LA Times: Angels owner Arte Moreno should share vision of future with Mike Trout

[Blarg]

It's a good thing it's the Most Valuable Player award and not the Most Valuable Hitter award then, huh?

 

Sorry TDawg but Cabrera is running away with the award and Trout is not a challenge at all. Mike is close to last season's production at the plate but not base running or on the field.

 

Fielding and base running is what was propelling his WAR numbers last season to be considered the MVP last season. This year he just isn't generating that kind of peripheral numbers to match Cabrera's offensive numbers so their WAR totals are .8 apart instead of 3.8 last season.

 

I love Trout on our team but Cabrera is the league MVP so far this season.

[tdawg87]

This year he just isn't generating that kind of peripheral numbers to match Cabrera's offensive numbers so their WAR totals are .8 apart

 

So...he's still been the better player?

[Blarg]

Trout is possibly the best center fielder in baseball even though he has a -0.7 dWAR.

 

Cabrera is the AL MVP.

[tdawg87]

He'll win it, yeah, but he hasn't been a better player than Trout has. He's the best hitter in the game which is a feat in its own right but his bat is the only positive thing he provides his team.

 

BTW Trout is ahead of Cabrera by 1.1 in fWAR.

[Bruce Nye]

1. Small sample size.

2. The Brewers 1-8 is hardly quality wo/ Braun, Weeks, Hart...

 

 

Tampa Bay?  Are they poor quality? 

[Blarg]

It is the most valuable bat in all of baseball. That trumps all at some point when it is so prolific that it enters the realm of Ruth and Bonds in terms of dominance.

 

Since games are won by runs scored, when Cabrera is in the mix runs are scored to the point his little defensive contribution is negligible. If you think his defense can be held against him then you would have to actually find every play he was involved in that caused the Tigers to lose. Good luck with that.

 

Meanwhile regurgitate the formula you think covers your cause. If not BBRef then jump to Fangraphs until you get the right combinations of numbers crunched by a formula you have no control over to determine if they are weighting everything to suit their desire to give Dustin Ackley a 1.8 oWAR last season for hitting .226 with a .622 ops.

 

 

 

He'll win it, yeah, but he hasn't been a better player than Trout has. He's the best hitter in the game which is a feat in its own right but his bat is the only positive thing he provides his team.

 

BTW Trout is ahead of Cabrera by 1.1 in fWAR.

[tdawg87]

You are really trying to make a case for Cabrera being a better player than Mike Trout, and you're on an Angels message board.

 

I'm actually speechless right now. Bravo.

[Blarg]

And just so we are clear, Trout is worth more to the Angels in a long term contract than what Cabrera or Prince Fielder signed to play for the Tigers.

[tdawg87]

I agree with that.

[mancini79]

Cabrera is the best player in the league (not including pitchers). That is no knock on Trout, McCutch, Davis, Cano, Machado, Iannetta, etc...

 

But I like how writers are making the doom and gloom of this season play out that Trout's days are numbered here. Lets just enjoy watching him while he's here. The team could win the WS and still could lose him. Players leave for FA for numerous reasons.

[Vegas Halo Fan]

Dipoto improved the team prior to the 2012 season.  The existing players that he inherited failed. 

 

His moves sucked this year.

 

If he gets fired, then Arte is essentially telling any other GM that applies for the job 

1.  They can't bring in their own manager

2.  The owner may have a large role in deciding who to spend FA money on and therefore there will be limits to what they control

3.  They basically have 1 season to get the team to a championship level with this limited control, and even if they improve the team one year and the owner limits what they can do the next, if they make some bad moves and the team takes a step back they are gone. 

 

seems reasonable.  good luck to the next guy. 

 

This is precisely why I favor keeping the GM and replacing the manager. Dipoto is two years in and he has already begun rebuilding the farm system. This takes time, and to expect it to be accomplished in less than two seasons is unrealistic. Moreno's pursuit of and overpayment for underachieving, aging stars has torpedoed Dipoto's efforts to improve the major league roster while the farm is rebuilt. Canning Dipoto and bringing in another GM with the large specter of Scioscia hanging about (and knowing that he is likely to be there longer than the new GM) would have to give all but the most marginal candidates great pause about taking the job.

[tdawg87]

Cabrera is the best player in the league (not including pitchers).

 

No. Just...no. I'm not trying to be a homer or anything, but Trout is the best player in baseball right now. Cabrera is the best hitter.

[mancini79]

No. Just...no. I'm not trying to be a homer or anything, but Trout is the best player in baseball right now. Cabrera is the best hitter.

 

We can agree to disagree. This would be like comparing Frank Thomas to Ken Griffey Jr in the early 90's.

[tdawg87]

And just like the Trout/Cabrera argument, Griffey was the better all-around player, and Thomas was the better hitter.

[nate]

Cabrera is the worst fielder in the AL.  He is not the best player in baseball, he is the best hitter though.

[AngelsLakersFan]

I have no problem with Cabrera winning the MVP this year. He deserves it - even if the Angels were doing really well this year I would have no problem with Cabrera winning MVP (even if I would vote for Trout) because overall they have been pretty close. Last year that wasn't the case as Trout was way better and on an equally good team. Cabrera ended up winning due to a statistical anomaly.

 

When you take the whole package, offense, defense, position, over the last two years Trout has been significantly better. The bulk of that came from last year. This year Cabrera has had the best offensive season of his long career, with his track record we can safely say that Cabrera has played a little over his head (no reason to expect a duplicate performance next year). His numbers have slowly fell back to earth as the season has progressed.

 

This was an argument people made against Trout last year - his UZR was overly high and unreliable, his BABIP is high and unsustainable, he strikes out too much, etc. This year you can't make any of those arguments against Mike, he is having just as good of a season as last year but he has done it without the benefit of any statistical fortune. All that and he's still been a win or so better than Cabrera.

 

At this point I'm surprised there is even any debate among Angel fans. I'd expect to have to make a post like this on an MLB forum, not on here.

[YouthofToday]

Hopefully the "walks are a false stat" belief does not lead to the organization thinking Trout might, well, walk when he reaches FA. Considering certain parts of the organization's history this is not a bat shiz crazy sentiment.

[Troll Daddy]

The best all around player on a winning team would be Beltre. He's having a amazing season too.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Troll Daddy

[Halos of Anaheim]

Very negative article.  I responded to him via e-mail.  The team was wracked with multiple injuries during this season and is closer to being a good team than he states.  This current roadies shows that the rotation is working and the bullpen is finally able to do the job as hired (the now come in the 7th inning instead of the 4th or 5th).  And, finally the farm has three teams in the post season and is showing signs of developing some nice players.

 

Eff the doom and gloom.

We had stretches like this 2 other times this season then ended them with 9 out of 12 losses. We aren't a good team and the doom and gloom is warranted. A minor league team making the playoffs doesn't correlate to the talent on the team. The MAJORITY of the players on our AAA/AA/High A teams are older than league average and won't make the big leagues. We aren't developing anything that is considered ''nice'' right now other than a small handful of players.

 

Trout could be the first player to wear an Angels cap in Cooperstown, if he sticks around. He could have won the most valuable player award in each of his first two seasons, if not for the Angels' futility.

 

What? This year Cabrera is blowing Trout out of the water at the plate. There is little chance at all that Cabrera is not winning the MVP for a second season in a row.  

That's funny considering Trout has a higher oWAR than Cabrera this year AND last (and after tonight's near cycle game, it'll be even higher come tomorrow morning). Trout is the better overall baseball player, take hitting, baserunning (this doesn't only include stolen bases but stretching singles into doubles and doubles into triples, which Trout has done MANY times this season and last), and defense (even though metrics hate him this year, he's been very solid). There was an article done by Fangraphs (and ESPN) that showed Trout's value compared to Cabrera also stems from less DP's and more hits from errors (that aren't counted as hits, even though 80% of them were all due to his speed). http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/39536/should-reaching-on-errors-count-as-hits

 

Face it, Trout is the best all around player and does more at the plate and on the bases that aren't counted on a stat sheet than Cabrera.

 

To much emphasis on Trout here ... we still have him locked up for four years. Trout may be the best position player but it's still a team sport. Yes, you try to lock him up but you do it to save money through his arbitration years.

 

Until he can drive in 130+ rbi's and score 130+ runs I would not break the bank on him just yet. .

Jesus Christ lol. 

Edited September 2, 2013 by Halos of Anaheim

[Vegas Halo Fan]

"Mike, I have a vision for this team. That vision is, as soon as Derek Jeter retires, I'm going to sign him to a one-day contract so that he will retire as an Angel. Then we're going to build a twice-life-size statue of him and put it right in front of the stadium. I can't think of anything that would inspire our fans more. Oh, did I mention that I just gave Mike Scioscia another ten-year extension?"

[ten ocho recon scout]

1. Small sample size.

2. The Brewers 1-8 is hardly quality wo/ Braun, Weeks, Hart...

agreed. Buuuut, to be fair, were starting rookie and replacement level guys at 5 of 8 positions nightly these days.

I agree with what you said in another post about most of our young guys not having a long term MLB future. That said, the team right now is essentially trout/trumbo/aybar (with some hamilton), then a murderers row of green-shuck-calhoun-jimenez-conger. The vets being the obvious difference, but the majority looking very houston-ish.

[ten ocho recon scout]

Cabrera is the best player in the league (not including pitchers). That is no knock on Trout, McCutch, Davis, Cano, Machado, Iannetta, etc...

But I like how writers are making the doom and gloom of this season play out that Trout's days are numbered here. Lets just enjoy watching him while he's here. The team could win the WS and still could lose him. Players leave for FA for numerous reasons.

Exactly. I've been shaking my head at that a while now.

Trout plays proffessional baseball. Hes gonna want to get paid. Other things will factor in. This season will not be one of them if he decides to hit FA in 2018.

Arte has the money. Arte wants to make more. Arte knows that trout will make him money.

Trout could go somewhere else. Thats still a presidential election term away.

And like you said, its not like if we won the world series this year, trout would say 'that was awesome. Ill give a discount now.'

[ten ocho recon scout]

I'd rather have a GM that will disagree and keep Scioscia in check, than a GM that will be Scioscia's buddy, and do whatever he wants.

not to mention sosh probably calls black 'buddy'.

[ten ocho recon scout]

You hire someone better. Look if you fire Mike then your basically saying Jerry has one year to turn it around or he's next. If you fire Jerry then the next GM can't pick his guy as manager and it's a cluster. If you fire both u have a refresh. This front office has made Jerry only get two years. Because what Arte Jerry and Mike have produced with tensions and just a terrible way to run a franchise. If Jerry was brought in. Given his say on team decisions and mike was fired then he prob would get at least another year. But Arte has screwed up the whole system.

I get what you're saying. But what happens when the new gm inherits a very flawed team and doesn't work a miracle in 2 years?

Everyone is pissed at this team. Dipoto boned us with the blanton signing. But (and this has been discussed ad nauseam), dipoto was given a team that already had a meager farm, a not perfect major league team, and a seriously flawed bullpen. He was then given a budget after arte hired pujols and hamilton. Its not like any of the 'better' gm's could have worked a miracle with thst, nor could they have prevented the 2013 snakebite we've had.

lets say we had epstein or friedman. Neither could have saved weavers arm. Or vargas' blood clot. Hansons brother. Bourjos' hamstring. Burnetts arm, etc.

He gets no pass on blanton. Zero. Santana is bad in retrospect, but I think the org as a whole got tired of his up and down act.

We can say iannetta hasn't worked out. To a point. But what was the alternative? Mathis? Amarista would have been better than romine, but frieri has been better than any in house options (sans downs, but we needed mpre than one guy).

I don't st all put all the nlame on sosh. He doesn't make these guys suck. He didn't assemble the team per say. That said, he doesn't seem to have a rep of being a great 'players' manager, and at least from our perspective, the team doesn't seem to be in tune with him anymore. Not to mention, he has a history of playing favorites....which may explain some of our pre dipoto moves that still hurt us.

If one goes, I would say sosh. Problem is, who replaces him? And there's no available experienced hm that I can think of who would be able to pursuade another one to trade us value for our crap (like so many think is doable), nor one who could make the next FA class better for us.

Long story short, its too early to make dipoto the sacraficial lamb.

[Halos of Anaheim]

Trout is now at a 9.2 fWAR and a 8.1 bWAR. More than a full win better than Cabrera in both. Better overall player my ass.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Halos of Anaheim