JBR

I’m still following the team because it’s what I’ve always done. I’d say it’s getting to the point where I watch out of habit, not hope. 

I don’t see myself getting to the point where I stop following the Angels completely but I also don’t have much desire to devote time and energy because I don’t know where the team is going. 
 

The organization feels lost and I’m losing my motivation to stick with it. Not totally yet, but maybe closer than ever to simply checking out for a while. 

For me, the question for the future is: do the Angels rebuild or reload? I'd be thrilled for the team to pick one, then make all decisions to support their chosen strategy.  I don't even mind years of losing ahead because we're already a losing franchise and have been for years. 

However, it seems like the strategy is not to fully rebuild but also not to fully commit to reloading either (which would require spending on premium arms), but a mix of partially reloading (i.e. Rendon) and recycling (i.e. Teheran/all the bullpen arms/seemingly all pitching acquisitions last year like Cahill, Harvey, etc). 

There's a lot I don't know about running a MLB organization. For example, how limited Billy Eppler's choice are by forces outside of his control (i.e. the will of ownership, especially in regards to past signings). So, more likely, it's not as simple as having one primary strategy like maybe Houston and the Cubs did before their cycles of success. 

I will say this though, I've been watching the Angels for 25+ years and I don't think I've ever enjoyed it less. Truly hope there's some bold decisions coming one way or another and it's not the status quo of mostly recycling players and not fully spending on premium arms. I'd rather they blow it up and rebuild and give us a chance at contention before Mike Trout is no longer great. I'd wait a few years for that. 

20 hours ago, Vlad27Trout27 said:

 

What ever this Philosophy is, it sucks, all its awarding us with is Tjs.

I think this quote may specifically have to do with the former pitching coach Doug White, who was there when Harvey was. Other pitchers reported having trouble adjusting to White’s ideas and approach to pitching, like Barrea and Suarez according to the LA Times.  
 

Even apart from White, I think the issue of TJ you bring up remains and seems to go beyond the Ausmus/White regime and stretch back years. It’s something the organization needs to figure out .

Knowing the Angels won’t blow this up and rebuild, and seeing this as maybe the best season to go all out for a playoff run with more teams getting in, then to me it makes sense to trade talent for Clevinger. He’s the ace the team needs. I wonder if the Angels have the players and boldness to do it. 

I’m a bit shocked that a system with Adell is ranked nearly worst in the majors. Gives me an uneasy feeling that we’ll be on the outside looking in come October because we just don’t have the reinforcements a playoff team needs.

11 minutes ago, Pancake Bear said:

You think they can just magically keep Betts beyond 2020? That's, uh, not how it works. And I don't think Moreno is interested in paying 360(or more) million to a guy who doesn't pitch (actually, I don't think anyone is paying that much even to someone who does pitch). 

Price is a gigantic injury risk. He's had elbow issues in recent years. He's far from a sure thing to be healthy. 

Making a move like that would set the farm back a bit, depending just how much it cost. It would destroy payroll, limiting flexibility going forward with Price's contract (depending how much Boston paid down - wouldn't expect much; at most 10m a season). 

When that colossally stupid idea crashes and burns, the only way forward is to try to spend your way out of it, which almost never is successful. Most likely it would be 2013 and onward redux. 

Thanks, but no thanks. I've been there, seen that show. It's a trainwreck. The only way forward is by being patient. Going full Dipoto is what stupid teams do. You apparently don't get that.

Why so unkind? 

29 minutes ago, Pancake Bear said:

Actually, I think you’ve missed the point. Winning the WS is never a foregone conclusion. The point in not trading young controllable assets isn’t that we think they’re sure to be good, it’s in large part that they represent valuable currency that shouldn’t be wasted. 

Blowing that currency is what Dipoto did. It was the wrong time and it set the franchise back years. There’s only so much you can buy yourself out of unless the owner just says ‘screw it’ and ups payroll to 300m. Every year there are examples of teams that got ahead of themselves and blew their window through impatience.

Betts and Price do not make us favorites to win this year, and we’d be stuck with Price for better or worse, for richer or poorer, as long as his contract shall last. That contract would give us less flexibility to make moves next season, and trading top prospects on top of it for one season of Betts? That only makes sense if you’re all in. We aren’t and shouldn’t be. 

I’m comfortable being in the camp that says winning this year and next is what matters most and is easier to predict (though also not guaranteed). I totally get that the Angels have been burned before going for it. I’m bummed that we have nothing but one division flag to show for the past decade. 

My perspective is that Betts and Price make them better in the next couple years, especially in 2020, when they’ll have Trout, Rendon, Ohtani, and Simmons (who could well be gone after) all in their prime. That’s a special core and if you add Betts all of a sudden it’s incredible. In 3-4 years those dudes might well be some combination of gone or in decline, minus Ohtani. It’d be cool if Adell and Marsh and some of the other prospects we’re quality players by that time, but I’d rather have the crazy lineup now and pad the rotation with Price. Would love a bullpen upgrade too to help. 

What I want to avoid is not fully going for it now and miss out on a special 2020 and then regret it later when the stars start to decline and the kids may or may not be ready to rise. 

On 1/20/2020 at 8:29 AM, Blarg said:

There is absolutely no value in Betts for the Angels. He is a one year rental when they definetely don't need another outfielder. Price is rediculously over priced so Boston would have to split the costs. I just don't see any reason to further beat this to death, pairing of the two is simply a waste of the Angels money and prospects. 

Can’t say I agree. What’s the value in putting together a team everyone will want to watch with 3 of the top position players in the game and Ohtani pitching and hitting bombs? What’s the value in completing a roster that almost certainly gets into the postseason this year, now? Adding Betts and Price does both. I think there’s tremendous value in winning now. 
 

I do respect the point that trading young controllable assets hurts and *might* hurt in the long run. But prospects aren’t guarantees and flags fly forever. Let’s win now.  

For me, it boils down to this...what helps the angels win a title more, the next 3 years of Clevinger or the next 7 of Adell?
 

I’m torn, but the more I think about it, the more I think Clevinger will help more. 
 

This great class of Angels superstars is ready to win now. Clevinger is a win now player who fills the Angels greatest need today. Adell is a win soon-ish player, probably, but no guaranteed, who plays a position where the Angels have Marsh waiting in the wings. 
 

We have less clarity on where the angels will be in 3-5 years, and more clarity on the next two years. Clevinger should help more during that span. 
 

Imagine if the Angels don’t go all in during the next two years and don’t win, Trout and Rendon begin to decline, and then the MLB is locked out. A labor lockout isn’t a given, but it’s not far fetched either. Let’s win now while the stars are still stars. 

11 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

Hmm, I don't see it like that at all, personally. I think we're all about hoarding everything now and proposing hilarious trades involving star players and a handful of prospects we don't care about. 

It's funny though because we used to whine about Stoneman being unwilling to trade anyone. 

I agree with @tdawg87. I personally think when resources are scarce, especially for an extended period, hoarding feels prudent and wise. It makes perfect sense. However, for me the priority is winning now and I find it hard to imagine, barring injury, that the Angels are better in the next 2 years with Adell than with Clevinger on the roster.  

Trout, Rendon, and Simba are in their prime now and need to best supporting cast possible to make a push before they start to decline. 

In 3-5 years it’s not hard to imagine Adell closing the value gap with Clevinger, maybe even surpassing Clevinger, but it’s so hard to project that far out with much confidence.

We basically know what Clevinger is now (the front of rotation arm we need), we think Adell will be good (maybe great) but there’s no guarantee, and the window to win is wide open now and might close a bit with every passing year. With that, moving Adell might make a lot of sense, as painful as it’d be. 

Baseballtradevalues.com has Clevinger for Adell straight up as fair. In fact, it thinks Cleveland would get more value long term with Adell than with Clevinger ($96M to $83M). That may well be true, however, Adell is unproven while Clevinger is a known commodity and looks like an ace, so I get why that deal probably wouldn’t work in real life.

I think I would send Adell for Clevinger in a one for one if it were proposed, but man that would hurt badly. To think we had Clevinger and sent him for Vinnie Pestano

Overall, rather than strip the farm of its best pieces for Clevinger, I’d rather to spend our way out of this and trade for a lesser arm like David Price. Why else sell Wilson for salary relief?

I love these questions man. For me, these are the questions I keep wondering for the players that I think will largely determine the Angels’ fate...if there are more yesses than no’s, we may well see Angels games in October:

Can they stay heathy? Ohtani, Heaney, Canning, Upton, Middleton

Can they be a reliable supporting cast? Bundy, Teheran, Bedrosian, Ramirez 

Can they keep it up? LaStella, Fletcher, Goodwin, Robles, Buttrey

Will they take next step? Adell, Rengifo, Sandoval, Barria, Thaiss, Ward

Will they meet high expectations? Trout, Rendon, Simmons, Stassi (Fangraphs projects 3 defense fueled WAR)

2 hours ago, Hubs said:

This a lightly optimistic but also realist projection. As junky says, other than Max Stassi's optimistic 2.5 WAR based solely on defense, where is the outlandish projection?

If anything they are a little low (0.5-1 WAR light) on most guys.

C...I think Stassi's projection is a little rosy, but lets stick with it.

1B.. I hope they can be a bit better offensively than the projections here, particularly Pujols and LaStella, (and Thaiss) who I think can get to +1 WAR (0.5 more each)  than they show here.

2B...They have Fletcher dropping in say 100 less PA from 3.4 to 1.8, I'd say that he improves a tiny bit, and ends up closer to 2.8, because he won't play as much but still that adds another +1 WAR.

SS...Forecasting a return to form for Simmons, but it's a 3.5 projection whereas he was 5.0 and 5.4 in his two healthy years before, lets add +1.5 WAR.

3B...Rendon has been better than they show here by at least 0.5 WAR...could be as much as 1.5. Still let's tack on +1 more WAR.

LF... Upton's bad year costs him in the projection department, but he was injured all year...he's been a 3 WAR OF or better in 6 of the last 9 years. So even if he returns to form, but not all the way, he's still worth again +1.5 more WAR than they show here.

CF...Trout's 8.8 WAR projection seems in concert for what he's been doing, but again, it's light compared to 2018's 9.8 and 2016's 9.7 so lets...add a +1 WAR.

RF... Who wins the job and plays the most really makes a difference, but Adell could be the biggest difference maker on the team, if he pulls a Juan Soto / Ronald Acuna Jr./ Cody Bellinger ROY impression. He could be worth 3-4.5 WAR because if he hits he plays... Acuna and Soto were brought up later in the year. And even if his playing time is limited by Goodwin and Upton,  Goodwin was worth 1.9 WAR in the same number of AB's as they have him on this projection in 2018. So lets just say they get 3.2 WAR from the duo. That's a big jump up from the 0.2 they project. That still adds 3.0 WAR.

DH... I think this projection of a breakout from Ohtani shows what they can get from the position. I don't think he gets 560 PA so I'm gonna drop it by say 1/6, which lowers it by 0.5, but I think the replacement guys will make up for the 0.5 loss too...so let's leave it alone.

That brings their BAT from 29.7 to a best in the majors 39.7, so even if it's half of what I picked above, then they'd still be at 34.7, or first place.

As for the pitching side, I still think they add one more starter, and go with a true 6 man rotation, to keep everyone in games longer, and Ohtani pitching once a week.

SP... Teheran always outperforms his peripherals. I'd add 1 WAR to this projection. He had 1.6 last year. Bundy, Heaney also are decent projections. Canning I think is a little light innings wise and Ohtani is about 2/3 of the innings they'd actually have him pitch, so lets be optimistic and safe and add 2 WAR. That sets the starters at 13.7.

RP... I think Robles and Middelton will each be better, as will Anderson and Pena. I'd add 2.0 WAR total for all four guys (Robles was 1.4 better than this and Pena was a starter, so...) and a few others they've undersold.. That's an increase to 4.1.

Pitching total is now 17.8, moving them up to 11th.

That's an overall best case scenario, 57.5, which would be a team well over 104-105 wins. Is that possible? Obviously, everything would have to go right, but I see an absolutely loaded team.

 

 

 

I love the optimism. Personally, I’d be thrilled if the Angels won 92 games and we’re alive until the last week of the season. That feels like a good challenge for them in light of how competitive their division is and the AL in general. 

11 minutes ago, Chuckster70 said:

If we lose out on Ryu in the FA sweepstakes I'd seriously like to explore a trade with the Red Sox for Price. David Price getting reunited with Joe Maddon could be a boost to his career, but from what I've seen in some of his starts in 2019 he sure looks like he can still be a #1 ace in a rotation.

Here's a few of his starts against good hitting teams in 2019. 

 

 

Price is a decent pitcher at this point, so I think it’s all about what he’d cost. FanGraphs Zips projections have him worth around 2 wins-ish each year for the next three. He is being paid maybe more like a 4-5 win pitcher. Craig Edwards over at Fangraphs says Price is maybe worth $30M, so he’s worth maybe $60M less than he’s making. It’s a big gap at this point so if the Sox send a lot of value with him, or we can swap a bad contract to pay that down, maybe this works. For me, Ryu is the guy. Price is an okay fallback option but I’m not clear on why they would not do everything possible to get Ryu? The pitching market seems to be slowing down a bit. 

35 minutes ago, Torridd said:

It looks like we'll be outbid on Ryu, if this trend continues. Do you think acquiring Rendon saves Eppler's job, do you play out the season to see, or does he get canned for missing out on everyone else of note?

Honest question: what makes it look like we’ll be outbid on Ryu? I haven’t read that so if there’s a source saying that or reason for that I’d appreciate hearing that if you could share. In my opinion, Ryu still makes a lot of sense, he ha a high ceiling, won’t cost prospects, and with the durability of Bundy and Teheran, Ryu can throw 150IP and still make a major impact. If anything, Ryu makes more sense than ever to me. 

I’m with you that I don’t feel great about selling prospects to pay off bad contracts because the Angels system isn’t considered to be loaded on the whole, though not barren like it used to be. However, the system seems heavy on SS prospects. Even after this trade, 6 of their top 30 prospects are listed as SS, so it seems like they dealt from a position of strength. The move seems reasonable enough in that light and for me, if they use this money to sign Ryu, I’ll quickly forget about Wilson. 

14 hours ago, wopphil said:

Let's say we sign Cole on Tuesday. Then what? We can't be done at that point. There will presumably be a little money left to play with, a few trade chips in the farm, and plenty of holes still to fix. 

What is Eppler's next move in the hopeful event we get Cole this week? We need another couple of talented pieces after Cole.

I like an idea @Chuckster70proposed of a trade involving Contreras/Darvish. If the Cubs would eat enough of Darvish's deal, that could be a trade worth moving some of our better chips.

 

I wonder if Upton would play 1B to save his legs. If so, then maybe the Angels can keep Adell and Marsh to surround Trout in the near future, and purchase a 1-yr placeholder for RF, maybe Calhoun? Sadly it would then be time to say goodbye to Albert. Just no need to roster him if Upton can play first. 

For rotation, sign Porcello as a buy low on the potential that the change of scenery will do some good. He eats innings consistently and has shown much better results in past than 2019. The value of someone reliably taking the ball every fifth day can’t be overstated with the injury risks on this rotation. 
 
For lineup, get Donaldson and his 4-5 WAR in there. Now you have tons of infield flexibility. That way Cozart can play (backup really) his more natural position up the middle. 
 

Maybe this is going more expensive that Arte wants but it’s hard to imagine the Angels winning a wild card spot without spending huge. The gaps on the roster are just too big. 

3 hours ago, floplag said:

I dont want to even consider this, BUT... we cant deny the possibility of it.

IF we lose out of Cole, i pivot to building the best offense in the game to make up for lack of pitching.  Its really our only option at that point if we dont get at least one of Cole/Stras, and i dont really think Stras is truly in play for us at all.

So... I sign Rendon and make a trade for a top young catcher.  Maybe grab Catellanos or Puig for a year or two to fill in the OF till the kids are ready or I make the trade with the cubs to get Contreras and Bryant, maybe more, and i sign as many mid tier guys as i can like Kuechel, Lindblom etc... and try to win every game 6-5.

What other option is there?

I totally agree. If Cole and Strasberg go elsewhere, then it’s Rendon and an arm like Keuchel, or bust. Angels may have no choice but to spend their way out of their mediocrity since they’ve been unwilling to blow up the team and rebuild, when they probably could have a few years ago. Continuing to slowly wait for the farm system to deliver as mike trout’s prime slips away and team control of stars like Simmons ends is no sure bet to pan out and could alienate the fan base in the process. This free agent class is terrific and the Angels have to get one or two big stars or risk falling out of contention and out of favor with fans.