Players from rival teams you have a secret crush on

[ten ocho recon scout]

I dont know about everyone else, but I rarely cheer for non Angels. Theres guys who I of course acknowledge are very good. Like Bellinger for example. But I hate the dodgers, so I dont "like" him. Then theres guys like Yelich, who isnt a rival, but still not an Angel, so Im more or less neutral... but realize hes a beast.

Whos your rival that you actually like, but keep it to yourself because hes a "bad guy"?

Vlad and Nomar were my 2 secret guys back in the day. Thats why I was so ecstatic when we signed Vlad.

The other two.... who to this day I love, were total Angel killers. Always dominated us, but was fun to watch. The first was Halladay. My god that guy was fun to watch pitch. And he owned us. 

The other, who to this day is my favorite pitcher ever, was Randy Johnson. Absolute nightmare against us, and 95 makes it worse. But forget Maddox, Clemons, Pedro (who I hate... but think was the best). Johnson was the "coolest" pitcher ever. Ugly as hell, big, intimidating. And that slider was as iconic as say Griffey's swing, or Arods lips.

[Claude]

Gerrit Cole

 

 

 

 

 

.....@ngelswin

[PattyD22]

2 guys.  Current player Justin Turner.  Former player, Derek Jeter.

i just feel like both guys are competitive players and seem like great teammates.  

[kevinb]

I like Bruce Harper I don’t know why but I do. My favorite sports athletes growing up we’re Jordan and Deion Sanders even though I wasn’t a fan of either of their teams. Bryce is brash and I enjoy that I guess. Something different than baseball players usually. 

[m0nkey]

Not a rival player but because everyone makes everything a comparison, Bryce Harper

[Justin]

Kershaw seems like a great guy and in his (non-postseason) prime, he was spectacular to watch on the mound, like he was conducting a symphony. (Up until a couple of years ago, I would have said Altuve as well, but I got sick of the Astros real fast and the events of the last few months have multiplied that.)

However, there will never, ever be another non-Angel whom I love more than I did Tony Gwynn. 

[PattyD22]

5 minutes ago, SoPas Angel said:

 

However, there will never, ever be another non-Angel whom I love more than I did Tony Gwynn. 

Great choice

[failos]

It used to be Anthony Rendon.

[failos]

I just rewatched watched game 7 of the 2001 WS...and, may Allah forgive me for uttering this, but Jeter and Clemens were the shit. 

[Lhalo]

We're gonna need some bans handed out for some of the disgusting shit in this thread.

[floplag]

For the longest time, for me, it was Beltre.  Knowing how close we came to getting him, how great a fit he would have been all those years, how much better we would have been, and yes how he always seemed to rub our noses in it. 

 

 

[Claude]

Mark Teixeira was such a perfect fit until he bolted for the east coast. That really sucked. 

[Brandon]

George Brett

[Stradling]

Will Clark

[Claude]

Jack Clark 

[Stradling]

[Lou]

2 hours ago, SoPas Angel said:

However, there will never, ever be another non-Angel whom I love more than I did Tony Gwynn. 

Beat me to it. 

[m0nkey]

Growing up, I always liked watching A-Rod, Chipper Jones, and Jim Thome.  Arod and Chipper because they were on TV so much and so good.  I don't know how or why Jim Thome became one of my favorites as a kid.

[Tank]

my all time favorite player is johnny bench. loved watching him and the reds during the big red machine era. they were my national league team.

also a big fan of griffey, jr. and gwynn. of the current crop of players, i like watching yelich and bellinger.

 

[PattyD22]

I don’t think there will be another player like Cal Ripken Jr anymore.

Another player who just loved to play the game.  Not only with his consecutive game streak but he stayed loyal to one team his whole career.  

[Ace-Of-Diamonds]

Sandy Koufax

[ten ocho recon scout]

3 hours ago, SoPas Angel said:

Kershaw seems like a great guy and in his (non-postseason) prime, he was spectacular to watch on the mound, like he was conducting a symphony. (Up until a couple of years ago, I would have said Altuve as well, but I got sick of the Astros real fast and the events of the last few months have multiplied that.)

However, there will never, ever be another non-Angel whom I love more than I did Tony Gwynn. 

Agreed.

I met kershaw once... really nice guy. And at his peak he was pretty amazing. And funny enough, ditto on altuve.

And I think gwynn is every baseball fans guy... i cant think of anyone who wasnt a fan of that guy.

[ten ocho recon scout]

1 hour ago, m0nkey said:

Growing up, I always liked watching A-Rod, Chipper Jones, and Jim Thome.  Arod and Chipper because they were on TV so much and so good.  I don't know how or why Jim Thome became one of my favorites as a kid.

Thome is a good one.

[ten ocho recon scout]

Going further back I go with Ricky Henderson. I think hes the most underrated MLB player ever. At his peak he was young trout. 

[fanfromday1]

I was introduced to Baseball by my Dad back in the in the late 1940s, but didn't learn to fully appreciate the game until the early 1950s when I became older. There were no major league teams on the west coast back then, so we followed teams from the old Pacific Coast League, mainly the LA Angels and Hollywood Stars. My hometown hero back then was Steve Bilko who played for the PCL Angels, and in 1961 also played for the MLB Angels.

My Dad was also a fan of the old Brooklyn Dodgers and at that time that was the only connection I had to the MLB. I knew all the Dodger players names: Newcombe, Campanella, Furillo, Hodges, Snyder, Pee-Wee Reese, etc. It was about that time that I started collecting Baseball cards. Back then the baseball cards came in a small package of Bazooka bubblegum with 5 or 6 cards usually wrapped in a small comic. The gum tasted awful and often times stuck to the cards, or stained them. But collecting the cards was the only way that I was able to learn the stats, and names, of the other MLB players. (In December of 1960 when the AL held their draft to select the new Angel and Washington teams I spent most of the night going thru all my baseball cards trying to locate as many of the new Angel players as I could. I also made quite a few phone calls to trade cards with friends to get BB cards of players I didn't already have). 

When the Dodgers relocated here in 1958 it was my first chance to see professional baseball, and get to see all the great players that were in the National League. So the first couple years that the Dodgers were in LA, my Dad and I would go to see as many of the games as possible. We wanted to see as many of the great players as we could. Players like: Aaron, Mays, Musial, Banks, Spahn, Clemente, Mathews, etc. It was a once in a lifetime experience and also, kind of a dream come true to see all these great players in person.

When the current Angels came into existence in 1961 it gave me a chance to see the best players in the American league. It also allowed me to return to the place where I learned to love baseball, Wrigley Field. My Dad and I went to the Angels inaugural home game against Minnesota back in 1961. We lost, but it didn't matter , because now I was once again an Angel fan, and this time it would be for a lifetime.   

For me it would be hard to pick one favorite player from the Angeles or any other team. I have seen so many fantastic players over the last 65 to 70 years of my life that it would be almost impossible to chose just a single one. But I would have to admit that Mike Trout is right up there.

(Here's an obscure fact that many of you may not know. In 1957, a year before the Dodgers moved here from Brooklyn, they bought the PCL Angels from Wrigley, the owner of the Chicago Cubs. They moved the Angels to Spokane, Wa. and, for a few years, it served as one their minor league teams. The other Los Angeles PCL team, the Hollywood Stars left town that same year and moved to Utah and became the Salt Lake City Bee's. Who are now an Angels minor league team).