eaterfan

5 minutes ago, jsnpritchett said:

Taking on bad deals, even if they come with assets, is absolutely not what the Angels should be doing when they have $75M+ committed to Rendon and Trout for next year. 

Hard disagree. Get as much young talent into the org as possible. It's not money and this team isn't competing. If Arte can pay $$$ to get a recent first round pick as a PTBNL or something like that, why not? 

Why does it matter what the payroll is, as long as it's below the luxury tax? It's not like taking on more money will keep us from signing anyone who would lead us to the playoffs. 

One huge advantage that large market clubs have over small market ones is the ability to throw money around at young talent. The Yankees and Sox did this to build up their farm systems before the hard cap on draft slots went into place. Arte never did. The Dodgers take on bad deals to get in talent. Arte should, too.

2 hours ago, Docwaukee said:

It's not even mediocre at this point really.  And there aren't many teams that have some sort of secret sauce in terms of development.  For the most part it's about volume.  Drafting 20 pitchers isn't desperation.  It's just a mathematical oddity.  My guess is that they didn't skip over 9 position players higher on their board to take Ky Bush.  How does adding a sprinkling of position players in that draft really change things all that much.  

By and large, there's no magic to keeping your farm system decent.  The angel's biggest problem has come from self evaluation.  They either don't know who they are or are unwilling to accept it.  For about the last 15 years they have not moved some players when they had an opportunity, they've prioritized proximity to the majors over talent, and they've traded away org currency where the return, while fair, wasn't close to moving the needle (making these efforts wasted). 

On top of that, their starting point was scorched earth so there was an entire infrastructure that needed to be repaired.  Even putting a solid foundation in place doesn't do anything when you don't have building materials.   

Another thing that's hurt is taking that year to year win now philosophy to free agency.  Instead of turning 1-2 years contracts into prospects at the deadline with good players, it was making multi year commitments to high priced players that became immediately un moveable.  Which in turn limited your financial resources.  And because that need to field a competitive team was pervasive, any extra money was spent on 'lightning in a bottle' types with low odds of having any value that could turn into futures. 

Finally, the recent emphasis on getting your highest value picks to the major as soon as possible contributes. 

Teams do each of these things sparingly based on the situation, and while none of them are individually catastrophic, doing them all, across the board, every time, over a period of 15 years, has resulted in exactly where they are now.  

the next problem is that now there is a solid core of young players at the major league level with zero support elsewhere in the org.  In order to take advantage of that, they'll justify their deadline deals of, again, taking talent close to the majors over more worthwhile players who would take time to develop.  And while the FA market was pretty thin this last year, a decrease in payroll was favored over adding some mid range talent that could be swapped for future talent at the deadline.  

The bottom line is that they're still doing it the same way.  A general unwillingness to accept a plan that requires 5+ years instead of less than 3.  

I think at the end of the day, Arte is just cheap and short-sighted. He'll spend money on things the clients will see like the MLB payroll and the scoreboards, but will be as cheap as possible with every other facet of the game. A lot of the teams that do have the "secret sauce" to draft and development spend money on scouting, analytics for minor leaguers, better coaching and nutrition for them. It's not just random that teams that have invested the most in minor league development continue to have the most success with it. 

15 hours ago, Vlad27Trout27 said:

What's really caught my attention about Fontenelle is his impressive record of 10 stolen bases in 17 games. That's pretty impressive, especially for a runner seen as below average It really just sounds like he is a really smart player. For me he's been the biggest riser in our system, basically I have him 4th, and looking at the top 100 list and top 10 3rd baseman, by mid-season if he can keep producing, I can see him in the 90-100 range and in the bottom 3 next to Yohandy Morales  in the ranking. 

 

Talking about the top 100 and our system; my personal notes/takes

1. Dana rises to the number 1 spot in my rankings, and I place him in a tier similar to Horton and Painter, who are among the top 30 and top 4 or 5 right-handed pitchers

2. Rada drops to 2nd place, but it seems like he's finally starting to see the ball better in AA. Honestly, many young prospects in AA are struggling. Due to his age, I'd put him in the range of the top 40 to 75 prospects. You know what kind of annoys me? The Dodgers' Josue De Paula is included in most top 100 lists, yet Rada, who is the same age, putting up similar numbers in their Minor League careers, and at a higher level, is not.

3. Kent climbs to # 3, his ERA of 5.19 does not look pretty, but I've watched two of his starts, and hitters are having trouble picking up his pitches. There is potential four above-average or better pitches here.  Just needs to improve his command/control. due to his age and upside he has shown, I think he has the chance to slide in the 85 to 100 range, especially if he shown the command/control from his first start. 

4. Fontenelle climbs up to this spot and I've already highlighted him, and I think h could fall in the top 85 to 100 range by Mid-season or season's end. 

We could have four guys climb up into the top by the end of the season, not including the Draft picks. 

 

One of them is 6' 3" 185 lbs and one of them is 5' 8" 160 lbs. I think the power projection between the two is different. 

On 4/20/2024 at 11:04 AM, deepdrive said:

Notice how not a word is being said about our chances to win the upcoming lottery?

It's like Ducks fans are resigned to getting a 4th or 5th pick. 

Don't want to get disappointed again?  Believe it is actually rigged?  Realize the odds are actually what they are?  Or maybe like me, some have looked into the prospects a little and believe our best pick could be at 3-5.

I'm not totally sold on Celebrini or Levshunov.

I'm not focused on it because to me Cellebrini is in a tier all his own. After that there are about 12 guys in the next tier. There are some I like better than others, but to me I wouldn't be surprised if any one of them became the best NHL player of the bunch. The Ducks don't "need" a forward any more than they "need" a defenseman. So basically, I see very little difference between having pick 2 and having pick 5. The chance of winning the one pick is pretty low. 

8 minutes ago, Blarg said:

This story gets more bizarro world every day. There cannot be a three year period where Ohtani did not have a conversation with his tax accountant about where his money was going. Just too much bullshit in these stories. 

The tax accountant talked to Ippei? I mean, how many financial classes do you think Ohtani has taken in his life? How comfortable would you be discussing technical finances in your second language in a country you aren't familiar with tax laws in? 

It's a sizeable chunk of money, but if you don't care about money and let people manage your money for you and there's always plenty in the account when you want to buy something, why worry about it?

I mean a guy just stole $20 million from the Jacksonville Jaguars for gambling and the owner speaks English and could talk to anyone. There's a lot you can do if you have access to people's accounts and the accounts aren't getting close to $0.

3 hours ago, cals said:

 No shit, this type of thing takes like a year, not a week and a half.

It can. It depends on a lot of things. 

From the time FTX collapsed until Sam Bankman Fried was sentenced was only a year and a quarter. In that case there was a trial, and there were billions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of accounts effected, lots of financial maneuvering, and SBF wasn't cooperating. 

If Ohtani handed over his financial information, I imagine it wouldn't take long to examine his few accounts. Plus, it sounds like the bookie is cooperating, too. I don't think this is the complicated web that FTX is. If Ipei wants to avoid a trial, I'm not surprised this isn't taking that long. 

37 minutes ago, Vlad27Trout27 said:

My personal hot takes by seasons end;

1. Dana will be the number 1 prospect in our system, top 35 Prospect and top 5 RHP in all of MLB. With My comp being a Corbin Burnes for him. 

2. Rada is the number 2 prospect, and he be anywhere from 45 to 60 in the top 100.

3. Kent makes it as the number 3 prospect, and in the 90-100 range for the top 100. I see a bit of Jose Berrios in him. 

4. Cole Fontenelle, climbs in the the top 10 list for me, and i see him similar to how Alberto Callaspo type of player

5. Hurtado, make it the top 15, with an upside of a #3 or #4. 

I don't get the hype with Rada. It's fun to daydream because he's so young, but what is the upside? He's small and has no pop. He has good command of the zone, but as the pitchers get more control as he moves up he will probably walk less. He doesn't seem to have the power to keep pitchers from throwing strikes. I get that power is the last thing to develop, but it's not like he's 6' 2" and skinny with a frame to add more weight. There's the occasional Altuve, but I don't like the odds of Rada being close to that. What does he project as in the big leagues? CF David Eckstein?

On 3/13/2024 at 8:06 AM, gotbeer said:

It's very possible he does re-sign back. A 3/$3 would be ideal. Also remember that the taxes in Canada for high earners is stupid high. I read a rumor that ricos contract was front loaded for the year, so he's not getting paid much for playing in Edmonton. Which is probably why he ok'd being traded there.

At least Rico was reliable defensively. Man strome is just killing us defensively. He is just a turnover machine with the Puck in the defensive zone.

He can afford a halfway decent accountant. He shouldn't be paying any taxes anywhere. 

The only All-Star game that mattered was MLB. And with interleague play it lost its luster. Get rid of interleague and it will be more fun again. 

The other games are really hard to do well because effort matters so much. In baseball the pitcher and hitter are really the only ones who need to try. Basically it requires the players to try for about 10% of the game. The other sports require effort from everyone all the time or else it doesn't look like an actual game that counts. 

On 2/10/2024 at 8:21 AM, Second Base said:

In regards to prospects, I'd rather have a few major leaguers that are age 24, than several prospects that are 20.

The point is to win at the highest level. 

It would mean something if we had a bottom ranked system AND no Neto, O'Hoppe, Bachman, Silseth, Joyce or Schanuel in the majors. 

Sure, but we aren't winning and haven't been. So many teams have guys that are as good as those and in similar volumes. The rest of the Angels have been so bad for so long that we've grown into thinking that a few young guys contributing anything is exceptional. Also, is been a year. We've had Fletcher, Walsh, Borjous, Barria, Canning, Suarez come up and look good for short periods of time. 

The system was bad and still looks bad.

On 2/4/2024 at 10:05 AM, Make Angels Great Again said:

Haven't we had a bottom 5 farm for like 15 years straight now? Thats impressive.

Yeah. And every year people on here say we're ranked too low and scouts only pay attention to the Yankees and Dodgers prospects... Meanwhile we've produced Trout, Ohtani and no one else of note in 15 years. Maybe the low rankings were right.

I'd like them to sign him. The team isn't going anywhere this year and I'd rather watch Joey Votto hit (or not) than a marginally better player who I don't care about. This is to say I'd rather win 80 games with Votto than 82 with CJ Cron.

Chargers hired former QB Jim Harbaugh as head coach. 5 year deal. Hopefully this works out for them.

10 hours ago, deepdrive said:

You know I was wondering earlier today. When LaCombe was taken off the roster, do you guys think there was any chance he was the focus of the Cutter trade? Maybe as an addition to Zellweger or something.

No real reason to think that except the timing and position.

Gibson is sick and they need to activate a backup. LaCombe is eligible to be sent down. Simple as that.

2 hours ago, St1ck said:

My son went to that game. He had a great time.

Even with all the players sitting out because they are entering the draft or transferring?

A 7-5 UCLA team is playing a 7-5 Boise St. team in something called the "LA Bowl hosted by Gronk" on December 16th is ruining college football way more than the transfer portal ever could.

Maybe it's me, but I loved watching the Oregon Washington games between transfers Penix and Nix instead of them being stuck on mediocre Indiana and Auburn teams fighting to reach the Bahamas Bowl or whatever. But maybe you enjoy that more?

8 hours ago, Blarg said:

Had to dig a little for a tennis thread. 

"A 35-year-old Bobby Riggs would’ve beaten all of us" - Martina Navratilova rejects role of gender in Billie Jean King’s victory in Battle of Sexes (sportskeeda.com)

Martina Navratilova recently slammed the United States Tennis Association after learning that transgender athlete Alicia Rowley, who identifies as a woman, had won a Women's 55+ tennis tournament in the country.

"Come on @USTA - women’s tennis is not for failed male athletes- whatever age. This is not right and it is not fair. Would this be allowed at the US Open this month? Just with self ID? I don’t think so," Martina Navratilova wrote.

There are dozens of courts by my house. Whenever I walk by, they're half filled with old men with beards and mustaches wearing skirts trying to win the first place trophy in the ladies 55+ division tournament. It's horrid and unfair and no one can say anything about it because of this PC cancel culture BS.

23 hours ago, arch stanton said:

Campbell isn't the target. It's what they send as the sweetener. You're lowering the AAV for the next 3 seasons by a mil a half plus getting a pick or 2

If it's an unprotected first this year and maybe a first or second next year, I'm running to the phone to say yes. 

It would suck if that's the reason the team misses the playoffs...But I like how Dostal is playing and this team is legitimately a year away from being playoff caliber and 2 away from really contending.

Oilers are all in this year and their goalies are really holding them back. Their coaching staff and front office are barely hanging on and need to do something. They are up against the cap, so Campbell has to come as an offset and maybe eat some of Gibson's salary this year. But if that can get two firsts (this year unprotected) it's with it. 

Plus, as you mentioned, it reduces the cap load the next few seasons. That could do a lot to help keep the youngsters together or add some solid depth.

The Ducks need some more scoring and if they can have 2 lottery picks that would be awesome. Eiserman is supposed to be a scoring machine but will likely go in the top 3. Beyond that, it's pretty heavy on defenseman. 2 picks would allow you to go BPA with at least one of those picks instead of forcing a winger in the draft. For example, if the Ducks end up with picks 5 and 12 they could take an awesome defenseman at 5 and roll the dice on a wing at 12. If the winger pans out, great! If he doesn't, at least you got a great piece with the other pick.

21 minutes ago, gotbeer said:

I disagree. Both players have huge flaws that require bridge deals. Now the amount is up for question. With a bridge deal, it's nowhere close to a 7-8 year contract. What both sides are asking for is really unknown. But I think drysdale should be in the $2 million range and Z should be in the $4 million range.

The problem with paying them what they want is you have a bunch of skilled young guys right behind them. You give Z say $6 million. Then the bar is raised when McTavish needs a contract. Then Carlson. And just like that you are in cap hell like Toronto. Shortsided is we have the cap room now, pay them what they want.  But if the team is to be successful, you need to be planning years down the line.

The one that needs to worry the most is drysdale. In the limited amount I've seen him, zellweger is really showing the speed and skating that drysdale is supposed to have.  And for a small guy he was throwing his weight around.

They just through out huge contracts to aging vets who won't be contributors by the end of their deals. Yeah, overpaying is bad, but there's at least a significant chance the young guys outplay their contracts. I don't get throwing money around recklessly and then claiming the need to spend wisely. It's not a coherent plan. Especially when those big free agent deals were longer term than needed when those young stars you mentioned are coming up for bigger contracts. 

There are also big risks with the bridge deals, if both players play well, their next contracts will be much bigger right when we need to sign the guys who are coming in behind them. The cap is rising, so you might have to pay $3-4 million more each in 2 years, when the bridge deal is over. 

Got to love the strategy of offering ridiculously high contracts to aging mediocre veterans and nickel and diming your young stars. I can see why this team has been so successful over the last half decade.

14 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

I've said this before, I don't like repeating myself so I haven't but IMO one of the biggest malignancies on this team has been this insipid need to try to appease a player and the self induced stress to try to keep them in tow.  First it was Trout and the constant talk about having to do ___ ____ ____ to keep him, then it was Ohtani. Nothing against either guy, both are generational talents, but FFS ... its been like having nice wheels on a rusted out Chevy Vega.

The best thing this team could do for itself is simply focus on what will actually lead to winning and stop concerning itself with how so and so will react or if it will impact how someone views the team. Once Trout signed long term the mission should have been getting the rest of the pieces in place -- we know how it's gone, we didn't see any real effort to build a complete team until this season and despite their best efforts for a change it's gone comically bad.  Great, shit happens, now do it again you f%^&s

If I have ONE hope moving forward is that they just keep keep trying to what they did last winter and at the deadline.  Everyone will continue to talk about how "disastrous" the deadline was but nobody will give a shit if they simply keep at it and finally turn the corner.  Even getting back to .500 at this point would be a win.  

If they had put as much effort into building a whole team as they have trying to win certain players over they might not be in this mess.

 

First was Pujols!

5 minutes ago, James said:

I would think he would need much more information to make such a decision/comment on his future. 

That's why he wouldn't give a definitive statement, but he said it's really hard to come back from a second UCL tear. 

Talked to a guy who is an orthopedic surgeon today. He thinks it's likely that Ohtani is done as a pitcher, but he says it's not impossible he comes back to pitch. I imagine he probably moves to the outfield after he recovers from TJ if necessary. I think he'd be pretty good out there if he starts playing out there regularly and that brings more value than just DHing. 

17 hours ago, T-angel said:

If Arte stays on as owner, he at least needs to move Carpino aside and hire a real baseball guy as President. Yes, Arte meddles and has been the cause of some catastrophic mistakes. But which owner doesn't to some degree. Eddie Debartolo with the 49ers had Jon McVay and Bill Walsh to check him. Arte needs to find that type of guy and make him President. When Friedman was with the Rays, Arte should have made him an offer with the keys to the castle, free reign, a blank check, and absolute veto power. But alas Arte didn't have the foresight to do that but he needs to now. 

 

Even if Arte were willing to hire someone who could stand up to him, the meddling is only half the problem. The other part is that Arte is cheap and won't spend on anything that isn't on the MLB roster. 

I don't think it matters who is hired as long as Arte owns the team. He may have high payrolls, but doesn't spend on anything that isn't on an MLB field.

This team gets injured every year and falls off because they don't have a farm system. They don't have the depth to replace injured players the way other orgs do. Arte also lacks the patience and long term vision to build anything sustainable on the farm or in the organization. Every team gets injured, maybe the Angels are more unlucky some years, but not always. Last year the Dodgers lost so many players (and a lot of good ones) and still rolled because of their depth. 

Every year has been "go for it" since they signed Pujols. They were trying to maximize their window with Pujols and borrowing against the future when they should have been trying to maximize Trout's window. It's not going to change until Arte is gone.