into the Big A and see a game at our familiar ballpark. Spring Training is incredible and it has been fun watching on TV but there’s nothing like attending a game live; especially in your home ballpark.
Dorothy was right, there is no place like home.
What have we learned this week? Jose Soriano is a stud. 2 starts, 2 wins, and complete dominance in both. I’ve often posted the marriage of Soriano and Maddux could work magic and we might be seeing it.
His baseball savant page is already covered in red and the union has just begun.
Outside of Soriano, though, Angels pitching has been a very mixed bag. That bullpen is a high wire act no matter who is called but I do enjoy seeing Bachman throwing some nasty sinkers. He’ll never live up to his draft status but getting something of value there, and in an area of need, is a nice little cookie this off season.
Soriano’s early success and the Angels lack of a good farm have folks already speculating on when the Angels might trade him. They should know by now we hold onto our players and let the leave for nothing around here. Getting good prospects and extending players are for other teams.
Oh, I took another massive shot at Arte over On SI. He landed a TV deal but has not spent a dime. To be fair he has yet to receive many dimes but still.
For a week at least we are seeing Mike Trout flex at the plate. It has been fun to see.
Thus far I am not a fan of Kurt Suzuki’s management. Simply put, he’s not putting guys in the places their career numbers suggest they should go. Perhaps he’s right and thousands of data points are wrong, but that is rarely the case.
Nolan Schanuel behind Mike Trout needs to stop. Who should be hitting behind Trout? Depends on the hand of the pitcher we are facing.
Sorry about the short links this week but I am buried with work and have a family obligation I simply will not miss. Love this community and so happy you all support me as a father so I know you’ll understand. I’ll make it up to you soon, I promise.
So link what I missed and enjoy your weekend. If you make it out to the Big A have a helmet sundae for me. And try to make it to the meetup in two weeks against the Padres.
Just dropping this here as well, since it’s an Angels event:
Bremner debut this evening at 6:30pm.
https://www.milb.com/gameday/canadians-vs-dust-devils/2026/04/04/819181/preview
He’s been saved multiple times by Schanuel on bad throws and is sitting at a OAA of 0 this year which is still mind boggling.on the balls he hasn’t handled. But let’s give it time to catch up. Moncada dead last in 3B OAA since last year. Of course Rengifo was not much better.
Moncada has the second most assists after Matt Chapman on the second most chances. That’s gotta count for something.
https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/fielding/_/position/3b/sort/assists
At this stage it means nothing. Paris started off on fire at the plate last year too – but his weaknesses got exposed. Elly was 7th in the league in assists last year and first in errors with 26. Visually – Moncada’s weaknesses are crystal clear. He doesn’t read hops well. His arm stroke is inconsistent. Does not have a good first step. His glove is mediocre at best.
Kade Anderson – Jamie Arnold battle royale also to expectations. Scoreless with no XBH through three, Anderson living more by the K, Arnold pitching more to soft contact.
Fourth inning, Travs draw first blood with a walk (lotta borderline calls) and a blast on a low inside pitch that was a pretty remarkable bit of hitting. Arnold recovers quickly and strikes out two swinging, and gets out of the inning without further damage.
These are good pitchers looking as advertised in a AA context against solid hitters.
And then there’s the 2027 draft. In my continuing series, Friday Night with Dax Whitney, the sophomore improved to 5-0, lowered his ERA to 1.33 with 6 1/3 shutout innings,,whiffing 10 as he continues to lead the college pitchers in Ks.
No, I don’t drive down to Corvallis to see him. The Beaver games are on tv here. I’m tempted, though, to try to get a ticket for the regional
Angels picking 1-1 in 2027 is quite the long bet, but keep the flame lit, I guess. 🙂
I think top 5, not necessarily #1 and it will depend on his 2027 season, too
In Seth Hernandez’s pro debut, he gave up a run on a triple and RBI single, but he also struck out the side. All swinging. Including fellow first rounder JoJo Parker.
He followed that up with a hitless, scoreless second inning. Two more Ks. Six outs, five on strikes.
Sinker working 96-99 mph. Of the first 25 pitches he threw, 12 were whiffs.
Sheesh.
INSANE. Another inning, another three strikeouts, all swinging.
Getting Ks on the sinker, the cutter and the change.
Nine outs, eight strikeouts, 39 pitches.
Five teams are likely to be slapping foreheads that they missed on this kid.
His day is over after three, but WHAT a debut.
I’ve barfed up enough comments on this board about my feeling on Hernandez. Don’t care if the Halos had to go overslot and have less money to spread around, this kid is not your average prep-arm. You don’t pass-up a potential franchise prep-arm with No.1 starter ability. I am hopeful Johnny Slawinski helps takes the sting out of not drafting Seth.
I was locked in on Seth too, thought he was clearly the best prospect in the draft. His stuff is simply ridiculous and he was commanding a true 4-pitch mix as a HSer.
Oh well, I suppose. Happy with Bremner and hoping we hit on a couple of the prep arms — looking at Slawinski and Haley
Not to sound like I am down on Bremner, looks like his change-up can get major league hitters out. Looking forward to a his first full year of development, pray for health.
I was happy the Halos went over slot with Slawinski (Bremnar savings). After Seth, Johnny was up there in the top prep-arm rankings. Exciting to see what this year pans out.
If Slawinski and/or Haley develop into solid starters, with Bremner making continuing to refine his other offerings, that might be even a better deal and I can stop my whining. It will be interesting.
I nattered on for a couple months about how I had a rule that you never draft a prep pitcher in round one (the data tells the tale of broken hearts), but that Hernandez might be a rare exception to that rule.
By draft day, he had dropped to #3 on my Angels board (still calling him the “unicorn from Corona”), because I just couldn’t see the Minasian draft room going in that direction, and all chatter pointed to discount selections (the chatter was right!). I focused on the two BPAs that I thought the Angels might legitimately select, even as my heart kept Hernandez in the picture.
My draft pitching feature actually started with Seth, but quickly wrote him off as a pipe dream.
If the kid stays healthy, he looks like a crazy complement to Skenes in that rotation.
The doyers got 10 RBI from their top 4 in the batting order today. Is that good?
Had a pretty close spot for Trout’s Roger Lodge interview earlier
That’s awesome, man.
Noice.
Victor Mederos is officially out of the Angels org, traded to – you guessed it – the Atlanta Braves
The Angels get international bonus space back, which hopefully presages an interesting future Latin sign or two this year.
The Angels received $250,000 in international bonus pool money from the Braves in the trade for RHP Víctor Mederos, per sources.
Now, the Angels have increased it to nearly $600,000 for the remainder of the international period, through December 15.
https://x.com/i/status/2040163672329232493
The way that tweet is written is a bit confusing. Intl bonus pool cash is traded in $250k increments. Can’t tell if the 600k is cumulative remaining pool bonus, or part of the Mederos exchange.
Definitely confusing. I read it as $250k for Mederos, which brings the remaining pool to $600k.
AA threw Perry a bone here because we lost Mederos to our own roster mismanagement.
Let’s sweep the Mariners and get the vibes right.
Their impotent offense is the perfect elixir to get Silent C and RJ right. Detmers is gonna show out for the home opener, you best believe that
Would still prefer Trout at leadoff, followed by Neto then Schanny.
I’m also Ok with Trout leading off, Schanny in the 2-hole and Neto 3rd.
I’m not too worried about whatever order those guys are, it’s Moncada and Soler batting higher than Adell that irks me
This!! Soler is killing it with a .148 average and 44% K rate 😂
Predictable, right?
Cubans are good at baseball, not our Cubans tho. You nailed your assessment of Soler and especially Moncada
I’d OK with giving Soler a bit more time to “find it” based on his strong Spring and track record.
Moncada has done virtually nothing in his career over the past 4-5 seasons to warrant his position in the batting order. In fact, we would probably do better with inserting ANYONE in his stead.
Jeff covered who should hit behind Trout. Sounds about right to me.
https://www.si.com/mlb/angels/onsi/who-should-hit-behind-mike-trout-01kmv971mwyj
I’ll probably get beat up for this but I’ll say it anyway. Every time I read something like this (referring to the analysis in Jeff’s Column) from someone here, which is just about everyday on one subject or another, It infuriates me that posters here who look a these things as a hobby, can figure this out, but the people in the organization who get paid big bucks to do this for a living, can’t figure it out. This isn’t that hard and there may not be on perfect solution but there are certainly a few that should be tried that make far more sense than the current one. You can’t feel sorry for these people because they are just idiots. I’ll bet you if you presented Jeff’s argument to them they wouldn’t be able to appreciate or understand it.
Home Opener is Sold Out!
Some seats available tomorrow but all 400/500 level sold out ($3 tickets direct from angels). Hope I still get a calendar! Kids keep reminding me.
Lots of tickets for other $3 ticket games 4/5-4/8.
Yeah I waited until last minute thinking demand would be low. I did get a good deal on club level but definitely more money than I anticipated spending
Just got my tix in 523 for tomorrow. Hope my 4 year old can hang until the fireworks, but I doubt it.
I thought the same on Shani hitting behind Trout as he offers almost nothing that opposition pitchers fear. I would pitch around Trout and try to get him to chase. That’s exactly what is happening with Trout now chasing more. Not a ton of great options in this line up but this doesn’t seem to be working.
If you don’t confine yourself to just Angels farm ball, the current AA series in the Southern League between the Midland Rockhounds and Arkansas Travelers is really fun this weekend. I listened to yesterday’s afternoon game before the Quakes contest. These are the AA clubs for the A’s and Mariners respectively, and they’re stacked. The #2 and #3 ranked affiliates at any level of the minors.
Tonight, Kade Anderson starts against Jamie Arnold to give you a flavor. Those two were 1-2 on my Angels draft board last summer, so it’ll be exciting to see who triumphs.
5pm start time.
Additionally, two more really fun farm contests this Friday…
Kyson Witherspoon makes his pro debut today for the Greenville Drive (Boston’s High-A club) against the Pirates’ loaded club. And down the ladder at Single-A, phenom / future-ace Seth Hernandez goes up against Trey Yesavage, who is on rehab assignment with Toronto’s low-A club. That’s quite the matchup!
Yesavage was top of my draft board with Cam Smith when the Angels selected Moore in ’24, and Seth Hernandez would’ve been the most exciting pick the Angels could have made over Bremner in the ’25 draft. (I ultimately had Anderson/Arnold ahead of him for probability/safety, but there’s no question that Hernandez would have been a really fun follow, with tons of upside.)
Four of the six top arms from last year’s draft are in action today, and Bremner goes tomorrow. Not sure when Doyle is slated to pitch for Springfield – he doesn’t seem to be on tap for this weekend.
Salt Lake was rained out yesterday but I listened to the first Quakes game and Dylan Jordan picked up where he left off last year. They let him go five innings in a pitch-efficient 76 pitch outing. He scattered three singles, didn’t walk anyone, and struck out eight in a scoreless outing.
Seattle farm pitching largely kept Alvarez quiet, but the Quakes eked out a 4-2 victory, and they led throughout.
67% strike rate, lots of first pitch strikes, good command throughout. Not a lot of velo reads on the radio broadcast.
To put this in more context, Jordan is carrying a 0.80 ERA over his last eight starts at Single-A. If he continues like this, a promotion to Tri-City later in May is not out of the question.
Some video:
https://x.com/i/status/2039901896710725877
Bad-ass.
Gotta love the pitchability. Jordan is a stud
Kevyn Castillo is intriguing. Mid-sized Venezuelan outfielder starting his third consecutive season in the Cal League, despite posting fairly decent stats in the first two (slightly under .800 OPS). But still only 20-years old, since he started his career at 16. Never/rarely mentioned on prospect lists.
Some bat to ball skills but not much power projection. Light utility profile. Gets mentioned at the very back of top 50 lists like Prospects Live 1500. While young-ish, he’s repeating the level for a third year, and I think he’d likely struggle against better pitching at A+/AA. Alvarez has pushed him to LF on the Quakes.
If the Angels had a bit more farm depth, I think he would’ve been promoted already, but they’re pretty shy about putting developmental bats in the weird Northwest League.
Dylan Jordan is a top 100 prospect in baseball. Made his 2026 debut yesterday in Low A —
5 IP
0 ER
3 hits
8 Ks
Lucas Ramirez, keeping that WBC momo rolling. Manny’s boy can ball —
3/4
2 doubles
2 RBIs
Would love to see a pre-2025 scouting report on Lucas… to better grasp how slid into draft-flier territory. I know there were doubts about his power… but he seemed to check so many other boxes.
He was raw and mostly projection at the time, plus was committed to Tennessee, so his signability was in question. He hadn’t demonstrated a ton of game power (4 HRs in his senior season) in HS, though the athleticism was there.
Perfect Game graded him a 9 out of 10 – basically a top 500 prep ranking nationally, appropriate for the back half of the 10 rounds – in practice, most of those kids just go to college.
There’s a scouting summary in this 2023 article that covers his commitment to the Vols at the time:
https://247sports.com/college/tennessee/article/tennessee-vols-baseball-manny-ramirez-lucas-ramirez-commits-tony-vitello-203400380/
Right. And yet… steered away from college for $100K? Obviously didn’t want to be a Vol that much. I’m not a conspiracy guy – I’m really not! Moon landing legit! 9/11 as billed! – but I wonder if some x-factor crept into the equation prior to enrollment.
Probably just more attached to baseball than college. Not every kid is into school – and he’s been steeped in baseball his whole life. All the reporting around the signing was that he had some serious conversations with his father, and Manny said why not, go for it.
He wasn’t a top ranked prospect, so didn’t have a ton of leverage. I imagine he wasn’t slated for regular play at the outset with the Vols, so decided to go somewhere where he could make his baseball his daily gig and focus.
He spent his first year in instructs, working a lot on conditioning and fundamentals. He’s still no sure thing yet – but is becoming viewed as a potential follow prospect, though he hasn’t cracked the top 30 Angels farmhands of any of the major lists yet (MLB, BA, FG). The idea that something was afoot during draft time presumes that he was more coveted than he was at the time.
If he can follow up his WBC highlights with a few sustained months of high performance, that’ll change, and I imagine he’ll be viewed more in the Raudi/Rio mold, as he’s at a similar age / inflection point in his career trajectory as they were last season. When you watch him, however, just keep in mind the context: Cal League pitching is pretty poor, defense is raw, and it’s a very offense-oriented league.
Official rosters have been slow to materialize in the lower minors, but here’s MLB’s link to where each of the Halos’ Top 30 prospects will be starting the season. The two most aggressive rosterings, IMO: Raudi in AA and Talon Haley in Rancho. Talon, especially… the lone 2025 HS draftee to skip the AZL altogether (Davilillo also skipping it, evidently). Not even Slawinski is doing that. They must like what they see in Talon’s makeup/approach.
https://www.mlb.com/angels/news/angels-prospects-team-assignments-to-open-2026-season?t=mlb-pipeline-coverage
The individual affiliates announced their preseason rosters on Tuesday. I shared them in the comment section on Tuesday’s news crash:
https://crashingthepearlygates.com/2026/03/31/la-angels-tuesday-news-crash-84/
The roster section of each MiLB affiliate site has been up to date with full rosters for a couple days.
Amazing!
Jake Munroe also getting a nice push into Tri-City…
Out of necessity to an extent – the shelves are barren batwise. I was surprised Alford didn’t get the same promotion, as he outplayed Munroe imo last fall. Alford was hitting cleanup and playing first in the Quakes game last night.
Does anyone know where Dana has been assigned. Unless I missed it (quite possible), I didn’t see him on the AAA or AA rosters. Is he hurt?
The ACL Angels “activated” him in March so looks like they’re keeping him in camp… recovering from mono.
I had forgotten about the Mono. Thanks,
Eventually tagged for AAA once he recovers.
Suzuki is experimenting with the lineup — like most managers. The Halos don’t really have many obvious options at many spots. They don’t have that many consistent hitters. When guys are hot, they fit in spots. When they aren’t, many are seven hole hitters.
See what happens. The same for the future. We all know what Arte has done. That said, if you or me owned the team and our GMs brought us Stephenson, Rendon, and others for big money and then a player died via drug use and we got blamed and then our local TV deal cratered and it looked like there might be a player lockout next season, the purse strings might become a lot tighter. Why pay money when the deals you sign don’t work out anyway?
Let’s all hope the future is somehow brighter. Some of the young guys need to become quality players, including the pitchers.
Don’t even defend Arte. He’s allegedly a “master businessman” and should know that all investments…. like signing players….may not work out the way planned. It’s the “price” of being a billionaire and owning a sports franchise. Furthermore, just because prior player decisions didn’t work out is no excuse for not trying to win. Lastly, Arte hired Perry and extended his contract. If Perry is driving the car off a cliff, remember who gave him the keys and bought the fuel.
Arturo and his intern Minasian are quite simply pathetic. The only remaining question is when will they be gone.
Who hired the GM, and the GM before him, and the GM before him, and the GM before him?
If the problem is “nothing I do works out” maybe walk away?
I’m not sure I understand the rationalization that its not Arte’s fault everything he has overseen continues to fail and sunk the org to Rockies/Marlins-level futility. If we were discussing Starbucks or Apple or any other American business, the CEO would be facing immense pressure to perform. Why should Arte be given a safe space?
Maybe because he’s the owner, not the CEO?
Especially the pitchers! If you have good young pitchers, you can pretty easily get whatever else you need.
What to eat at the Big A
I’m lagging on my food at the Big A piece. Went to the media event and ate way too much.
I have a good excuse, though. And I’ll drop it soon.
Awesome! My guess is an in depth interview 🙂
Pac man chomp stop
I did a piece on that too.
https://www.si.com/mlb/angels/onsi/angels-home-opener-upgraded-pac-man-pavilion-will-be-a-hit-with-families-01kn11ktnfbn
Can’t wait to go tomorrow and again on Sunday! Good read
Angels Home Promos
Clear backpack looks cool. We still use the mother’s day clear bags from a few years ago.