Dave Saltzer

Seminaris with probably his best night. 6 IP 9Ks, 1 BB, 6 HS 1 ER. 

Mostly sat 87-89. His best pitch, and a good out pitch was a slurve that he threw about 77. Had 3 Ks on that pitch at leadt. Had a good change as well, but didn't show it too much. Struggled in the 1st,when most of the damage was done, then established that he could hit his spots on the corners and got the ump to open up the zone a bit. He finished strong. I really think that had last year been a normal season, he'd be cruising much better at AA now. 

I have been told he can dial it up to 94 for an occasional bullet, but mostly sits 87-91 ish. 

We really need to get out and support the Minor League teams. Our players are coming back and you can't beat the value. 

Working on getting some interviews for us. 

Thank you for posting this. It's nice to have some hope for the future!

Yesterday, it really hit me that the Minor League schedule makes Mondays suck. Instead of teams having random days off here and there, so that there are other teams to look at and discuss, with all of them being off on Mondays at the lower levels, it makes for a boring day.

7 hours ago, UndertheHalo said:

I’m really trying to not be one of these curmudgeonly dip shits but I would love for him to take it easy until he doesn’t fucking suck at the majors.  

Agreed. Until he's earned it by performing and succeeding at the Major League level, it looks immature and magnifies any mistakes that he makes.

3 hours ago, AngelsFaninGA said:

Wasn't his attitudRight nowe/makeup considered one of his strongest points up until last year? Wonder what happened, hopefully adjusts itself with maturity

Yes, it was. I think it's a case of him knowing he has tools to drool on and believing all the hype. I agree that he needs to knock it off. When he's had a couple of years of success at the Major League level, then it's a different story. Right now it's just magnifying his struggles.

I have been reaching out to the Minor League affiliates and hope to be able to get Zoom interviews with players and coaches throughout the season. If anything good can come from Covid, it's that people are more willing to use Zoom for interviews. 

1 minute ago, m0nkey said:

There’s a guy named Davis Daniel?

Yep. He even made our Top 30 Prospect List if you want to check out more information on him. 

Just now, Dochalo said:

I kinda wonder how restrictive it is.  In other words, it wouldn't surprise me if we get some updates on guys who aren't listed.  Is it in Long Beach?  Or Az?  Regardless, you know the rest of the crew is there doing baseball things.  

You know, "baseball things"....spitting seeds, chewing, scratching, adjusting. Key skills indeed!

1 minute ago, Inside Pitch said:

Davis Daniel is listed.

Oh. I read this on my phone and must have skipped over his name. Still a bit surprised by the others. Hernandez in particular could accelerate for a role in the pen by the end of this year. 

Thank you all for the well wishes. The thoughts and prayers are much appreciated.

The best part of today at the hospital for me was coming in wearing all Angels gear. Several of the nurses are huge Dodgers fans, so I had plenty of fun giving them the business that we are in first place and the Dodgers are in last place. In hindsight, maybe I shouldn't have done that until after the treatment was over, but, it was a lot of fun giving them the business!

Thanks for posting this. There are a couple of players missing whom I thought would be there....Kyren Paris, William Holmes, Aaron Hernandez, Adam Seminaris and Davis Daniel in particular. Hernandez, Seminaris and Daniel could all find their way into bullpen roles, so it would make sense to get them as much work this season as possible. 

This is a great and smart move. As I said in my predictions, he will get MVP votes just because he is so useful and makes the team so much better. 

It looks like Minasian is jumping on the trend of signing young players earlier and paying for their prime years at a reasonable but good rate rather than waiting until later and paying more money for their eventual decline. 

I am very happy with this move! 

5 hours ago, John Taylor said:

Every season since I was a kid I would literally be counting down the days until Spring Training, and then would try and watch every ST game as I counted down until Opening Day. This year I'm really struggling to get excited about baseball like I usually do.

I have yet to watch a full ST game (although I partially blame my dislike for Jose Mota's PbP for that), and I just don't feel that sense of "excitement" that I always do. It has nothing to do with the on field product, I actually think the Angels will be better this year, and I've been really excited about seasons where i knew we'd suck.

I think last season really messed with me, it was the first season in almost 20 years where I didn't attend a single game. I also hated the short schedule, and the pandemic in general. I am not struggling with depression as this issue only seems to be affecting baseball for me. Also I put a lot of energy into the Trevor Bauer social media recruitment thing and that really soured me as well.

Also I struggle with change, and looking forward to hearing @VictorRojas and Gubi in the booth was something I would look forward to yearly, like being visited by old friends, so I think Victor leaving affected me more than I realized, although I am very excited about Matt Vasgersion. (If they stuck with Jose Mota this season I would have legit cancelled MLB.tv)

I don't think I've posted in the AW Twitter account since Jan (All posts are @Chuckster70 right now I believe) and I've barely visited AW.com

 

Is there anyone else struggling with getting as excited about this season as previous seasons?

 

I think I need to go to an actual game and to borrow a quote from Shawn Michaels "Get my smile back" lol

John,

I appreciate your honesty and respect your feelings. As others have pointed out, this past year, with all the strife and division has really sucked the enjoyment out of a lot of things. Even baseball.

But, I'd ask you to listen to my interview with Daron Sutton. While I will very much miss Victor Rojas (hearing him on TV, especially at the start of a season, was like talking with an old friend and catching up). Daron Sutton will be similar, but a bit different. My impression will be that listening to Sutton will be like running into that old friend from high school and retelling all the great old stories, reliving some glory days and enjoying the new times too. 

In almost every way, 2020 tried to suck the life out of all of us. But, we just have to get back out there and start doing things again, and we will find our enjoyment and passions are still there.

On 3/20/2021 at 11:39 AM, Slegnaac said:

Great interview with Daron. @Dave Saltzer thanks for the last question which led to a really wonderful story.  

So smart of the team to get someone that can share these kinds of stories with the fans.

I agree Slegnaac! I think Daron has plenty of other stories that he will be sharing with fans over the course of the season. More importantly, I love his self-depracating style and humor, which will make the games all that much more enjoyable!

On 3/19/2021 at 6:46 PM, HaloSpurs said:

This was great! Nice job Dave. Daron is such a nice guy, real asset to the organisation 

Thanks HaloSpurs! I am really looking forward to having Daron call the games. As I said in the interview, he bridges multiple eras in Angels history, which will make for great broadcasts for fans from any era, and will help educate younger fans (such as my sons) on Angels history. It's going to be a fun season!

Thanks for sharing a good story. I wish more former Major Leaguers would take and apply what they Lea Ned to help develop the future of the sport. Good for Tim for doing so. 

I truly hate the runner on 2nd rule for extra innings. I get the 7 inning double-headers, but putting a runner on base who didn't earn his way there makes no sense. I get why reporters like that rule--they get to finish their stories and go home earlier, but as a fan, I do not like the rule at all. It gives the visiting team too much of an advantage.

9 hours ago, beatlesrule said:

I love short term deals that pay more. Wouldn't you rather the Angels had given Pujols the same contract as Bauers? The Dodgers tried a 4 year deal with Harper and he declined. Bauer didn't. I have been suggesting short term deals that pay a lot but don't saddle teams length wise for years now. It's cool to see some teams actually doing it. I would be okay with a maximum amount you can pay a player per year but MLB doesn't have anything like that so again, I see nothing wrong with what the Dodgers did with Bauer.

It's easy to type that you would have written the article if it was the Angels instead of the Dodgers since it didn't happen. You can't prove or disprove that. One thing we can agree on is that Manfred is a total joke. It's embarrassing that he is the commissioner of my favorite sport. Again though, I don't have any problem with this contract so I didn't expect him to comment on it or veto it.

I think you are missing a big part of my article. Yes, we agree that Manfred is a total joke. A real commissioner would do more for the better interests of baseball, and Manfred does not appear to do much for the long-term interests of the game.

Sure, I would have loved to have had Pujols on a shorter term deal. We did not get back in value anything near what we thought we would get when we signed him. That is, unfortunate.

What I really don't like about this contract, and why I think it's bad for baseball is the timing of the money and the opt-outs. Do you really believe that Bauer won't opt-out of that third year? Does anybody? If the Dodgers can get away with 1 year that is clearly designed to lower the AAV for Bauer, why not offer Turner a 5 year deal with an opt out after each year with payments as follows: $12 million/$10 million/$1 million/$1 million/$1 million. That would have an AAV of only $3 million, so the continued hit under the Luxury Tax would be minimal. No one would expect Turner to stay for those remaining years. Heck, even if he did, by lowering the AAV by that much with those final 3 years, they would save money on the deal versus what they would pay under the Luxury Tax.

The Bauer deal sets a very bad precedent. Manfred is too weak to realize this. If he had any gravitas, he would veto the deal and force it to be reworked. 

As for saying that I wouldn't like the Angels to sign Bauer to this deal, in a response above I discuss why I wouldn't want this deal. You may think otherwise, but I assure you, I don't like setting bad precedents and I wouldn't want Bauer if it meant being unable to afford solving any of our team's other problems. 

7 hours ago, Angelsjunky said:

Some would, undoubtedly. But the problem with the Angels doing a deal like this is that while it would improve them significantly over the next two years, it wouldn't push them over the edge - and they would be taking a major luxury tax penalty turning an 84-85 win team into an 87-88 win team. Not a good look, and probably not what Bauer has in mind. Plus, you'd be paying a monumental douche more money than Trout and Rendon, also not a good look.

While the best team in baseball is arguably the last team that needed Bauer, especially with their starting depth, it does make a certain amount of sense given the gains the Padres have made. Now we've probably got the two best teams in the majors in the same division, harkening back to any number of Yankees-Red Sox years. Half of this board will likely be part-time Padres fans.

Yep. Some would. I would not. I don't like hypocrisy and I don't like thwarting the system. 

More importantly, I would not at all like this deal if it meant eating up all of our resources so that we could not fix our holes this offseason at SS, C, RF, starting pitching and the bullpen. If we did this deal early in the offseason, and didn't have the resources to solve our other holes as a result, our ceiling might be higher, but our floor would be lower. Once again, a key injury or two, and we would be done for the year. To solve our other holes, we would have had to trade off a lot more of the farm, which would handicap us long-term. I don't think that we would have been a better team overall with just Bauer, as opposed to what we have done so far this offseason. So, not only would this deal not push us over the edge, it could have left us in no better shape if we couldn't solve our other needs.

And yes, while salaries do inevitably seem to go up, there is something wrong with paying Trevor Bauer a lot more than Mike Trout. Trout brings so much more value to the team overall, through his fan interactions, positive image, etc., that I would have a problem paying Bauer more than Trout. 

AJ, a really good article. This should have been a blog post as well. You provide great analysis and should publish using your name. 

Chuck and I were talking about this on Friday. I think you hit the nail on the head (and was going to write something to this effect) that the plan is to raise the floor more than raise the ceiling for the team. For so many of the recent years, everything would have to go absolutely right (meaning no major injuries, players playing to their potential, etc.) for us to have a shot. But, if something bad did happen to one or two key players, the wheels came off for the team, and we fell apart.

This year appears to be about building some depth so that we are far more likely to be an 82-85 win team with a shot at more than we have been in the past. It's also about bridging one more year to layer in some cost controls so that we can sign an expensive FA or two next year when Pujols comes off the book, several of our pitchers are likely to come off the books (and hopefully be replaced by Detmers, Rodriguez, etc.). I fully expect us to be in play for one of the top shortstops next year and possibly a pitcher. 

Minasian had a lot of holes to fill with this team and chose to spread the money he had around to solve multiple problems on a short term basis hoping that some of our problems would be solved long-term internally. He could have solved one problem long-term with a big splash, but that would have left us where we were--a higher ceiling but a much lower probability of reaching it.

What is hard for us, as fans, is as you pointed out--we've been down a long road and waiting another year is never fun. What's worse is that the A.L. West seems more winnable now than it has for the past few years, so for us as fans, it's even more frustrating. Hopefully we will be in it enough to convince Arte to shell out some more money at either the trade deadline or in the offseason as next year. 

Again, I'd like to encourage you to post articles like this on the blog. 

On 2/6/2021 at 11:36 PM, axalar said:

Ignoring the fact that it’s Bauer (and the potential theatrics that come with him), and ignoring the fact that covid has potentially made all owners question their revenue over the next season, can we really see any other stars taking a deal like this vs just going for a longer deal with guaranteed money like 5/175? How often would that happen?

In what semi-real-world hypothetical do we think this could be manipulated further? Maybe a star pitcher in Free Agency coming back from TJS?

Because of the question marks surrounding Bauer (or because he wanted a short contract) he didn't have any longer offers on the table. If he did, would this even be a manipulation that was available to the Dodgers?

I have nothing against a longer term deal with salary fluctuations within the deal. Paying a player a signing bonus is an example of a financial manipulation, and I'm not opposed to that. I can easily understand why players might want a much lower salary in 2022 because of the good chances of a strike, so again, I can understand the timing of money in a guaranteed.

As I said in the article, I'm not opposed to opt-outs. There are valid reasons for them. 

I'm also not opposed to backloaded contracts--even with opt-outs. It's far less likely that a player would opt-out of a backloaded contract.

What I am opposed to is the clear manipulation of the system that's going on here. It's not the years. It's the opt-outs AND the dramatic drop in salary for the third year. Why not add a 4th year to the deal with an opt-out at $10 million to further erode the AAV? Why not a 5th year at $5 million with another opt-out?

If baseball lets it slide here with Bauer, they forever set the precedent that what the Dodgers did was okay and every other team will further try to expand and exploit this loophole. Better to stop it now and do what's right then allow it to get out of hand. 

On 2/6/2021 at 8:04 PM, disarcina said:

great article.

the contract structure for Bauer undermines the whole luxury tax scheme -

the Dodgers are just playing by the current rules and manipulating them to their advantage -

MLBPA probably won't touch this but should -- MLPBPA is headed at some point to a real show down between the top 1 percenters with the huge contracts (Bauer, Cole etc.) and the rest of the folks -- the new look MLB rosters for 2021 into the foreseeable future is going to be a top 1% guy for the Dodgers and Yankees type franchises  (add Cardinals now , too, after Arenado - although Colorado is paying a good chunk of cash towards that deal/ contract) -- so you have maybe 2 guys up huge contracts, 3 guys with pretty significant deals and the rest of the roster is major league minimum players or those under club control.

I agree with the author that allocation of the contract (like Bauer's) over the length of it - with the opt out decline value factored in - makes sense to maintain the integrity of the luxury tax rule.

Thanks Disarcina.

I would truly prefer a hard floor and ceiling for the game and forcing those owners out of the game who refuse to spend the minimums or abide by the maximums. I have some ideas on how that can be enforced, and maybe will write something about that in the coming days.

But, until we get there, all we have is the Luxury Tax to dissuade owners from overspending. Since that is the mechanism that the owners have chosen to police themselves, then a commissioner should see this as a serious threat to that mechanism. 

As for a showdown between the elite players and the average players, the union has 2 big advantages on its side. First, it prays upon the hope of every player that with a minor tweak here or there he will become one of those elite players, when in reality that won't happen for the overwhelming majority of them. And, the minimum payroll is so much bigger than what the average person makes that the average player doesn't really see how the system is rigged against him. So, the union can still cater to the elite players at the expense of the average or lower-tiered player. 

Unlike a true economy, baseball is essentially a closed system. In a real economy, if person A makes a billion dollars, that doesn't take anything away from the rest of us (and in many cases, often makes us better off). In baseball, there are only 30 teams, and a limited payroll for each team. When elite players soak up that money, it does come at the expense of other players. 

Look at how baseball is shutting down Minor League teams and looking to shorten the draft. That's fewer players playing and fewer dollars going around. 

I hope that the union does have a showdown and really works for the best interest of baseball. For me, that would be a floor and ceiling for all teams on payroll. 

On 2/6/2021 at 3:01 PM, beatlesrule said:

I don't see what the issue is here. The Dodgers did nothing against the rules. Bauer did nothing against the rules. Those teams with lower payroll are doing that by choice. Since there is no minimum payroll, those owners are also doing nothing wrong in terms of the bargaining agreement. Since baseball plays the most games out of any sport, it's never going to be like other sports in terms of contracts and all the other things comparatively.

Oh and I can guarantee Angelswin would not have written an article had the Angels signed Bauer to this same contract.

They didn't break the rules? That's like all the social media companies saying that they aren't doing anything wrong by shutting down accounts and users they don't like because technically they are a private company and people don't have 1st Amendment rights when it comes to private companies. Sure, it's technically accurate, and we all know it is BS. The Dodgers and Bauer didn't do anything wrong--they just pushed the boundaries beyond all credibility.

As for whether or not AngelsWin would have written such an article if we had signed Bauer, I guarantee you, I would have written it. Sure, I wanted Bauer, but not at the expense of doing permanent damage to the game or by thwarting the system so much. This is just a game, and it is not a case where one needs to win at all costs.

Part of my article is pointing out how we do not have a real commissioner, one with real power, who would see right through these shenanigans and shut it down. A real commissioner would come out with a rule, like what I proposed, in conjunction with voiding the contract and forcing it to be reworked. I would want a strong commissioner to do so whether it was the Angels or any other team, as I want this game to be strong and still very popular for future generations to enjoy.

I don't blame the Dodgers for trying this, but, I do blame the lack of a commissioner for letting them get away with it.