oldguy

By Jonathan Northrop, AngelsWin.com Senior Writer
It is probably too early for this, but I'm bored and what else are we going to discuss? Here's what I expect to see from the current team so far - at least the regulars. My predictions tend to be what I see as reasonable optimism, although this is partially in contrast to the everything-went-wrong fiasco that was the 2023 season. When considering playing time and injury, I'm treating each player individually, that is, in a vacuum; chances are, more games will be missed by some of the starters. 
C LOGAN O'HOPPE (24)
2023 Stats: 51 games, .236/.296/.500, 14 HR, 113 wRC+, 0.2 WAR
There's a before and after for O'Hoppe. Before his injury, he hit .283/.339/.547 with a 137 wRC+ in 16 games; after he hit .217/.279/.481 with a 102 wRC+ in 35 games. But even that can be split up:  .145/.217/.291 with a 35 wRC+ in his first 15 games back, and .270/.325/.622 with a 152 wRC+ in his last 20 games.
So who is the "real" Logan O'Hoppe? I'm pretty bullish on him and think he's going to be one of the ten or so best catchers in baseball as soon as 2024. My lone complaint is that I'd like to see him take more walks. For his first few years in the minors (2018-21), his BB% was in the 7-8% range; in 2022, it doubled to 15.7% (70 walks in 104 games). In the majors so far, it has been back down to 7.4%. Presumably he'll eventually be somewhere in-between.
Anyhow, in 2023 the top two catchers by WAR were William Contreras (5.4) and Adley Rutschman (5.1), followed by four in the 4.1 to 4.7 range. After that there's a drop, with nine in the 2.0 to 2.8 range. My guess is that O'Hoppe splits the difference between two groups and finishes in the 3-4ish range, with 4-5 upside in peak years. But even if he becomes more of a 2-3 WAR player, he has a chance to become the best all-time Angels catcher by WAR before he reaches free agency (to be fair, that isn't saying much, with Bob Boone being the all-time leader with 13.1 WAR).
2024 Prediction: 113 games, .263/.337/.518, 23 HR, 128 wRC+, 3.1 WAR
1B NOLAN SCHANUEL (22)
2023 Stats: 29 games, .275/.402/.330, 112 wRC+, 0.1 WAR
Schanuel is one of the most unusual hitters in baseball. He walks a ton, but has virtually no power (1 HR, 3 2B in 30 hits last year), mainly due to an over-cutting swing that generates a lot of ground balls. I think he'll eventually develop at least low-average power (25-30 2B, 10-15 HR) to go along with a .290+ BA and 100+ walks. In other words, a poor man's Wade Boggs, though won't have the benefit of the Green Monster to bounce doubles off of. He might be slated to start the year in AAA, but I think will be the starting first baseman well before the All-Star break. With that OBP, he could end up being the most unconventional lead-off man the Angels have had since Brian Downing.
2024 Prediction: 110 games, .284/.407/.390, 7 HR, 124 wRC+, 2.0 WAR
2B LUIS RENGIFO (27)
2023: 126 games, .264/.339/.444, 16 HR, 114 wRC+, 1.9 WAR
Of all the players that I was concerned might be traded this offseason, Rengifo topped the list for me. He seemed to have a micro-breakthrough in the second half of 2022, hitting .267/.290/.455. After a slow start in 2023 (.219/.312/.326 in the first half), he exploded in the second half (.318/.374/.587). Now it could be that Rengifo is just a slow starter, and certainly I don't expect him to reach those numbers over a full season, but...I think he's going to take a big step forward in 2024 and, like O'Hoppe, be in the 5-10ish range for his position. But he's a guy to watch early on: if he starts strong, he could be even better than I'm predicting.
2024 Prediction: 143 games, .274/.348/.487, 23 HR, 126 wRC+, 3.4 WAR
SS ZACH NETO (23)
2023: 84 games, .225/.308/.377, 9 HR, 89 wRC+, 1.1 WAR
A bright spot early on, Neto impressed with his all-out play. He really seems to embody the notion of "spark-plug" - a guy who just brings life to the team, in the batter's box, on the base paths and, most of all, in the field where he was stellar. Some have compared him to Dustin Pedroia and David Eckstein; I think, when he finally reaches his potential, he'll be somewhere in-between the two. For next year, I expect better numbers than 2023, if only because his season will (hopefully) not be interrupted by a long injury layover, but Neto also seems to be the type of player who will miss time, due to his hard play. 
2024 Prediction: 133 games, .267/.328/.422, 14 HR, 105 wRC+, 2.7 WAR
3B ANTHONY RENDON (34)
2023: 43 games, .236/.361/.318, 95 wRC+, 0.2 WAR
What a disaster. Sorry, homers, but you're not a "hater" if you simply point out the obvious: Rendon hasn't been able to stay on the field the last three years (148 games all told), and when he has he hasn't been good. The pattern seems to be: start rusty and slow, get going and hot, get hurt and miss more time than expected, rinse and repeat. The thin slivers of hope are that A) He hasn't played much over the last four seasons, so has less wear-and-tear than a 33-34 year old normally has; and B) he has hit well once he throws off the rust. So maybe he has something left in the tank, but...Anyhow, I'll split the difference between "homerish optimism" and "more of the same."
2024 Prediction: 100 games, .271/.374/.420, 15 HR, 118 wRC+, 2.3 WAR
LF TAYLOR WARD (30)
2023: 97 games, .253/.335/.421, 14 HR, 107 wRC+, 1.5 WAR
For about a month and change in 2022, Taylor Ward looked like a breakthrough superstar. Then he crashed into a wall and was out for awhile. When he came back he didn't look the same, though gradually heated up and finished the year strong. Going into 2023, I had a lot of hope that he had had a legit breakthrough, but Ward's 2023 was another disappointment among many for the Angels, and just as he seemed to be finding his groove (a 197 wRC+ in his last 14 games), he was hit in the face by a 92-mph Alex Manoah sinker. It is anyone's guess how he'll come back. There's a non-zero chance that he will never comfortably stand in a batter's box again and/or that his vision will be compromised. As far as I know, there's been little news about his recovery other than the usual baseballspeak. He could put it all together and be the star player he's flashed for parts of the last two years, or end up as a charity-case bench player. To quote Fox Mulder, I want to believe.
2024 Prediction: 118 games, .274/.357/.491, 20 HR, 128 wRC+, 2.8 WAR
CF MIKE TROUT (32)
2023: 82 games, .263/.367/.490, 18 HR, 134 wRC+, 3.0 WAR
For the first month of 2023, Trout looked like Trout, hitting .320/.408/.612 with a 176 wRC+ through his first 26 games. Then for the next six weeks or so, he went through the worst such span of time of his career, hitting .199/.318/.351 (85 wRC+) from April 30 to June 16. He finally seemed to shake it off, hitting .340/.441/.680 (203 wRC+). June 17 until July 3 when he...broke his hand on a contact-less swing?! Only the Angels and, unfortunately, only Trout. After putting together what was arguably the best first eight full seasons in baseball history, Trout has been a shell of his former self the last four years, mostly due to a string of injuries that has seen him miss over half of all Angels games over the last three seasons.  Or to put it another way, from 2012-19 he was (70.6 WAR) was 50% better than the next guy (Buster Posey with 47.0 WAR); from 2020-23, he has been the 29th best player, producing 58% (13.8 WAR) of the leader during that span (Aaron Judge with 23.6 WAR)
I suppose the silver lining is that each injury has been different and mostly random; so it isn't like he has a bad knee or some other chronic injury (well, aside for that weird back condition). He just seems to have a knack for injury and, quite frankly, there's no reason to expect that to change. Still, there's also no reason to think that with a player of his talent and due to the freakish nature of his injuries, he can't put together a few reasonably health seasons in, if not 2012-19 form, something not far from it. I do think he bounces back, but it will be at a slightly lower level than what we've seen in his prime.
2024 Prediction: 128 games, .281/.393/.577, 34 HR, 163 wRC+, 6.5 WAR
RF JO ADELL (25)
2023: 17 games, .207/.258/.448, 86 wRC+, 0.2 WAR
The good news is that Adell seemed to improve in the ways that he needed to improve - he took more walks and played better defense. The bad news is that it was in AAA. More bad news is that, like everyone else, he got hurt and then only played 17 games in Anaheim. At 25 in April, he's no longer young; but he also isn't old. To some extent there's still the sense that Adell will either be a star or a bust, but I think more likely is that he's somewhere in-between, maybe something like Hunter Renfroe. He seems to really want it and will keep working to improve his game. But it is really coming down to a place where its now or never. 
2024 Prediction: 110 games, .252/.301/.493, 23 HR, 114 wRC+, 1.8 WAR
DH BRANDON DRURY (31)
2023: 125 games, .262/.306/.497, 26 HR, 114 wRC+, 2.5 WAR
Drury was one of the only bright spots for the Angels, and probably the only acquisition that actually turned out as hoped. He pretty much continued where he left off from 2022; now, averaging 2.8 WAR over the last two seasons, he's pretty much the definition of "quality regular." What you see is what you get. If the Angels are out of it in July, he's a likely trade candidate.
2024 Prediction: 130 games, .260/.315/.490, 27 HR, 118 wRC+, 2.0 WAR
OF MICKEY MONIAK (26)
2023: 85 games, .280/.307/.495, 14 HR, 114 wRC+, 1.5 WAR
Moniak seemed like he had finally found his first round potential in the first half, but there was a lingering concerning as he didn't walk. At all. He finished the year with an ungainly 9 walks to 113 strikeouts, which doesn't bode well for the future. But even after his midseason slump, he started hitting again; so he seems like a feast-or-famine guy, who will get hot for spells. On paper, he looks like a good platoon player or 4th outfielder, but this is a bit tricky with such a streaky player. But he'll be in the mix with the rest of the questionable cast of characters that will be the Angels outfield, and will get playing time. That said, he's the only player among the ten on this list that I predict will be worse in 2024 than in 2023.
2024 Prediction: 90 games, .250/.280/.442, 12 HR, 100 wRC+, 0.8 WAR

By Jonathan Northrop, AngelsWin.com Senior Writer
Introduction: It Can't Be Worse
While we just tipped over into the second half of January, which means we're still several weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting (February 14) and two and a half months from Opening Day (March 30), it is still the new year, and it seems that the Angels are--barring a surprise move--mostly done in assembling their 2023 team.
How does the team look? What can we expect and reasonably hope for? One thing this post will not be is a Debby Downer rant about worst-case scenarios and the poor moves of past and present management. I will try to be as objective as possible, but err towards the side of how good the team can reasonably be, if more things go right than wrong.
Injuries happen. Players have bad years. But players also have good years, and it is unusual that a team suffers the almost uncanny combination of bad luck and injury that the 2022 team experienced, essentialized in their 14-game losing streak. Chances are, no matter how bad it gets in 2023, it won't get that bad. And GM Perry Minasian has put a lot of work--and fair amount of money--into preventing a repeat of that debacle.
 
1. The Angels vs. the World Champions
What has Minasian done this offseason? Well, he's lifted the floor on the team substantially. The Angels poor performance in 2022 can be visually expressed like so:


Now it might not be fair to compare the Angels to the World Champions, but on the other hand, if you're trying to build a contender, one important tactic is to look at successful teams and, most importantly, how they succeeded and, if possible, trying to emulate that. 
What are you looking at? The two charts compare the Angels and Astros, first in hitting as represented through wRC+, secondly in pitching as represented by FIP. The striking difference between the two teams in both charts is perhaps best characterized not by the best players, but by the worst - namely, the number of poor performers on the Angels, and the visual "real estate" they take up on the charts.
Perhaps the most glaring problem the Angels had is the huge number of plate appearances given to bad hitters: Their first four hitters by plate appearance were all plus performers, but the next seven were negative; and after the first four, only one out of the next seventeen was average or above.
Compare that to the Astros: six out of their first seven were average or above, and seven out of their first ten. The mass of below average performers on the ride side of the first graph make up a fraction of the Angels' comparable section.
We see a similar phenomena with the pitchers, although in some ways it is even more striking in that the Astros only had two pitchers with below average FIP that were given substantial playing time, and one of them--Jose Urquidy--still managed about a league average ERA of 3.94.
Meaning, the Astros weren't sending (almost) any poor pitchers to the mound, while the Angels were shuffling through a bunch of them.
If you're the GM of a baseball team, you look at ways to improve controllable outcomes, of which injuries are (for the most part) not. Meaning, Minasian has very little say in whether or not Anthony Rendon gets hurt or how Mike Trout ages, or even whether Taylor Ward decides to crash into a wall. But what he does have some control over, is how the roster is configured.
So Minasian's big task this offseason was to turn as much of the "purple" into "green." There are specific needs to be addressed, but in its most simply--yet still comprehensive form--that's what was required.
The big question, of course, is how successful was he? In mid January, we cannot know. We might now come May, but even then it might not be until about mid-season that we have a sense of whether the "Minasian Plan" (Or Minasian Gambit?) worked. What did he do?
2. Minasian's Moves
First, let's talk about what he did not do: He didn't sign any big free agents or make any huge trades. Everything he did was minor to moderate, in terms of resources. The total result was the equivalent of signing a big free agent and some scraps, but no single move did any of the following:
Give a player $20M+ per year* Sign a player for more than three years Give up any top 10 (or even top 20) prospects I asterisked the first, because he did give Ohtani a one-year deal worth $30M. Ohtani was due for a big arbitration pay day that would probably have earned him a bit less, but we can consider this as a bit of a good-will deed. 
What did Minasian do? Well, here's a list:
Signed Shohei Ohtani for 1/$30M Signed SP Tyler Anderson for 3/$39M Traded Janson Junk, Elvis Peguero, and Adam Seminaris to the Brewers for OF Hunter Renfroe Signed IF Brandon Drury for 2/$17M Traded Alejandro Hidalgo to the Twins for IF Gio Urshela Signed RP Carlos Estevez for 2/$13.5M Signed OF Brett Phillips for 1/$1.2M Plus a bunch of minor league acquisitions As you can see, other than Ohtani, there is not a true star in sight. What the above list includes are a handful of quality, major league regulars and solid bench/platoon players.
The Angels Opening Day 26-man payroll is estimated at $188M, $7M higher than last year; similarly, the CB Tax 40-man payroll is $207M, $8M higher than 2022.
3. 2022 vs. 2023: What Will Be Different?
A lot remains the same, but some significant factors have changed. Essentially what has happened is:
The Angels have swapped out Brandon Marsh and Jo Adell (608 PA, 0.7 WAR) for Hunter Renfroe (522 PA, 2.5 WAR) Swapped Andrew Velazquez, Matt Duffy, Tyler Wade, Jack Mayfield, Michael Stefanic, Jose Rojas, Jonathan Villar, Phil Gosselin and David MacKinnon (1099 PA, -3.3 WAR) for Gio Urshela and Brandon Drury (1119 PA, 5.4 WAR) Tyler Anderson (178.2 IP, 4.0 WAR in 2022) has replaced Noah Syndergaard/Michael Lorenzen (177.2 IP, 2.2 WAR). Carlos Estevez (57 IP, 0.4 WAR) is replacing a variety of pitchers, including half a year of Raisel Iglesias (35.2 IP, 0.7 WAR) Replaced Magneuris Sierra, Juan Lagares, and Mickey Moniak (220 PA, -0.9 WAR) with Brett Phillips (225 PA, 0.1 WAR) OK, before you protest, note that I am not saying that we can simply take last year's numbers and switch them out like that. But I am saying that this is essentially what is happening in terms of playing time, without even looking at injuries; I included some stats to give. For instance, we don't know how much players like Rendon, Trout, Ward, and Fletcher will play in 2023, or at what level. Catcher is also a big question mark: which version of Max Stassi will show up, and who will share catching duties with him?
But....if you do swap out those players, you get a +12.8 WAR swing, about two-thirds of which (+8.7 WAR) is coming from the infield. 
What does a +12.8 WAR swing look like for the Angels? Well, if we just take the raw numbers, that adds about 13 wins and the Angels go from 73-89 to 86-76.
Again, it isn't so simple as that - and things always turn out differently than planned. But that is still the basic idea behind these moves: replace sub-par performance with--at least--solid, league average performance.
Minasian's moves this offseason could pay huge dividends, especially in the infield, where the Angels gave about two full season's worth of playing time to -3.3 WAR performance, most of which was due to poor hitting. Even if the Angels can replace that -3.3 WAR with slightly above replacement level play, they add four or more wins.
4. Two (or Three) Factors for Success in 2023
The Angels 2023 season is mostly banking on two factors:
One, the above mentioned changes work out mostly as hoped. They don't have to work out completely, but just for the most part. 
Two, better health - and not just Trout and Rendon, but Fletcher, Ward, Canning, Rodriguez, etc. Last year the Angels got only 166 games from their two highest paid players, Trout and Rendon. In 2021, it was 94 games - so if we want to find a silver lining, at least we're trending in the right direction. But they really need more from these two, and while the farm system is on a positive trajectory, there simply isn't the offensive talent waiting in the wings to make up the difference.
I would add a third that is less necessary but could swing the team significantly:
Three, positive minor league developments, namely players graduating and performing in the majors. This could include better health and performance from guys like Canning and Rodriguez, a breakout performance from Logan O'Hoppe, some of the plethora of pitching prospects in the high minors graduating and performing well. Meaning, something, someone...anything!
Summing Up
The Angels team has a lot of talent. While it may be unlikely given recent track records, there's a scenario in which the very similar Renfroe (124 wRC+, 29 HR) and Drury (123 wRC+, 28 HR) aren't, even repeating last year's performances, among the top four or five hitters on the team. It requires Trout and Rendon to be healthy, Ohtani to stay healthy, and Ward to at least repeat something similar to last year's performance (137 wRC+). Add in a potential bounce back from Jared Walsh, and the Angels could have a lineup that features seven players hitting 20+ HR, with 120 wRC+ or better...and that isn't even considering continued improvement from Luis Rengifo (103 wRC+, 17 HR), a bounce-back from Stassi or breakout from O'Hoppe.
The rotation looks, at the very least, quite solid, with the potential to be very good. There are a wide range of outcomes for the bullpen, so it bears watching. But the Angels have a lot of minor league arms to draw from, as well as (hopefully) a healthy Chris Rodriguez and Griffin Canning.
There are no certainties in major league baseball (or life), but we can at least look at the Angels and say that this team has a chance to be very good - and maybe even better. But the risk is there; they're as likely to win 80 games as they are 90 but, I would say, more likely to win 95 than 75. The talent is there.