AngelsSurfer

That makes sense to me too. Alternating the more reliable pitchers (Weaver, Shoe and eventually Richards) with the ones that are more iffy seems like the only way to keep the bullpen from getting horribly overworked.

Coconut water is absolutely vile stuff.

Great insights, and I totally agree on Cowgill and Calhoun. Calhoun should have been up for a Gold Glove last year. And I do hope that this year they will give Cowgill more starts and playing time.

Venditte was pretty amazing, and what a formidable weapon that switch-pitching could be. I'd love to see him improve and land on a MLB roster somewhere.

Just to stay in shape, perhaps? If he has any interest at all in returning to baseball at any point in the future, it's probably going to be a lot easier if he's at least somewhat prepared. I just look at Hamilton vs. Skaggs. Skaggs knows for a fact that he's going to be out of the game until 2016 and he's committed to rehabbing. He's planning on going on road trips with the team. He's appeared at Angels events. Hamilton...could ostensibly also be out until 2016, and he's holed up in Texas hitting off a tee. Maybe he's actually planning on retiring? The original positive quotes seem as though they were trying to spin Hamilton as a player who was still committed to being a part of the team. Scioscia's comments make it seem as though they know there's little hope of that.

So three weeks ago there was some attempt to protect him or project him in a positive light in the press, and now there isn't. Hmmm.

I think it would be a lot fairer to the Angels to have some information on the length of JH's suspension sooner rather than later, but at this point IMHO they need to proceed as if he's completely gone. And I kinda think that's what they're doing. They're not even mentioning his return, really. And given the fact that his rehab from the surgery doesn't even seem to be progressing and there's no evidence he's going to be able to help the team in any way. they might proceed the exact same way even without a suspension looming.

He's not in the mix at all for 2015. IIRC he's not expected back until 2016 and if he pitches at all this year it will be in something like the instructional league as part of his rehab.

Ye gods, yes. I finally ended up muting it because I just couldn't stand listening to them. And what was with the weird random shots? During one of the innings they focused on a plane flying by for a good minute or so instead of focusing on what was happening on the field, and at another point they totally cut to another random thing and missed someone's AB.

IIRC he also had flu that took him out for about two weeks recently. I'm not worried about him.

It's a shame if that's the case, and I hope the Powers That Be will change their minds on that. As the others have mentioned he's outperformed the prospects, Santiago and Wilson, and he's certainly making a case for that 5th spot. I would certainly trust him to start over Heaney or Tropeano.

Hopefully not, but some people don't do the work after they leave the inpatient facility and that makes all the difference. The ones I know that have not been as successful have been the ones that have thought a month in rehab on its own was a magic cure. In contrast I know recovered alcoholics that will go to AA meetings even when they're on cruise ships and have made a commitment to do longterm work and it's not a surprise that they stay sober.

I'm sure the good ones do, but is it even enough time? It can take some people years to chisel through all of the baggage that is causing them to use and figure out how to change their coping strategies. They're not going to be in rehab for years - one would hope, anyway. So there might need to be something after rehab to really get into that work.

I shouldn't see why a person couldn't have more than one team they like or love. Most of us have more than one friend or relative we care about, right? I love the Angels best, but there have been a bunch of players I've liked - both Angels and players from other teams - who have been traded or signed deals elsewhere. I'm not going to stop liking them just because they're now wearing a different color jersey. As someone else said on this thread, good baseball is good baseball.

I tend to agree with this. I think outpatient programs like AA and NA that acknowledge the illness AND work on personal responsibility and accountability might be better for a lot of people. If they kick drugs and don't address whatever drove them to use drugs, they'll just go on to relapse or to be addicted to something else. On the other hand there are those who go through rehab once, make a commitment to maintain sobriety and never go back. On the other hand, a lot of drugs - be they legal or illegal- cannot be stopped cold turkey without some major physical problems because the user builds up a physical dependence. People trying to stop heavy alcohol use can end up with seizures and such. For those people, being under the direct care of a physician is important and depending on what drug is being stopped and how heavy the usage was, being in a hospital or rehab for that part of the detox might be a good idea.

Most of the people who have denied PEDS, who have been suspicious, always or almost always came out clean on the MLB drug tests. Even A-Rod technically did not test positive for PEDS in the Biogenesis scandal that got him suspended. That's the difference. They could keep denying because the evidence of their PED use was concealed. In Hamilton's case it was inevitable that the drug test was going to come back positive. He was just reporting something that would have been immediately discovered anyway.

They mentioned he had relapsed with alcohol as well, and that was not said to be a one time thing. That's why I was thinking rehab. Addiction counseling might work too, though.

Maybe they don't need to do anything; they should just hang onto that money or use it toward extensions on some of the key players they have now. Last year the team did just fine with the players it had, without Josh, and they have a lot of great players in ST this year. It isn't as though losing Josh, at the playing level he exhibited last season, is going to be a loss. There' s no need to bring in anyone else, IMHO.

Under the guidelines of being a fourth time offender I think a year's suspension is fair. In addition to that, though, he really does seem to need to go back to rehab.

ITA with this. There seems to be some misconception that if you acknowledge that addiction is an illness or has some physiological triggers, you're somehow throwing up your hands and saying "well, there's nothing he can do, it's a disease, just lay off the guy." Acknowledgment of personal responsibility and acknowledgement of addiction as a disease are not mutually exclusive. In AA and related systems there is usually a huge - HUGE- emphasis on taking personal responsibility for one's actions, righting wrongs (including apologizing but also making amends where it is at all possible) and taking control of one's life. But there's also an acknowledgment that an addict might need support from others or some kind of rehab to do that.

I actually don't think he relapsed with drugs in September either - it could have been alcohol, and it would be plausible, but I don't know and there's no way of knowing. And I think that whatever happened, it was on HIM, not the Angels organization. I do think that something was very visbly up with him, though. Whatever that was, I don't know, but he seemed completely indifferent and disconnected to the team. And I also think that when he played poorly and the press asked about it, there is a distinct possibility that he exaggerated an existing injury or just made shit up - hence the whole thing about not being able to breathe/chest pain/etc. I have to think that was hyperbole because as mentioned, if he'd actually had chest pain and shortness of breath he would have been sent to the ER in about two seconds. The question that hasn't been answered in terms of the current situation is whether he is tested during the off season. If he's not been tested since October, it means there were several months there where he was not actively being monitored for drugs three times a week. And if that's the case, it would make sense that he admitted his relapse to MLB now - he knew the drug testing was going to start back up when full-roster spring training began, and then they would find out anyway.

I don't think there was a coverup or a conspiracy but I do think something about it is not what it seems. If Hamilton was really having severe chest pain that was radiating to his shoulder and arm and interfering with breathing, he really SHOULD have been in the ER. Nobody plays around with that sort of thing. Even if he wasn't using at the time - cocaine can cause permanent damage to the heart, so his past use could have had long-term effects, unfortunately. I can't see the Angels trainers or Scioscia letting him continue to play with that sort of pain - they would have packed him in an ambulance immediately the second he said he had chest pain and trouble breathing, because that's too serious to just write off to his shoulder injury. I also can't see Hamilton being brainless enough to ignore major heart attack warning signs. So I think it was something that may have been embellished.

This guy has so much heart. I love that he's raring to go and is trying to play as soon as he can. I equally love that Scioscia and the medical team are holding him back until he's safe and really ready to be out there.

Cocaine can make the heart race, cause irregular heartbeats, increase blood pressure, and give users heart attacks. So it absolutely could cause chest pain.

Perhaps...because he honestly doesn't give a damn. What's it to him if he goes on the DL? He gets paid and he doesn't have to worry about playing and getting booed. Perhaps also because many of those injuries are exaggerated. If he was really feeling severe chest pain radiating to his armpit and had so much pain that he was having trouble breathing, the guy should have been in the ER getting checked for a heart attack or a collapsed lung, not playing baseball (and yes, I know he said right side, not left, but it's not out of the question that heart pain can appear in the central or right side of the chest). That's an incredibly cynical POV and I know it, but Hamilton doesn't seem to be invested in the game in the same way the other players are. He doesn't seem to be sitting there fighting to get back or worrying about his place in the lineup the way other injured players are doing.