DCAngelsFan

Yup, and that was my opinion (which, actually, it wasn't - just an excuse to try to say something funny - just 'cause I say something doesn't mean I mean something ) Anyway, I can now see this discussion spinning round and round, like a snake eating its own tail, so this is where I get off ...

Well, when you telling people what they shouldn't do, I think it's a little more than an "opinion." Not that he's wrong - but then again, if we couldn't speculatewildly without facts to back it up, well, might as well just shut the board down ...

Oh, man, I *wish* altuve was a FA next season - Astros have a $6.5m club option for him in 2019.

The compensation - lost draft pick(s) and loss of international bonus money - will impact the teams that have the most money (comp is meant to penalize those that exceed the luxury cap, and give relief to those that get revenue sharing.) And Boras as his agent may backfire - Boras will want to keep him on the sidelines and try to get into a bidding war late in the offseason. But if the rich teams pass, it might not happen. And looking at his stats, I'd be cautious - I mean, the 96 OPS+ can be somewhat ignored, since he's broken out in 2015 and more or less sustained things. But his walk rate is down a bit, his SO rate is up a bit, and mostly, pate discipline has taken a step backwards(from fangraphs) Season Team O-Swing% Z-Swing% Swing% O-Contact% Z-Contact% Contact% Zone% Pace 2011 Royals 33.4 % 64.9 % 49.0 % 71.4 % 92.7 % 85.4 % 49.5 % 21.3 2012 Royals 34.5 % 65.0 % 49.1 % 63.4 % 86.2 % 77.9 % 48.0 % 21.8 2013 Royals 32.2 % 67.1 % 48.8 % 69.4 % 89.3 % 82.4 % 47.6 % 23.2 2014 Royals 31.8 % 68.3 % 48.3 % 78.1 % 87.4 % 84.0 % 45.3 % 24.2 2015 Royals 32.7 % 64.4 % 47.2 % 75.2 % 90.3 % 84.6 % 45.7 % 23.4 2016 Royals 27.0 % 60.8 % 42.2 % 76.8 % 91.3 % 86.2 % 45.0 % 24.1 2017 Royals 40.4 % 74.6 % 55.0 % 68.5 % 90.8 % 81.5 % 42.9 % 23.5 For comparison, here's all 3B: 2017 29.4 % 67.5 % 46.4 % 63.9 % 85.8 % 78.1 % 44.5 % So, last season, he swung at 75% in the strike zone and 40% of pitches outside the zone - that's ... not great. His contact rate fell off a bit - 5 percentage points. It's still good - but point is, I'd be very concerned at the trend over time - someone that swings at everything really hard seems awfully vulnerable to a quick regression. I gotta think advance scouts have taken note, and may have some new adjustments waiting for him next season. And of course, his defense is just adequate these days. All that said, the mlbtr projection for him is 5/$85m - despite all the yellow flags, if that's his contract, he'll probably earn it, but just - guessing 9 or 10 WAR over the contract life.

Nope, I'm sure this conversation will be repeated and repeated until the end of time - or 2021, whichever comes first. The backloading of this contract probably seemed a good idea at the time - but makes it nearly impossible for him to walk away. Sure, it costs more - money now is worth more than money later - but if we'd have front-loaded it, he'd find it much easier to walk away. Owing him, what, $114m over the next four years? He's not going anywhere. I mean, look at Fielder - he announced he would no longer play; but didn't retire - he wanted the money. Pujols won't retire even if he's in a wheelchair - why should he?

Yeah, I was in Philly that day, I'd have crashed, too, since my invite obviously got lost in the mail ... Now we know why it snowed - he wanted snow on his wedding day, and thus it was so ...

I dunno, I don't think I'd pass based on this - would he rather play SS for a team going nowhere, or 3B for a team that has a very good chance, with his help, of advancing in the postseason? The cost may be too much, of course, but you *have* to inquire ... Wouldn't plan to keep him, though - he'll cost too much. So, a rental.

I think he'll always suffer (unfairly) in fans minds as they recall the Angels draft room celebrating like Trout just fell into their laps again when they drafted Ward - and the world said "who the hell is Taylor Ward?" Hey, at least he's not Baldoquin ....

Great movie, there were no good guys, or bad guys - or rather, everyone was both - pretty much buried every preceding Western with its finesse and actual complicated characters, instead of 2d stereotypes. Set the stage for Deadwood, one of the great (and similarly under-appreciated) TV series. "And there was nothing on the marker to explain to Mrs Feathers why her only daughter had married a known thief and murderer, a man of notoriously vicious and intemperate disposition."

After seeing the Marlins sell Stanton for little more than "money", I'd try to pry Starlin Castro away from the Marlins without giving up too much talent. Failing that, Neil Walker's a FA, and his OBP makes him potentially "adequate" - which is better than what we've got. Moustakas - well, he's tied to comp, and as I understand it, we'd forfeit $500k in international bonus pool - how much money remains in our 2018-2019 pool? Can we even do this? And I actually wouldn't want to - he underperformed for so long, I'm not convinced he'll continue to produce, especially moving to Anaheim, where he has a career .713 OPS, and I get the idea he's a bit of a cancer, so yeah, I'm really not enthused about this one.

I agree 100% - the U.S. suspected Japan might attack - but thought the attack would come elsewhere, not what was very nearly a decapitation at Pearl - had the fuel bunkers been hit, had a ship sunk in the ship channel, things might've turned out much differently - Pearl would've have been useless for months, and without fuel, we'd have had to operate from the West Coast, Midway would never have happened, and all those front-line Japanese carriers, and all those pilots would've stayed on the board. And Yamamoto wouldn't sit back and let us rebuild our navy; without Pearl at his back, the West Coast shipyards and naval base and oil storage would surely be bombed, merchant shipping would never survive the trip to Hawaii, so Pearl would never be re-constituted and Hawaii would eventually have been invaded and lost. - or at least the threat of such would've been used by Japan to force us into capitulation, yielding the Pacific to Japan forever. Today, we might be sending our best players to play in the NPBL. So, basically, we took the chance of losing the Pacific war from day 1 because we somehow knew that Japan would cancel their second strike and not destroy the 4.5m barrels of oil at Pearl? That's beyond ludicrous. Really, the only thing to add here is there's a pretty solid suggestion that the USSR knew either about the Pearl attack, or that *something* was coming, when Richard Sorge gave information about Japanese plans - variously, Japan was going to attack somewhere in the South Pacific, or possibly, Pearl Harbor itself, depending on who you believe. At any rate, the information passed allowed Stalin to strip the Mongolian frontier of the modern divisions that were then used to shore up Moscow's defenses, and launch a counter-attack in front Moscow which effectively permanently ended the German advance. Without that information, Moscow would likely have fallen. And had Japan attacked the Soviet Union instead of the US, the world map would look far different today.

And I'm hearing there's a possibility that it might snow in hell sometime ... Weathermen and hot stove league prognosticators have the easiest jobs - will anyone be impressed if I tweeted "I'm hearing that a decision will certainly be made in the next 2 weeks" ... ?

I'd think a club need only show the August weather forecast and park effects chart - pitching on a 100 degree day with 100% humidity for a guy who played in a dome in a city with an average temp of 72 degrees should do him in. And yes, it's an extreme pitchers park - only Coors is worse. Really seems the worst possible place for him to pitch, absent the money. Then again, I'd have thought AT&T would be a bad place to pitch - once the sun goes down, it's like a mausoleum - but guess it's easier to keep warm in a cold place than cooling down in a place where the field temps are like 110 ...

To be fair, the Baldoquin move was pretty singular in its idiocy - most GM's don't get a chance to do "two" of them. With "Angels Management" being an oxymoron for so long, I've been pretty slow to trust Eppler, especially since he was inheriting such an awful mess in the farm, the payroll obligations, and the international limitations. But given these limitations, I have to say ... ... screw that, I don't have to say anything, I'll just jinx it - so, yeah, he's Reagins 2.0 ...

I believe that's correct - I think we had an agreement in principle, but Miami approached Detroit with a proposal they thought would be better - when Detroit accepted, they didn't even give us a chance to improve - they got who they wanted - they thought Maybin and Miller were going to be stars - they were both Top 10 prospects they thought they could build around, cheaply. Wood was still top 10 then - but he was always considered risky. I don't think Miami wanted more established players from us, they wanted high-end prospects under club control for a long time.

No topping that, um, so to speak ...

So, basically, you've named China, Vietnam, Korea, and sort-of China again, - for a Japanese baseball player. There are a lot of animosities there, between Japan and China and Korea, especially - and is a little like saying a German soccer player is going to be comfortable in a new city because there's a French restaurant, Wee Britain, a Polish pirogi restaurant, and members of the Russian mafia living nearby.

Good lord, he's channeling my high school newspaper "sports reporter" with all the awkward metaphors and hyperbole - Jim Murray and Shirley Povich must be spinning in their graves ...

Yeah - agreed - the Stanton contract is freaking ridiculous, especially when we're already on the hook for Pujols - but that would be an outfield for the ages ...

Cut it out, you're gonna give me blue balls ... This would probably be greater - Pujols was already on the decline, and Wilson was never better than a #2 - we'd have 2 MVP candidates on the same team - like Mantle & Maris ...

Time to order Trout a copy of Rosetta Stone - Japanese language .... Oh, wait, what am I saying? Mike can do anything, probably already speaks Japanese ... Angels can make a pretty compelling offer outside of money - and perhaps they can make a quick trade to a team that's been eliminated for more international bonus pool money?

A little nit-pick-y, but there's a difference between such obvious spending line items such as "payroll" and spending on all the nuts-and-bolts that make an organization more effective. I don't feel like they're "cheap" in terms of payroll, but in those less-glamorous things where "spending money" can improve your decision-making/yield better results. (better analytics and technology to support scouting and player development, for example, and actually having South American scouting/development, which we failed to have for years, advanced training facilities for player development, and so on.) If we're still the Angels of old, we won't even post a bid for Otani if he posts, just like we didn't compete for Cespedes, Darvish, Iwakuma, Maeda, etc. (I'm thinking we might've at least spoken to Chapman - but whenever some international FA did a showcase in front of 29 times, seemed like you could count on it being the "Angels" that didn't bother showing up.) And then there's idiocy like blowing all your bonus pool money on a no-name, (I'll stop there) named "Baldoquin" - and then, stopping - the greater sin - other teams that went into penalty (like we did) just kept signing, like the Yankees and Red Sox in 2014 - all it would have cost is "money" - other teams in that situation loaded up on additional players - we went home, and the only reason I can think of is that we were "cheap." I could be wrong; but I get the idea that Oakland has spent more on internationals in the last 10 years than the Angels have. Spending on payroll just shows how much you're willing to pay for free agents; it's not "impressive", not when you're letting other areas of your organization lag. (this is primarily retrospective -- but we're living with the consequences of decisions made years ago now.)

Plus, he gets a $500k bonus if traded - my guess is we'll pick that up. Fora $500k bonus to spend a couple of months playing on a contending team, he's either trying to work an extension or is, perhaps, an idiot. If he's reluctant, under those circumstances, just stay in Atlanta - I'd rather someone hungry for the post-season.

I figured that's what you meant - just gave me a chance to raise an issue I always found annoying - the number of AA kids whose athleticism would have let them go far in those "other" sports, but who didn't have the "right" gifts to excel in their preferred sports, still choosing to chase the NBA dream, even though they were never going to be taller than 5'9". Compared to boxing, however, pretty much every other sport - including "golf" and bowling - offers better opportunities for college.

Well, I'd put that slightly differently - those would-be great (African-American) heavyweights spent their youth playing basketball and/or football, but may have topped out at high school - they might've been great heavyweight fighters, but that doesn't mean they reached the NFL or NBA instead. Have seen a lot of AA kids whose athleticism might have let them reach lofty heights in sports like baseball or soccer, instead invest their time in basketball or football, and perhaps their gifts just weren't "right" to be the tiny, fractional percentage that make the pros. I mean, imagine if Mike Trout's passion was soccer? His "career" would probably have ended when he graduated high school. But you can't make kids love the game. I remember DC converting all their urban football and soccer fields to baseball diamonds in an attempt to convince MLB that it was a baseball town - but if you paid attention, you'd realize those diamonds remained embarrassingly empty year-round - the kids played basketball, football and soccer (primarily South and Central American kids.)