jordan

Rendon has had a wRC+ of 97 the last three years when on the field and 112 overall as an Angel.  
I don't particularly like Rendon because of the way he acts and the things he says.  But even if he was the poster boy on how to conduct himself while not living up to a contract, it wouldn't change a damn thing about the fact that he's been more injured than not the last three years and when he's played he's been decidedly average.  Not horrible by any means.  
I think we can all agree that we, as fans, know about 10% of what is actually going on (at best) and we tend to fill the other 90% in with what we think they must be thinking or doing.  And it's way more projection than based on anything real.  

Blue Jays fans are very cocky about getting Ohtani. I'm sure it's possible, but I just don't see him wanting to play in Canada, on the other side of the country. 
But man, these guys are convinced they're getting him. Maybe they will. Who the fuck knows at this point.

It's a good thing YouTube TV and the MLB Network separated a year ago. I can't watch a GD thing during the winter meetings on their network.
Fuck em.. I'm going to post up at the bar in Opryland for Mon-Wednesday. I took those days off a few months back. 

At this point i want to see Ohtani resigned just to hear the bellyaching from fans of other teams.

I said next winter or two. Next year's FA class is better, deeper, has talent that's more favorable to SoCal IMO... 
My scenario if I was in a 'win-now' mode:
Get a legit #2. Sign ERod to something like a 4/$80-90. Yamamoto is a maybe.  Sign an upside one-year arm gamble or an intriguing 'safe' 3/$30ish guy. Stroman at 2/$40m is a maybe. Add a semi-versatile, Drury-esque level of a proven bat. Candelario, Gurriel, trade candidate like Verdugo, Gleyber, Polanco Sign one other vet arm; Maton, Kimbrel, Smith. Akin to Estevez/Tepera/Loup money. Whatever money is left cheap vet RP depth a la Kolarek, Cishek, Watson. Cheap. Not Tepera/Loup money. Most (not the ERod/Yamamota slot) of these are relatively tradeable guys (plus the dudes we have) at the deadline if things go south, to help rebuild some upper-level depth, perhaps enough to start making guys like Sandoval, Rengifo, Canning, or Ward truly expendable, if the few prospects on the farm aren't yet doing this.
Next winter, sign a top SP arm. Go for it. Burnes, Fried, Bieber, Glasnow, Buehler. Or Soto or Alonso if offense winds up being the need. Enough salary should be cleared from Estevez, Drury (or be relatively tradeable/salary dump-able) to help facilitate this. Not much else known to be needed at this time, provided the young core keeps trending the right way.
And if Arte truly wants to go Illitch and sign his mythical 'special player' in Ohtani, I argue that you could still do that and have room at DH/SP for him. Yeah, it'd lead to a payroll around $250m+ or something, but that's no longer unprecedented in MLB and we topped out around $220m last year. If he thinks he's got a 2-3 year window to try and make this work, here it is. Could give you a '25 rotation of Ohtani, Burnes, ERod, Detmers, and whoever is left of Sandoval, Canning, Silseth, the 3/$30m guy...

So many people are completely discounting Ohtani returning to the Angels.  But he’s got a place in his heart for the team, the fans.  Angels have a legit shot of him returning.  

Draft Lottery is this Tuesday, Dec. 5.  Hopefully a top-3 pick is on the way.  Maybe by the time the draft rolls around there will be some college pitchers ready to step into the rotation.  

I really don't think it would cost all that much for Burnes if we took on all of Yelich's contract. Luckily, Angels fans are used to overpays, especially in the OF. I've run it through the trade simulators, and trading them Rengifo alone according to the evaluator is more than fair value back to them. They really are in some payroll crunch time, need to move an OFer, appear ready to be signing their top prospect (a CFer), and need middle infield help with offensive upside. Sounds to me like Rengifo and Suarez should be more than fair for a pitcher that they will lose in a year, major financial relief, and filling their MIF need makes us line up well for them.
 
As you and I have discussed, this would be my offseason plan. Trade for Burnes and Yelich. Sign Ohtani if possible to DH and if not, signing JD Martinez. And build up our bullpen. 
 
Our team needs more players who draw walks throughout the lineup, so we can have more balanced production. We had way too many free swingers last year in our lineup.
 
As for my offer to Ohtani, it would be as such:
$45 miliion a year guaranteed per year for 10 years making him the highest paid player in the game, just as a hitter. 
Add in $1 million for every 10 innings, rounded up (so at 10.1 innings he gets $2 million). If he pitches 150 innings, he's at an insane amount of $60 million for that year. Bonuses for All Star Appearances, awards, etc. 
Opt outs for him after years 2, 4, and 6. The Angels get 1 opt out after year 5. 

So many people are completely discounting Ohtani returning to the Angels.  But he’s got a place in his heart for the team, the fans.  Angels have a legit shot of him returning.  

I think I saw Tampa employs around something around 40 people in their analytics wing, near top of baseball. Angels were lower-mid of pack with around 18? Maybe?
Anyways, they’ve maintained this so consistently for so long, all while losing talent over the years to other teams, I’m assuming it’s a KFC/Coca Cola scenario where no one person knows the whole recipe. The process that brings them success isn’t individual but part of whatever collective pool of systems they’ve built there.

Gentle reminder that this is why I’d rather save big pitcher money until next winter. This was tweeted earlier this year by Milwaukee’s near Tim Mead equivalent I think.
Bieber, Glasnow, Fried, and Beuhler all hit FA next winter too, all with SoCal ties.
I don’t think we match up, but it’s also why a trade for Burnes could be in the mix this winter, and another reason why considering assuming some or all of Yelich’s contract could be a scenario that helps facilitate a deal. Milwaukee has four or five solid MLB-ready outfielders outside of Yelich. 

Obviously it's because they didn't think they would get him if they didn't.
All of us can just guess whether they are right, but I tend to think they have more information on his market than we do.

I know this gets beat to death here, and obviously Arte's lack of investing in a proper analytics wing and minor league development is a huge systemic failure, but the problem IMO isn't so much Arte but the year-in, year-out mindset of having to build a contender. No one can say Arte is cheap. This has consistently been one of the higher payroll teams in baseball. It's not distributed well, no one will argue otherwise, but it's not because of a lack of money.
Coming off of Trout's injuries, another managerial change, and Ohtani's likely departure, there is no better year to 'take a year off' from this mindset than 2024. 
Dipoto was somewhat good at trading value for value. His FA track record was overall very underwhelming, but I would not say it was disastrous (understandably up for debate in terms of payroll clutter). I think the negative view of Dipoto's tenure is a little over-exaggerated due to trades like Clevinger for Pestano, but the Trumbo for Skaggs + Santiago, the Huston Street trade, even the Greinke trade, the Frieri trade, even Kendrick for Heaney were not bad trades, all things considered. I think he tried to be too cute with his trades and was aiming to look more savvy in his deals than he actually was. The bigger problems with Jerry were that he could not work with Sosh, and on top of subtracting from the farm, literally did not do a single thing for it in his entire time. CJ Cron was maybe his best draft pick. It's one thing to trade the farm away, but the lack of adding or developing anything to it over an entire tenure, even if being tasked to 'win at all costs', was 100% inexcusable. A good GM should be able to at least tread some water here, and Dipoto could not...
strengths: trading, not totally bombing in free agency weaknesses: could not draft or develop any minor league talent in any way, traded/interacted in a way that clashed with team chemistry (Here and in SEA), trading too much
...and that ultimately is why I still think Eppler was an overall solid GM. Almost every single one of his FA deals were total failures, but they were relatively few and low-impact. The Simmons trade was good. The Sandoval trade was fantastic. He did a tremendous job finding value off the scrap heap, and his ability to keep the team afloat via creative waiver claims while everything crumbled around him is often overlooked. And he did largely turn the farm around. What really sunk Eppler, IMO, were the injuries. They were beyond the norm and no GM would have really been able to compete over that two-year span or so where everything came apart with pretty much every SP (and most of their replacements) having TJS. Add that to the devoid farm he inherited, and there was no way he was going to succeed. 
strengths: waiver claims, 40 man depth, trading weaknesses: could not sign a quality FA, could not establish analytics, seemed to play it a little too conservatively
Perry has been an interesting cat. In some ways, he actually reminds me a little more of a blend of Dipoto and Tony Reagins. He's been able to make, IMO, mostly good trades. He's acquired usable pieces, he's sold well, and time will tell, but I think he's bought pretty well too. They've perhaps been a little rosy and over-eager (perhaps due to Arte's influence, hence the Reagins comp) and have eaten away at the farm a la Dipoto, but he's also been able to counter that by drafting for quick-impact exceptionally well (though I'm still a little leery about the overall farm depth building, again a bit like Dipoto). Additionally, his FA track record isn't bad, but it isn't great. It's been mixed, which is IMO typical of most GMs, even those of higher repute. His biggest 'failures' have been where Eppler really stood out...he has really struggled filling out sort of the 30th-40th guys on the roster. The 4-A guys, the upper-level depth...it hasn't been there when they've needed it. Last year's injuries were akin to Eppler's dark days where no GM could weather what happened, but overall the replacement depth has really killed the team in Perry's time. 
strengths: drafting impact players, selling via trade, not totally sucking in trades/free agency weaknesses: can't seem to build upper-level depth, has yet to really find big-win FAs/trades

So many people are completely discounting Ohtani returning to the Angels.  But he’s got a place in his heart for the team, the fans.  Angels have a legit shot of him returning.  

Or, it could be that they're getting other big pieces early because they know Ohtani is coming back.

So many people are completely discounting Ohtani returning to the Angels.  But he’s got a place in his heart for the team, the fans.  Angels have a legit shot of him returning.  

You keep saying that and I m not sure who you are tryng to convince. He is not going to start in AAA, he has the plate discipline that is elite and I'm sure Washington will clean up any of his defensive flaws. It's as if you never saw him play last season and so willing to shuffe him off to AAA where he doesn't belong. 
The Angels need a leadoff hitter. Hell, they could use a #2 hitter that can move a runner to 2nd by a hit or walk. What they don't need is another stiff that strikes out 180 times but hits a home run once every 5 games so you can say you have a power hitter. 

This is what I tell everyone. 
 
There are really 3 factors that determine where a FA plays: winning, comfort and money. I think everyone agrees that money is no 3 for Ohtani. 
 
If winning is No 1, it’s the Dodgers. If comfort is No 1, it’s the Angels. Difficult to see how another team could trump the Angels or Dodgers in those categories. 

I feel very undecided about what direction this team should go and whether putting a bunch of money into them is really worth it.  
They just lost Ohtani, Rendon is basically a ghost, and Trout is averaging about half a season per year while showing signs of decline this year.  Drury was a nice pickup but has 1yr left.  Anderson sucks.  
On the other hand, they've got a nice collection of young, solid players.  Several of which have some decent upside.  
But it sorta feels like a bunch of the young guys really need to come into their own AND the veteran guys need to play all year and play well.  
Otherwise, investing in expensive free agents seems like an unnecessary risk.  
 

There are very few people in the baseball industry whose opinion I care about less than AJ Pierzynski’s.

Mine, that is.
35.5 years in IT
Freedom!

Funny aside:
Early in 2022, when things weren't going right for the Angels offense, Joe Maddon shook up the batting order and he basically admitted it wasn't for any reason more than just for the sake of making a change.
He called it "rearranging deck chairs on (pause) the big boat."
Maddon was halfway through his sentence when he realized he was about to compare his team to the Titanic.

You think Anthony Rendon’s gonna waive his NTC to go to the Yankees?
That’s hilarious.