Albert Pujols released...

[tdawg87]

1 minute ago, Taylor said:

He went through a counted.

 

 

Just kidding. It's in the top-right corner of the screen. It's how we know that @Lou is the biggest contributor to the Trumped thread.

Im on an android you silly goose

[Stradling]

3 hours ago, Lou said:

Why did I think you hate that show?  

[Taylor]

1 minute ago, tdawg87 said:

Im on an android you silly goose

I guess you have to be on a desktop to see the very important stats.

[UndertheHalo]

7 minutes ago, beatlesrule said:

I missed this. If this really happened, wow. I believe him about Pujols. I thought it was an absolute no brainer to resign Hunter but Moreno signed Hamilton instead. Like many here, I was very against it especially when Hunter said he was told there was no money. Hunter was a class act here and went on to still be productive in Detroit. Certainly produced more WAR than Hamilton for way cheaper.  One of Moreno's many mistakes.

Honestly, Arte had sort of been able to hide because of cartoon characters like the Wilpons.  I get the Angels aren’t the biggest team in the league but they aren’t small.  They’re in a huge market and they’ve got big time players.  The last decade or more has been pretty bad and increasingly more and more of it seems like the dysfunction is directly sourced from Arturo.  

[St1ck]

2 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

Im on an android you silly goose

 

[Dtwncbad]

19 minutes ago, cals said:

If Pujols genuinely wouldn’t accept being a part-time player then I suppose the Angels had to do this.  Optics still look terrible, but ultimately it’s on Albert if he cousins accept he’s not a starter.

Optics only look terrible to people who lack the brainpower to see things clearly.

[UndertheHalo]

It’s great that the Pujols era is blessedly over……finally.  But this is a shit show.  It should have happened at least 2 years ago.  Like they’ve somehow managed this as badly as possible. 

[thebloob]

The news tomorrow will include two random attacks a la tonya Harding on Walsh and ohtani.  The masked perpetrator could be seen running very slowly away.  

[tdawg87]

1 minute ago, st1ckboy said:

 

I don't know how to see this but damn I need to take it down a notch.

[ettin]

So we all suspected this day might come and it arrived abruptly 5 weeks into the 2021 season, catching most of us by surprise (including me).

Clearly this was unplanned to a degree, because if the Angels had wanted to axe him they could have simply done it pre-season and you would think that if they had it planned they would have found a more gracious exit point, than mid-day on a random Thursday in May.

I'm sure the previous several pages have speculated on it, but it really sounds like a simple case of Albert Pujols wanting more playing time and the Angels refusing to give it to him. There is always the argument that players playing part-time, can't find their rhythms at the plate and in the field, but I think Pujols is also unwilling to face the reality that his skills have diminished to the point that a bench role or retirement is suddenly here.

The Angels are making the right call here in terms of on-field performance, so that isn't the issue from my perspective. I think that they probably wanted to give Pujols a chance to show production and made the mistake of letting him play it out, rather than making the tougher call of cutting him before the season got underway. I think the latter would have been more graceful, the way it did happen was abrupt, surprised many even though it was always a known possibility, and just has an air and look of "meanness", despite the underlying logic of winning games.

On the same side, Pujols should know better, too. Despite having the blinders on, you can't hide diminished baseball skills and not know it inside your heart. Like many before him, he is holding onto the last vestiges of a prestigious career, even when it is quietly hurting his fellow teammates.

Not a great day in Angels history to be honest. It may prove to be a pivot point not just for the team and Albert, but for other members of the team as well. I can only imagine how Mike Trout is feeling right now, considering the relationship he cultivated with Pujols over the years.

I hope the fallout is not damaging to anyone, especially Albert, who I believe is a good man. He and his wife Deidre did so much for the St. Louis and Anaheim communities and their legacy will live on well after Pujols baseball career is finished, so I wish them all the best of health and happiness.

Thanks for all of the effort Albert, appreciate what you did for the community and the team. I wish you and your family well!

Go Angels!

[Torridd]

I guess I'm in the minority in that I don't feel celebratory for this. He just left a little sooner than I thought. He wasn't really blocking anyone from playing. The team still needs pitching and I don't think he soured the team like Jose Guillen did. I don't envision the team going on some big winning streak now.  

[IheartLA]

I'm guessing in Albert's mind they could have Walsh in RF and still play him and Ohtani everyday like they were doing. 

[Taylor]

13 minutes ago, beatlesrule said:

I missed this. If this really happened, wow. I believe him about Pujols. I thought it was an absolute no brainer to resign Hunter but Moreno signed Hamilton instead. Like many here, I was very against it especially when Hunter said he was told there was no money. Hunter was a class act here and went on to still be productive in Detroit. Certainly produced more WAR than Hamilton for way cheaper.  One of Moreno's many mistakes.

 

https://mlb.nbcsports.com/2013/08/23/report-torii-hunter-and-albert-pujols-nearly-came-to-blows-last-summer/

 

Quote

Pujols called out [Jered] Weaver for showing up a teammate the night before. Then he turned his attention on Hunter, blaming him for the dugout altercation with [C. J.] Wilson.

What Pujols did not know at the time was that Wilson and Hunter already had made amends, with the pitcher apologizing to the outfielder for overstepping his bounds in the dugout immediately following the game.

“Albert, you’d better get your facts straight,” a seething Hunter told Pujols.

Pujols said something back, and Hunter jumped him for being a bad teammate and pouting all season whenever he failed to get hits in a game, even in games the Angels won … and now he was going to call others out?

“Shut up, Torii,” Pujols snapped.

It was then that Hunter, from across the clubhouse, lost it and charged Pujols. [LaTroy] Hawkins and outfielder Vernon Wells had to restrain him.

The meeting proceeded from there, and when it was over, tempers still heated, Hunter had to be physically held back a second time from going after Pujols, who is described as wanting no part of the fight.

 

[St1ck]

2 minutes ago, st1ckboy said:

 

You see that post count indicator at the top of every page? Click on the arrow. 

[Torridd]

1 minute ago, Dtwncbad said:

Optics only look terrible to people who lack the brainpower to see things clearly.

What does that mean? You don't think DFAing a HOFer in his last year of a 10-year contract doesn't look bad for the Angels? This was definitely mishandled.

[yk9001]

49 minutes ago, Chuckster70 said:

 

Arte is a genius businessman.

[Angelsjunky]

55 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

I'm fine with WAR and wRC+ and shit like that. I get it.

But you can't just completely overlook the "old people" stats.

He's 3rd all time in RBI's. Only Ruth and Aaron have more.

He's 5th all time in doubles. Tris Speaker, Ty Cobb, Pete Rose, and Stan Musial are ahead of him.

He's 5th all time in homeruns. 

So yeah, WAR is great. wRC+. Find some more stats that he isn't impressive in. 

He's in the top 5 in HR, doubles, and RBI's and is 32nd all time in WAR. 

Saying he's one of the top 10 players all time is not at all a ridiculous statement. 

 

53 minutes ago, beatlesrule said:

I think the fact that him and Hammering Hank are the only 2 players ever with over 3000 hits and 600 doubles and 600 home runs or something like that puts him higher on that list. He has more home runs, more rbi's etc than Gehrig, Foxx and Anson do too. These are not my opinions just what people might be looking at.

 

42 minutes ago, REDneck said:

Ok...I'm not a huge stats guy particularly with the advanced stats, but I can appreciate them and your logic.

Will you acquiesce to top 20?

That's still inner circle HOF

 

I'll respond to these three together, because they all relate.

"Greatness," as I see it, is a combination of quality and quantity. Hall of Famers score high in one or the other; inner circle Hall of Famers, both.

To some degree Pujols scores high in both, but the problem is that he accrued a lot of his counting stats at the expense of quality.  For the last five seasons he's been below replacement level; for the five years before that, barely an average regular.

So when we look at Albert's counting stats, sure, they're impressive, but the only reason they're as they are is because the Angels had to pay him. 

As to whether I'd call him top 20, while I'm not a WAR absolutist, it is the best overall measure of total contribution - at least right now. So I'd have to be convinced that eight of those guys were less great. Looking at the Fangraphs list, I would rank him #23 at most--meaning, I would say that the top 22 all had better careers. Once we get to Yaz, Ripken, Anson, Kaline, Boggs, Pujols, Connor and Brett (rounding off the top 30), I think it is debatable and somewhat arbitrary in terms of how to rank them.

So no, I would not consider him an "inner circle" Hall of Famer, but that might be semantics. For the sake of this discussion, I would posit three tiers of Hall of Famers:

Inner Circle ("Golden Hall"): Roughly the top 20 hitters and top 20 pitchers. One of the very best at their position.

Middle Circle ("Silver Hall"): A no-doubt Hall of Famer, but outside the inner circle.

Outer Circle ("Bronze Hall"): Borderline Hall of Famer, but got in. Some of these guys were lesser players than guys that didn't make it.

I'd put Pujols in the "Middle Circle," if in the top half. Meaning, if further divided the three circles into six tiers, two tiers per circle, I'd put Albert in tier 3. But I wouldn't put him in the Inner Circle (tiers 1 and 2). He would have been there if he declined at a close to typical rate, but his decline was one of the worst in history among players who were truly great in their 20s. Griffey is also in this category: Normal decline and he'd be inner circle. But his second half was as bad as Albert's.

Edited May 7, 2021 by Angelsjunky

[Angelsjunky]

That said, BR's WAR likes Albert quite a bit more. They have him second best among first basemen with 99.4, compared to 87.0 from Fangraphs. I think FG is a superior stat, so go with that. 

[Torridd]

3 minutes ago, IheartLA said:

I'm guessing in Albert's mind they could have Walsh in RF and still play him and Ohtani everyday like they were doing. 

Never thought of that, but there's still the issue that he's not hitting.

[JarsOfClay]

5 hours ago, Don said:

It honestly seems like this could have been handled by Albert and the team (maybe) a bit better. Sucks to have to release a HOF player in the final year of his career, but it had to be done. The optics are bad on both sides though. Pujols says he wants to keep playing, and that's just delusional on his part. I just wish someone from the Angels/someone in Pujols' camp could have talked him into taking a coaching position or something like that with the team. I'd have to think the Angels would have created a role for him on the staff to avoid this look.

What will he coach the players? How to see the ball? How to field? How to run the basepaths?

Ya no thank you.

I agree it's bad optics, but it's bad because Pujols forced the Angels hand instead of retiring when it was obvious his time was up.

[Dtwncbad]

4 minutes ago, Torridd said:

What does that mean? You don't think DFAing a HOFer in his last year of a 10-year contract doesn't look bad for the Angels? This was definitely mishandled.

No.  He had unreasonable expectations for his own playing time.  The Angels then gave him exactly what he wanted under the circumstances.  Go ahead and play somewhere else with not another day delay.

If it was mishandled it was mishandled by Pujols.  Embarrassing for him.

Edited May 7, 2021 by Dtwncbad

[AngelsLakersFan]

10 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

Im on an android you silly goose

When you get yourself a 34 inch monitor like me you'll be able to see the thread stats on the right hand side.

[Dtwncbad]

Just now, cals said:

Amazing you can then.

Insert Sarcastic Clapping here.

 

[Duren, Duren]

Things like this don't happen in a vacuum or overnight. He must have spoken to his agent and explored other possibilities for some time. If he wants to play more regularly he must know that opportunity will eventually come. Why quit and possibly never play again if no one was interested? Stay tuned... 

[yk9001]

49 minutes ago, fan_since79 said:

Angels are not foreseeing any kind of sendoff or tribute. Wow.

Why would they?

He practically stole a quarter billion dollars, and didn't do shit for the Angels.  

10 wasted years.