Angels in 2030

Give it time -- you will. Let's be honest though, can you even name 5 catching prospects outside of the Angels? Actually, even including Angels catching prospects lol.

i worked on my lower half a lot during this off-season as well.

You know what they say about a broken clock....

100% this. It's so frustrating. It's obvious from seeing the success of the LAD, TB, etc. the past 10+ years what works and what does not for LT franchise success. Further, Arte is truly willing to spend money on the organization as evidenced by his big contracts he doles out and the annual team payroll. But it's HOW he spends that money which is soooo frustrating. It's like a guy spending huge money on a fancy car & clothes to impress the neighborhood/peers/etc. while he's behind on his mortgage, having marriage problems, no retirement savings, etc. It's like he's not willing to put in the work to build a foundation that takes time (or doesn't see it) and prefers to jump to the front of the line with a fancy big FA purchase.

It's not "wrong" in an illegal sense. But it's wrong in a management/labor way. You can't be that stupid. He basically handed the MLPA a gold plater of goodies in their labor negotiations. Not to mention being a moron with his language comments. But it's the labor stuff that ruined this guy. A CEO might not want a Union to form at the company and it's not illegal for him/her to say so, but it's simply not something they can do. When you are management (especially senior or the head), you have to be smarter than that. How someone like that got there.... I continually am amazed at the dumb things my gender does day in and day out. Unsolicited and unnecessary things that get us in trouble, makes us look like fools/idiots, etc. Thank God women haven't figured out a way to guarantee a girl when making a baby (artificial or natural)....us Men might finally be doomed when that day comes.

So is pitch “fixing/tweak” the Pitchers spring training version of “best shape of career” for position players now?

It's easy to make fun of this....and i enjoy a good laugh. But honestly, there is a value (to the player and team) for a guy who can be a jack of all trades bench player all around the field. Ward will never be an everyday premium player starting 150+ games a year at one spot. He's just not good enough -- especially defensively at one spot. But being a bench guy who can play the OF, 3B, 1B and C if necessary is valuable. If he can work on 2B even better. Things happen over the course of a long season and you need a plug guy here & there to get thru the season. Bench guy who plays OF and 1B are a dime a dozen. But add in a difficult spot like C or SS and now you got a keeper for the end of the bench roster.

I'd definitely sign him to an extension now before the season starts. The uncertainty with him injury/durability wise should work in our favor to get him reasonably priced. Even if he doesn't "breakout" but simply stays healthy for 25-30 starts....that'll be expensive in FA as we've seen already.

Wasn't it Heaney who was one of the guys that sold part of his future earnings for an immediate payout with Fantex? Looked it up: yes, it was -- 10% of all future MLB salary earnings.

Huh? Eppler's approach for the big club was basically the same -- just maybe a bit more on the reclamation side SP wise; on the RP side was 100% bring in a bunch of clean peanut guys and hope a couple stick. Regardless of Minasian's and whether you like it or not (or if it's different or not from Eppler), it seems WAY premature to claim one is better than the other. Harsh. How about we get to the first Spring training for this GM before making such claims. Maybe even get a game or two of actual results in while we're at it.

Not if he ultimately projects to move off of catcher....or even is a negative defensive asset. Most scouts think he will have a hard time staying at C unless he makes major strides/improvments. We're simply better off going SP at #9.

Angels easily could be 75 wins or 85+ wins. Their margin of error is soooo much smaller than most other teams due to lack of depth. If they are healthy, 85 is possible and maybe more with the right mid-season trade. But a few injuries like usually happens and imploding to 75 wins max is very possible. I actually like the 350 ALW bet on Angels....good value even though the likelihood of all going their way is small.

Going only off KL's ranking, we were 30, 30, 12 heading into 2020. We had high drafts pick due to sucking and made no trades giving away any good prospects and without graduating anyone good. I think it's pretty obvious why i would think we'd be heading for the top 10. I'm not sure how you can not see that...but whatever. To fall back (on his list) to 16 and 23 is still a bit problematic and a concern. But as IP mentioned, there is some understandable reasoning behind some of it. Most of our top guys are either super raw or injured. So no 2020 minor league system really hurt us ranking wise. Plus, most rankings seem to go more off how many top 100 guys you have. We easily could have 5-6 guys move into top 100 with proper health and a full minor league season. In which case, we'd likely make a huge jump in these somewhat irrelevant (yet fun to talk about) rankings.

Agreed -- thanks IP for decreasing my need of additional medication. Much appreciated.

it's pretty disappointing though that we moved out of the rock bottom a few years back to get into the middle (or better) from most publications -- only to fall back the last couple years somewhat. That blown 1st rounder in really 2019 hurt. But still, overall it's weird considering we didn't really graduate any significant prospects. So we should be moving up -- not down. The lack of a 2020 minor league season hurt our farm system list since we have so many younger guys. But everyone is in the same boat. It's just disappointing since i'd have assumed we'd be easily top 10 now.

He seems like a better version of the annual Eppler BP pickups. Hopefully he performs that way too.

if you're not willing to spend money on someone good, then why would you spend money (even if discounted) on someone bad?

lol, ok now your just showing off

wow, you both totally missed my point. It wasn't complaining about Arte. He spends way more as the owner of a team in OC than i would even hope. I am more than fine/happy with his payroll. No complaints at all. His spending is the least of our problems. Anyone thinking he should spend even more is whining fan imo. The dude has WAY spent....and pt us a category we've never been consistently league wise before him. I just meant that the yanks spent way more than everyone else did back a few years ago and everyone complained about fairness. About time the LAD do the same as the big dog on west coast. They have recently and doing more so. Good for them. IF that's your team, you love it. That's allowed in MLB. It's not cheating like the Astros. I have no problem with their payroll.

if he wins the cy young in 2021 (or just top 3-5)....with fans now in seats and revenues up for 2022+.....yes he'll get a $200M contract next season.

Isn't that basically what the Yanks did for so many years until recently? Yeah, if that's your team -- you love it. If not, it sucks. If Arte was richer and spent balls-to-the-wall to win no matter what with his toy baseball team and we had a $250M payroll....you & everyone here would love it. It's like Bonds/Clemens/etc. -- you hate them unless he's on your team (in which case you love them).

and "only" be stuck with $102M -- poor guy. If he doesn't have an injury, he gets $40M (or $85M) plus an additional $200M+ mega contract. He also gets to play with a guaranteed playoff team that is the WS favorite and his hometown.