BTH

Perhaps my predictions on where players will be placed were a bit conservative. It's tough for me to say because fans didn't get to see what was happening at the Alternate Site or at Instructs. You're probably right on Rodriguez. Ultimately, the people in the Angels organization know what went on during the offseason, at the Alternate Site, and at Instructs so they should have a good idea of where those guys are at.

In English, please.

Hopefully there is a full minor league season so that we can see how it plays out.

I was referring to the alternate training site in Long Beach, not the instructional league. Perhaps instructs were enough for Martinez, but some players (like Rodriguez) got experience at both the alternate site during the season and instructs after the season.

I totally agree with you all that Ohtani isn't in a place to be making those kind of requests. The Angels should be in on Sugano, but I haven't seen any reports linking them to him. Maybe they are just keeping things under wraps.

I think the players who were at the alternate site have a greater chance of skipping levels. Martinez wasn't among those at the alternate site, so it's hard for me to see him skipping a level. For someone like Rodriguez, skipping a level seems more likely because he was facing AAA/MLB caliber players at the alternate site.

Yeah there is. There are the four full season teams (AAA/AA/High-A/Low-A) and a complex team in both the US and Dominican for every MLB team (which are short season). The complex team is essentially the AZL Angels.

It's hard for me to see the Angels going over the luxury tax period, let alone to go over the luxury tax for a collection of good- but, besides Hendriks, not star players. I think Arte might go over the luxury tax threshold if it means they get Bauer and complementary pieces, but I can't see him going over for 5-6 average to above average free agents.

I think the Angels still need to add at least 1-2 more quality bullpen arms. Last season, it seemed like they had a solid back-end with Robles, Buttrey, Middleton, and Bedrosian. Then Bedrosian got hurt and the other 3 collapsed. There's a strength in numbers, and I think the Angels still lack numbers. If you have 6 quality bullpen arms and 3 regress but 1-2 show improvement (like Mayers and Peña did last season), you are still in decent shape.

You think so? He hasn't even played a single game at AA. I'd be surprised if he skipped AA and started at AAA.

My guesses would be: Marsh: AAA. Adams: High-A with a quick trigger to AA. Detmers: High-A with a quick trigger to AA (just like Canning at the start of the 2018 season). Paris: Rookie (AZL). Rodriguez: High-A with a quick trigger to AA. Jackson: Low-A. Knowles: Low-A. Koch: Rookie (AZL) to control his innings and then Low-A. Martinez: AA. Placencia: Dominican (DSL)

Why are you just making up information? You literally said 40 minutes ago that he "Has meetings with Angels." Then you just backtrack it. The way you word your posts makes it sound like you know things for a fact and then you just say "who knows."

I hope I'm wrong, and I hope that they are in on Sugano but I am skeptical that they are.

There were rumors around the time Ohtani signed that he didn't want to be on a team with another Japanese player. I don't know how true those rumors are, but the Angels haven't signed another Japanese player since Ohtani. So until they sign another Japanese player while Ohtani is on the team, I'm not going to expect the Angels to be heavily involved in the market for a Japanese player.

The thing is, as crazy as it sounds, I think the Angels would've actually made the playoffs in 2020 if Ausmus was the manager. I say this because Ausmus would've had greater knowledge of the 2020 roster than Maddon did coming into the season. In the early parts of the season we saw that Maddon was still adjusting and getting familiar with the Angels personnel. For example, he didn't use guys like Bedrosian, Buttrey, and Ramirez while instead turning to Barnes and Milner. Maddon eventually figured out who to trust, but it was too late in a short season. Ausmus could've turned a few loses into wins with proper bullpen management at the beginning of the season, and that would've allowed the Angels to sneak into the postseason. The 2020 Angels had the talent to make the playoffs but didn't partially because the team was built to be managed by a Billy Eppler type manager (like Ausmus) instead of an old school manager like Maddon. Having a GM and Manager who are on the same page (which hopefully Minasian and Maddon are) is critical for a team.

It's interesting that Minasian (and the Angels as a whole) have yet to make a single waiver claim this offseason. Like you said, waiver pickups were a common occurrence for Eppler. Maybe it's partially because the Angels didn't have a GM when most players got placed on waivers (at the end of the World Series after teams cleared their 40-man rosters).

He said in his vlog a week ago that he was going to "hop on a call with the Dodgers" and that five people were going to be on the zoom call. Also, Bauer said that he was talking with Toronto on Zoom during his new vlog that came out today. The vlog is a few days behind, and it sounded like that meeting actually took place on Christmas or a day or two after Christmas.

For free agents, it'd just be Bauer. I'd say Odorizzi and Tanaka are in the middle tier of free agent starting pitchers.

Willits is actually the Yankees 1B/OF coach

Here's a question: would you trade David Fletcher in a deal for Castillo or Gray? Fans love him, but from a strictly baseball standpoint, they could probably sign a second basemen in free agency who could perform similarly to Fletcher at a reasonable cost. The reason why you would do it because you can sign a second basemen out there for a reasonable amount, but you can't sign an elite starting pitcher unless you're shell out a ton of money.

This isn't a hiring, but this falls under news for Perry Minasian's front office.

Minasian said on AM830 today: “I’m looking forward to filling out the rest of the front office. There’s still a couple things I’d like to do -- and I’m working on that -- but hopefully, at some point soon, we can send a release out with exactly what we’ve been able to do.” So it seems like there's still some more hirings to come.

I searched Jim Edmonds to see if he was still working with the Cardinals, and all I saw were floods of articles about his personal life. So yeah, cross him off the list.

Considering that Feliciano was also the outfielders coach, I'd assume that they bring in someone who has a background in the outfield. Some options that come to mind: Ron Roenicke, Darin Erstad, Termell Sledge, Mark Loretta, and Chris Denorfia. I believe Roenicke also coached the Angels outfielders when he was the Angels third base coach under Scioscia (though I could be wrong). Erstad and Edmonds are former Angels. Sledge, Loretta, and Denorfia all worked for the Cubs under Joe Maddon.