UndertheHalo

yea, its a shitty break for him. Im just glad to see him get right at least after they sent him down. That trade has gone amazingly well for us...well except for the tommy john thing with Skaggs but that is what it is. Both Skaggs and Santiago will be critical arms for us.

man, I cry about Aybar hitting 5th. The A's have the great Johnny Gomes of the .236 BA hitting 4th....Yikes.

if one takes the time to actually read the interview/article you will find that he's not "calling hamilton out". He's just stating a fact that he has not been the same dangerous bat that he once was with the Rangers. He thinks its a confidence thing. I don't see anything unusual with this.

thanks.

Albert definitely leads when pouting.

needs to work on some stuff. send him back to salt lake.

did we have to do this ?

this about sums up my feelings on Aybar

he still disappoints me for some reason. I realize that he's a solid short stop.

sorry guy, ill fix it. im sorry for my long winded (and mostly stupid) opinions. Its something im working on.

if you had asked me this in the preseason I would have said absolutely. I did not have very high expectations this year, mostly because of our pitching situation. its turned out that my (and many of yours) doubts were correct because here we are in August with a starting pitching depth problem. That said, we have handled the shortcomings of our starting rotation better that I would have expected. Garrett Richards has been better then I think most of us expected him to be this year. I always had high hopes for him, just didn't expect it this quickly. For me personally, the last 2 spring trainings, none of the Angels pitchers I saw out in Arizona impressed me as much(not really surprising given his stuff and talent) Anyway, I just didn't expect him to be this dominant this quickly. Also, DiPotto in my mind has done a fantastic job building up our bullpen into an elite group. Those 2 factors have really relieved the starting pitching imo. Back to the initial question though, now that we have had so much success, I would be lying if I said I would be satisfied with a stupid one game wild card exit. I really hope to see the Angels playing in at least the ALDS. Also, Im concerned going forward, I have my doubts about Pujols and Hamilton being any better....ever, and we need to be spenders in order to strengthen the SP corps. There are going to be a lot teams looking for pitching and I really hope we can pull down at least one of the big arms. We desperately need to. Also, ive just about given up (finally i know) on Kendrick and Aybar. I know they are fine major leaguers, but here we go again with Aybar. He's been f***ing terrible the last 3 weeks. Kendrick is apparently incapable of hitting anything other then a single. I never feel good about AB's from those 2. Freese, isn't as terrible as he seemed the first 2 months but we still dont have what I would consider a solid 3b. I dont expect these things to change next year. I do like Calhoun a lot. Anyway, I guess im just saying that im not sure we'll have a run like this again next year. So I would be disappointed to lose the 1 gamer. Oh maybe we can get the panda and a starting pitcher. Please Arte ? !

the article was saying that because he's had more plays directed at it this has driven down his stats. It (and Soscia) seems to suggest that the defensive metrics don't really provide an accurate reflection of the quality of play. Do you agree ?

Bryce Harper would have the Angels in first place. Mike Trout has failed.

This (the bold part) is definitely true. You probably are right that ISIS would have come regardless of a presence of our forces or not. However, even a small contingent of US forces being available to counter the initial push from ISIS may have made a huge difference vs. where we are today, in terms of ISIS rampaging through the country. It got to this point significantly because of the utter incompetence of Iraqi security forces.

I agree that we should not become fully engaged again in Iraq. Given our history with the place in the last decade, I think we are somewhat obliged to not completely abandon them. Air strikes are appropriate imo. it is critically important that Al Maliki goes however.

u know we still have troops in Germany and Japan. Obviously the specifics are quite different but its looking more and more like the right move would have been a draw down of forces as opposed to complete withdrawl. Of course, we had no deal to stay, but the truth is that the Obama administration sure didn't try that hard to get one done. Nice story above about the Peshmerga and the Iraqi air force acting to save the Yazidi. Nice to hear something not horrible coming out of Iraq. Maybe theres hope yet for the Iraqi armed forces....the air force anyway.

Im just gonna keep doing this, Hamilton is bad.. Mmmmk

He's already matched his innings pitched from last year. He's awesome, but color me concerned. What do we think ?

i anticipate defeat how could we let Jerome Williams slip away !

oh, my bad... Who knew.

Haaretz is an israeli paper is it not ! ? I could be mistaken. Fine though, I assume the BBC is an acceptable source of news. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-19975211 this is in the first paragraph "We never understood why the Ministry of Defence actually forbade coriander to enter Gaza," Israeli Foreign Ministry Yigal Palmor told the BBC's Newshour programme. "It did reflect some kind of petty interference with items that seemed of little note."

ah, but they do. http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/2-279-calories-per-person-how-israel-made-sure-gaza-didn-t-starve.premium-1.470419

C'mon Poozy, I think you can admit that at least some aspects of the blockade are unnecessary cruelties. How does restricting medicine and food improve the security of Israel ? I suppose a syringe could be weaponized

Maliki truly is a scumbag piece of shit. If this really is a coup this is the beginning of the end for Iraq.

the tragic irony of the situation in Gaza is that it is a lot like the Warsaw ghetto at this point. I don't think anyone would question the legitimate right of the Jews living that nightmare to rise up against that situation.