Reveille1984

Its weird how people have random gutteral reactions to players even though their stats show otherwise.

Williams and Reynolds single-handedly bring down the quality of MLB network.

One great accomplishment in life doesn't make you not an asshole.

I just said it was fitting since you know, he's hitting .220 and has been the worst regular in baseball for half a major league season. It's called "the bigger picture". But yes, I give him credit for that clutch leadoff single through the left side infield.

He just looks... old. He's slow as ever and his at bats are boring to watch. It was fitting yesterday that after our five run outburst, Pujols and Hamilton come up with runners on and strike out back to back to end the inning. Pretty much the story of the season.

Why doesn't Cowart just stick with hitting from the right side? Has an .800+ OPS doing that, which is awesome for a guy who's barely turned 21 in AA (although who knows how he'd do in righty-righty matchups). He has a .540 OPS from the left side with a .192 BA in 220 AB's, and doesn't seem to be improving much as the season has gone on.

He can't be any worse than Shmuck in LF. His routes to fly balls look like he's knocked back some Don Julio during warmups.

If you're expecting hard-hitting analysis from Gubi, you're probably going to be disappointed. I think he says "Again, it's not where the catcher catches the pitch, it's where the ball crosses the plate" at least 500+ times a season.

Just think of it this way: the last three seasons Hamilton averaged a wRC of around 105 (basically an offensive sabermetric stat attempting to show how many runs a player created for his team). That is considered great to elite offensive production. This year in 70 games (about 45% of the season) he has a wRC of 26 and is on pace for about a 55-60, which is basically half the production we're accustomed to seeing from him. Considering our record in one run games and how many we've had, Hamilton could have essentially kept us in the race by himself just by matching his career norms. I know some other players are underperforming a bit as well, but the level to which Josh has sucked complete ass this year is pretty much unparalleled.

Dude... stop going inside you moron

For most of these kids the biggest payout they're ever going to see will be from the draft and their chances of lasting long enough as an MLB regular to make big money are ridiculously slim.

at least the silver lining is that in a year, we'll have some good draft picks!

Even if these guys were playing up to career averages, we'd still be pretty far out of the race. Hamilton has been around a 4 WAR player the past couple seasons, and Pujols at his best is probably a 5-6 WAR player now. Given those reference points, we'd have maybe 3-4 more wins at this stage in the season if they were playing well. So instead of 27-37 we'd be 30-34 or something, awesome! As terrible as these guys have been, there are lots of underperforming/injured players not living up to their contracts.

"Don't quote me stats" is a special kind of special.

Trout has honestly been pretty mediocre in both OF positions this year, all things considered. UZR and a few other metrics confirm this as well, although it has been a somewhat small sample size. His arm is also ridiculously weak for CF, as we've seen it being taken advantage of by baserunners numerous times this year already. There's no legitimate argument really for keeping him in CF, other than the opinion that somehow playing CF makes him hit better. Or that playing him there will keep him happy and make him more likely to sign long-term.

The only move I thought was a massive mistake was Pujols honestly. We didn't need another first baseman plus he was 32 years old at the time and already in decline. And for ten years.... yeah. He will likely go down as the biggest contract bust in baseball history outside of A-Rod if he doesn't end up opting out at some point. And like everyone else, I never understood the Blanton deal and probably never will. Bad signing when it happened, and it just keeps getting worse. Hamilton I thought was a little desperate, but didn't really mind it when it happened. All the others I was neutral to positive on.

Fun fact: After averaging almost 4 WAR three of the past four seasons, Aybar is at a -0.2 WAR this season in 167 PA's and has a whopping 1.8% walk rate, which is second worst in the AL behind only Jeff Keppinger. Your 2013 Angels leadoff hitter, everyone!

How can any argument based on a guy playing two games hold any weight whatsoever, especially against a guy who is essentially the best player in baseball right now at 21? Your friend might be good at what he does, but hopefully whatever that is doesn't involve logical thought processes.

The most annoying thing is that when it's brought up he just has this attitude of "well, I have a history of hitting well and eventually I will hit well. Last season I had 43 HR's, did you see those?... blah blah blah". Like uh, are you working on anything? Watching video? Tweaking your swing and looking for mistakes or holes in your approach? Working with hitting coaches? He's on the wrong side of thirty and eventually he's going to have to rely on more than just natural freak ability to keep being a good player. Obviously he's probably doing what he can to remedy his horrible start, but the way he comes off about it is completely nonchalant and almost bored. I guess God will let him know through divine intervention when it's time to start hitting again.

Yeah, I wouldn't mind bringing him back on a two-year type deal (if he accepts it) if he can continue to be a good middle of the rotation guy.

He's been dealing with nagging injuries and is having a down year so far, and Segura is at a highly unsustainable pace at the moment. But what a perfect sample size to pick!

Pretty sure we've already gone over this ad nauseum. You trade talent to get talent, it's as simple as that. Nobody complained about us trading for Dan Haren when it happened. Now that it's four years later and those guys are panning out, everybody wants to be captain hindsight.

Wouldn't it be hilarious if Wells finished the year with a higher WAR than Pujols and Hamilton combined?

Seriously. Saunders sucks ass too, but some have an infatuation with him here for whatever reason.

I doubt 8/$100M will get it done at this point. Especially if he puts up a line like .300/.380/.600 this year and goes 30/30+ again. 8 years would buy out one league minimum year and three arbitration years at an AAV of $12.5M (which if he keeps this up, he's probably get around that much over arbitration anyways), so it would essentially be like him hitting free agency in his age 26 season and getting a 4 year/$50M contract, which is a ridiculous underpay. Yeah, he gets a raise of about $12M for his 2014 season, but would potentially sacrifice $50M+ over his age 26-29 seasons while still in the prime of his career. Unless he really loves the Angels or has his mind set on playing for one team his entire career, there's no way it happens.