Albert Pujols released...

[Docwaukee]

I seriously think the only reason Albert wants at bats is to have a shot at 700 hrs.  

Unless I missed it somewhere buried in the 38 pages of this thread, Arte has been curiously silent in all of this.  I'm gonna throw out some speculation that there may have been an ego clash here between Arte and Albert.  And my guess is that Arte is actually pretty pissed at Albert for not accepting his role as a bench player ie doing what's best for the team.   

[T.G.]

2 hours ago, yk9001 said:

He's a prissy, complaining, negative-WAR bitch

Nerdy insults are the best!

[Docwaukee]

5 minutes ago, True Grich said:

Nerdy insults are the best!

stop WAR shaming us.  

[totdprods]

7 minutes ago, Dochalo said:

I seriously think the only reason Albert wants at bats is to have a shot at 700 hrs.  

Unless I missed it somewhere buried in the 38 pages of this thread, Arte has been curiously silent in all of this.  I'm gonna throw out some speculation that there may have been an ego clash here between Arte and Albert.  And my guess is that Arte is actually pretty pissed at Albert for not accepting his role as a bench player ie doing what's best for the team.   

I have no doubt in my mind that part of this is Albert wanting to get to 700 and crack top ten in hits. I also don’t think that it means he’s completely selfish or doesn’t care about winning or helping the team. If he got to 700, that means he’s clubbed 30 HR for us, and in his mind, that is productive, which is what he believes his job to have been. The guy has far too long of a track record of being a great teammate and professional for me to believe he is solely about the stats. 

But he can also certainly in denial about how much the rest of his game is affecting the team. When you’ve produced as long as he has it has to be hard to recognize when you’ve not just declined, but become a liability.

If the Angels weren’t desperate to make the playoffs and didn’t have the Ohtani/Walsh logjam at his positions, he’d be here still. 

Overall it’s just a sad but brutally true scenario playing out. It’s not good for the Angels, it’s not good for Albert, it’s not good for baseball, but nothing playing out is really that unfair or egregious. There’s no story, no villains, no heroes. I honestly hope he latches on somewhere, somehow, and gets a shot to keep hitting even in a limited capacity because it would suck to see one of the games best players leave so abruptly and unceremoniously.

[totdprods]

Crazy as it is, Pujols was still ‘on pace’ to put up 33 HR, 81 RBI over 650 plate appearances this year. 

Bert’s been around so long, even when he was a teenager, even before he was signed, that the concept of a productive hitter was still relatively limited to HR and RBI. He was still hitting the ball hard and over the fence. I can see how, in the era in which he was developed, he still thinks he’s capable of doing his job. 

A big part of this is a generation gap. The game has changed. 

[Redondo]

AP could have lost weight and put in some work in the off-season to be in better shape

He also could have used the whole field to get more hits as opposed to trying to hit a home run all the time

I believe that doing those things would have helped him to slow the decline

But it seems that chasing home runs was more important than the team 

[failos]

1 hour ago, eligrba said:

 I guess Albert wants the money and the playing time. (Neither being earned) Albert's parents should call the athletic director and demand a change.

Pujols’ dad is a molester (no joke)

[Angel Oracle]

13 minutes ago, totdprods said:

Crazy as it is, Pujols was still ‘on pace’ to put up 33 HR, 81 RBI over 650 plate appearances this year. 

Bert’s been around so long, even when he was a teenager, even before he was signed, that the concept of a productive hitter was still relatively limited to HR and RBI. He was still hitting the ball hard and over the fence. I can see how, in the era in which he was developed, he still thinks he’s capable of doing his job. 

A big part of this is a generation gap. The game has changed. 

I looked at the numbers so far over the 88 PAs that don’t include the 5 HRs, and they are very bad.

.150/.200/.200/.400 OPS, approximate numbers 

That plus the very bad defense = Halos had no other choice but to curtail his playing time.

The only thing they could have done differently was to let Joe start him Wednesday night, and then have Perry meet with Joe and Albert to advise him of the need to cut back playing time.   That would at least keep the media off the Halos backs.

[Jay]

9 minutes ago, Angel Oracle said:

The only thing they could have done differently was to let Joe start him Wednesday night, and then have Perry meet with Joe and Albert to advise him of the need to cut back playing time.   That would at least keep the media off the Halos backs.

Angels can't seem to do anything right.

Even when they're right they're wrong.

[totdprods]

23 minutes ago, Angel Oracle said:

I looked at the numbers so far over the 88 PAs that don’t include the 5 HRs, and they are very bad.

.150/.200/.200/.400 OPS, approximate numbers 

That plus the very bad defense = Halos had no other choice but to curtail his playing time.

The only thing they could have done differently was to let Joe start him Wednesday night, and then have Perry meet with Joe and Albert to advise him of the need to cut back playing time.   That would at least keep the media off the Halos backs.

Oh yeah, no excuse. He was a one-trick pony at this point. Especially once he lost all defense and Walsh emerged. Literally all he could do was pop a HR every couple dozen ABs. He had held onto a bit of ability to come through in situations with runners on in recent years but that vanished too. That was about all he had going for him the last five years...acceptable defense, some power, and a knack for producing hits when runners were on.

All of that started going away last year and quickly dried up this year, except for the occasional HR.

[Dtwncbad]

4 hours ago, yk9001 said:

 

For ten fucking years, too many of you have believed that the Angels owe Pujols  something mystical and magical for what he produced with the Cardinals.  

The Angels paid the man a quarter of a billion dollars - and back 10 years ago, that was actually worth something - and got jack shit in return.  Pujols never came close to living up to his contract with the Angels.  And you two idiots are still clamoring for "respect" for him for what he did eons ago.

He's a prissy, complaining, negative-WAR bitch, who hasn't been worthy of a major league roster spot in years.  The Angels bent over backwards to try to appease him.  But his production wasn't worth a tenth of what the Angels did for him.  Passing some dead guy on an all-time RBI list never helped the Angels at all in the past 10 years.

F that guy.

 

I really didn’t have a problem with the contract originally and I knew he would decline and I knew at some point toward the end that the dollars out versus production would look ugly.

I hoped for 5-6 big years, then like 2 passable years.

His performance from day one against those expectations came up short but I resisted being overly pissed about it because it isn’t my money and there is always risk in long term contracts.

I thought he carried himself professionally so I always gave him as much respect as I could given his historical significance, what looked like his pure intentions to do his best, the kind of person he appeared to be off the field, and the way he stayed classy.

My “respect” for Pujols, despite the lackluster on-the-field performance was pretty fucking high.

This last page of the Pujols story with him expecting to be in the lineup when he is terrible took a measurable chunk out of my overall respect for him.  He screwed this up.

Given how much I (and likely tons of other fans) gave Albert the highest level of respect that I think he had earned, the funniest thing is seeing fans whining that somehow everyone owes him unconditional unlimited respect no matter what.

Nobody on earth deserves unconditional unlimited respect.  You get what you earn, and you better believe you can damage how much respect you get if you act like everybody owes you unconditional unlimited respect along the way.  Make a jackass mistake and it matters.

I wish him the best, but his respect score with me dropped.

We might get more details here along the way that might change that (in either direction).

 

[Blarg]

The Angels should have cut him loose three years ago. 

[yk9001]

17 minutes ago, Dtwncbad said:

I really didn’t have a problem with the contract originally and I knew he would decline and I knew at some point toward the end that the dollars out versus production would look ugly.

I hoped for 5-6 big years, then like 2 passable years.

His performance from day one against those expectations came up short but I resisted being overly pissed about it because it isn’t my money and there is always risk in long term contracts.

I thought he carried himself professionally so I always gave him as much respect as I could given his historical significance, what looked like his pure intentions to do his best, the kind of person he appeared to be off the field, and the way he stayed classy.

My “respect” for Pujols, despite the lackluster on-the-field performance was pretty fucking high.

This last page of the Pujols story with him expecting to be in the lineup when he is terrible took a measurable chunk out of my overall respect for him.  He screwed this up.

Given how much I (and likely tons of other fans) gave Albert the highest level of respect that I think he had earned, the funniest thing is seeing fans whining that somehow everyone owes him unconditional unlimited respect no matter what.

Nobody on earth deserves unconditional unlimited respect.  You get what you earn, and you better believe you can damage how much respect you get if you act like everybody owes you unconditional unlimited respect along the way.  Make a jackass mistake and it matters.

I wish him the best, but his respect score with me dropped.

We might get more details here along the way that might change that (in either direction).

 

In 10 frigging years with this guy, I never saw anything about helping the team win a championship.  It was always about his stats, and his milestones.

I've been wrong about stuff a fair bit on this site over the years.  But I smelled this turd for what it was by May 2012.

 

And I don't feel one ounce of sympathy for Arte.  The original spring 2012 marketing/billboards were touting how many championships and batting titles we had (with guys doing it on other teams).  Seemed like a terrible marketing idea then, and it certainly was in hindsight.  But what do I know, I am just a CPA, not a frigging marketing genius like Arte.

[thebloob]

Another forgotten thing is that fowlers injury forced Walsh to RF which opened up first base.   Had he not tore his knee up this whole situation may have played out earlier. 

[T.G.]

This thread should be required reading for any new AW members.

[ten ocho recon scout]

13 hours ago, st1ckboy said:

 

"THERE GO THE GAWDAMN BROWNIES!"

love that movie. 

[ten ocho recon scout]

12 hours ago, Angelsjunky said:

Albert's Angels legacy:

.256/.311/.447, 106 wRC+, 5.7 WAR in 1181 games, averaging 0.6 per year.

$253 million (including personal services contract and 3000 hits bonus). That's $44.4 million per WAR.

finally putting to rest the question of WAR, and what its good for.

[Dtwncbad]

54 minutes ago, yk9001 said:

In 10 frigging years with this guy, I never saw anything about helping the team win a championship.  It was always about his stats, and his milestones.

I've been wrong about stuff a fair bit on this site over the years.  But I smelled this turd for what it was by May 2012.

 

And I don't feel one ounce of sympathy for Arte.  The original spring 2012 marketing/billboards were touting how many championships and batting titles we had (with guys doing it on other teams).  Seemed like a terrible marketing idea then, and it certainly was in hindsight.  But what do I know, I am just a CPA, not a frigging marketing genius like Arte.

Oh don’t get me wrong, the contract was basically a failure for everyone involved. . . Except Pujols.  No question.

[yk9001]

35 minutes ago, ten ocho recon scout said:

finally putting to rest the question of WAR, and what its good for.

Although one wonders if "War and Peace" would have been as highly acclaimed as it was if it was published under its original name "War: What Is It Good For?"/ Elaine Benes

[Billy_Ball]

Arte's TV deal with Fox (Bally) Sports.

[Dtwncbad]

35 minutes ago, Billy_Ball said:

Arte's TV deal with Fox (Bally) Sports.

I am pretty sure the Angels would have a very healthy broadcast contract with or without Albert Pujols.

[Puget Sound Angel]

1 hour ago, Billy_Ball said:

Arte's TV deal with Fox (Bally) Sports.

Explain Bally Sports to a person living in Seattle please.

[thebloob]

Certainly not a man of his word.  He told the cardinals fans he would never leave just for more money.   The told the angels fans he’d retire when he couldn’t contribute.  Neither happened.  

[St1ck]

6 minutes ago, Puget Sound Angel said:

Explain Bally Sports to a person living in Seattle please.

Sinclair bought out Fox Sports and then sold the naming rights of the channel to Bally's. 

[ten ocho recon scout]

13 minutes ago, Puget Sound Angel said:

Explain Bally Sports to a person living in Seattle please.