Pancake Bear

Adell has the body of a freak of a nature and the baseball iq of a middle schooler. Frustrating because it's not hard to see what he could be, but he just keeps making these absolutely boneheaded plays. 

4 hours ago, Jason said:

 

Serious question, do you think the pitching staff, as assembled, is good enough for them to be competitive?

Yes.

Do I think they *will* be competitive? That's a lot more questionable. But the potential is there, especially with better coaching. There's no ace, other than maybe Detmers (#1 upside is possible, per Keith Law), but their top five all have the ability to keep them in games. My issue is we needed another arm for depth, because otherwise we're stuck with Soriano as our #6, which is...not exactly inspiring. Not like it would've cost much to bring in Lorenzen, but f'n Arte.

8 hours ago, Jason said:

They are really going to suck 

They look like a roughly .500 team. If that's where they end up, Minasian probably stays. If they lose 100 games? He probably is canned. 

Kinda doubt Perry gets fired after this season unless the team really sucks. It's obviously a transition year, and doesn't really make sense to dump the GM at that point. If they were going to do that, it would've made more sense to do it after last season. 

...Some of you were crying about wanting Perry to ship Anderson off to save a few million? Because I do. 

It was a very good series against a really bad team. Against Baltimore, not so much. Let's give it some time before we start going with the "things feel different this season" posts. 

4 minutes ago, Swordsman78 said:

Possibly.   Personally, I would put the O's in Tier 2, As of now the Orioles record is 3-2.  If they win their current series it would solidify Tier 2 for now.

  Yankees are 5-0 (Tier 1) and Dodgers are 5-2 (Tier 1).

Circle back to me after we are 20 games in.    Things are still very fluid.

This is what happens when you turn a box score into grades and present it as analysis. 

13 or 14 wins. No big injuries. Offense, rotation, and bullpen all in the top ten, with at least one of those top five in the league. Defense and base running noticeably improved. Multiple young guys (e.g. O'Hoppe, Neto, Schanuel, Adell, Moniak, Detmers, Silseth) performing well. 

Fubo was more than I felt like paying, so I'm just going mlb.tv this year. 

6 hours ago, Stradling said:

This is the better question. 

 

But that won't win you points as an edgy reporter who asks the hard questions.

59 minutes ago, Angels 1961 said:

Jeff, 2 spots left in BP who makes it. Zuniga, Pomeranz or Strickland. I'm thinking and hoping Soriano goes to SLC as a starter.

If results matter at all, Strickland earned a spot. 

43 minutes ago, mmc said:

This doesn’t even make any sense.  Even if this applied to Blum which I really don’t think it does, that certainly wouldn’t disqualify him from being considered a journalist

Okay, he's a part-time journalist. Better?

13 minutes ago, mmc said:

This is pretty rich coming from the guy who’s constantly crying about the way Blum does his

Blum isn't really a journalist. He's a dude building his own brand, which is why he so often inserts himself into the story. That's not journalism. 

10 minutes ago, BTH said:

But the question isn’t “not spend more money to improve the team?”

The question is “given the resources you had available, how did you determine that the best allocation was to spend 95% of it on the bullpen?”

He should be able to give a sufficient answer to that question, since he’s the one who decided to spend the money.

Assuming, of course, that it wasn’t Arte saying “let’s give $30M to Stephenson, Moore, García, Cisnero, Cimber, Kolarek, and Plesac.”

I just assumed it came down to Arte changing the budget on him. But it could be that he felt that was the best value. Or maybe Arte insisted we improve the bullpen, since he has to approve all big deals anyway. Regardless, it sounds like we had an offer out on Snell, so it isn't like he wasn't willing to spend more, Arte just undervalues pitchers. 

Neto is awesome. That is all. 

1 hour ago, jsnpritchett said:

There's certainly an argument to be made for adding depth, but I personally don't look at a rotation of Sandoval, Detmers, Canning, Anderson, and Lorenzen as an upgrade over Sandoval, Detmers, Canning, Anderson, and Silseth.

It may not be an upgrade, but it isn't worse, imo, and I think our depth is particularly concerning, tbh. 

2 hours ago, Stradling said:

He bought the team in 2003, not 2002.  Then the team became the media darling and was considered for nearly a decade the best ran franchise in sports especially for fan experience. Then the product went to shit because of poor allocations specifically to the farm and then to free agency. 

I remember when I first ran across the "Disney ownership was actually awesome" narrative. I was genuinely shocked by it. Especially since it came out afterward that they told Stoneman in so many words that they had zero interest in building a winner. Truly hilarious. Arte may be a shitty owner in many ways, but the notion that Disney was a good owner is based on nothing other than the fact that they basically ignored the club and let Stoneman and Sosh do whatever with a limited budget. 

I'm not particularly sad that we didn't get Snell. I said before I didn't see a contract scenario that made sense. Apparently there was maybe an offer from the Angels that would've made sense from their perspective, but I'm not surprised Snell passed on it, if that report was accurate.

I still think Montgomery is the better fit, but it sounds like he isn't interested in coming here. Personally, I'd still go grab Lorenzen and Martinez at this point. Sure, Lorenzen doesn't improve the rotation, but he does add depth (which, imo, we clearly need), and him and JD together probably don't cost all that much at this point. 

2 minutes ago, jsnpritchett said:

I think that's a fair way to look at it.  I guess my feeling is that the offense probably has more variable outcomes than in almost any recent season.  If Trout and Rendon are healthy and are at least in the universe of their prior performance AND the young guys are healthy and take steps forward, the offense could be quite good.  If either Rendon or Trout get hurt for an extended period of time again and/or don't perform up to their standards, then the offense will probably be average.  If Trout/Rendon aren't healthy/don't perform AND a couple of the young guys don't hit like we're all hoping they will, the offense could be disastrous.

Yes, you can come up with scenarios like this for other teams--but given the Angels recent history and the uncertainty around the younger guys, I just think the offense is more of a wild card than most teams' offenses are.

Absolutely. At this point, it's totally fair to wonder whether we'll get anything from Trout and (especially) Rendon, but you also don't have to squint too hard to see strong seasons from either or both. Neither is particularly old. The vets, like Ward, Drury, Rengifo, and Hicks all were above average hitters last season. The kids - O'Hoppe, Neto, Schanuel, Moniak, and Adell - all have to some extent the ability to break out in a big way. 

But, like you said, Trout and/or Rendon could have just another crappy injury-filled season, the vets could regress, and the kids could fail to take the next step, and we could have a bottom tier offense. There's a ton of volatility - and my biggest concern is that we really need more infield depth. Bringing in a JD Martinez would be huge, imo. 

1 hour ago, ThisismineScios said:

I am also pessimistic about the offense. Last year with Ohtani they were a top 5 AL offense before the ASB, bottom 5 after. You lose Ohtani and you don't add a single hitter to the lineup? Not any single one of significance. And the rotation, which was not good, didn't have any additions either. Just not sure why we couldn't go after a $5-8 million dollar player to play OF or 2B. Maybe they really, really, really like Drury and Rengifo. And no DH? I think without Ohtani, they are at best a middle of the road offense, especially without a single addition. 

Sure, if you assume everything remains static from year to year. Just saying Ohtani is gone and everything else remains the same is kinda disingenuous: Even the Rangers' offensive shift over the last two seasons shows how much a team can change from just one season to the next. The Angels have a new manager and coaching staff, young players who are coming into their prime, and two former MVPs who haven't been healthy in a couple of seasons. Am I saying we're going to have an amazing offense this season? Absolutely not, and I wish we'd brought in another player or two to help with depth, but there's a lot to potential in the lineup - we just seem to get the shit end of the stick every year with injuries. 

2 hours ago, DMVol said:

Not sure that has any appeal to the Angels. I guess with an opt out deal, if he tanks, he doesn’t opt out and we keep him but that’s not good…if a pure one year deal is all he and Boras are willing to do, I don’t see why we’d agree to that. You still lose the draft pick. 

Probably, but it wouldn't be the first time in recent years they did a one year deal with draft compensation attached. Syndergaard, for instance. My point is still that there's not really a deal that makes sense for both, which is probably why he hasn't signed. Bellinger made it work because he went back to the Cubs, so they lost nothing. 

4 hours ago, Docwaukee said:

I know people have info to the contrary and we'll probably sign him right as I post this but I just don't see us getting Snell.  

This is kinda how I feel, too. I'm not especially optimistic. 

Snell/Boras obviously have an ultimate goal of a long term deal, but it's self-evident that they won't get one at the level they want at this point in time. So, what's the alternative? They want a deal that is effectively a one year deal but that is structured longer with opt-outs in case Snell underperforms. 

By contrast, Moreno/Perry clearly aren't going to go for a long term deal at the rate Snell wants or it would've happened already. It's not like there's loads of bidders. The problem with a short term deal is it'll be an expensive first year, plus a loss of a draft pick in a season that Arte probably (with good reason) doesn't think we'll be competitive in. And if there are opt-outs, that makes it an even worse deal for us because Arte is assuming all the risk for extremely limited gain. And at 31, I don't see any world in which Snell accepts a deal with the first opt out after two years, which would make more sense for us.

I think the leaks about Snell wanting to play for us are probably true. I think he genuinely enjoyed being on the West coast and playing in SoCal. I just don't see a deal that makes sense materializing easily without Arte bending, because it doesn't really make sense for Snell to shift course. The biggest compromise I could see from Snell is a pure one year deal with no opt-outs. 

1 hour ago, ThisismineScios said:

I'd encourage anyone on Twitter to look at @BTH 's post about the players selected in the range the lost draft pick would be. The draft is always a crap shoot, and beyond the Top 10-12 guys, I think you get into a range where the outcomes are so wildly random. I barely recognized any names on that list going back to 2014. 

It's a fair point that the value is likely to be insignificant, but it also leaves out the value in terms of trade capital - prospects aren't valuable exclusively based on how good they will eventually be if they make the show. 

3 hours ago, Stradling said:

I am sure it’s coming down to opt outs and money. Snell will end up here. 

Snell wanted a long term deal, but reportedly he's now open to an opt out deal. Presumably that would involve an opt out after year one on any contract. I'm assuming Arte doesn't want to do an opt out deal because those aren't great for the team. We probably are wanting a 3ish year deal with no opt outs, but that obviously is less appetizing to Snell/Boras since their goal is for him to have a big season and re-enter the market next season. 

Personally, I'm less confident Snell ends up here. I could certainly believe they're interested, I just don't see a deal that is likely to work unless we give in on opt-outs, which I'm skeptical about. JD Martinez seems more likely, but I wouldn't bet a ton on that either. 

9 hours ago, DMVol said:

No offense taken…I like Olney and I put some stock in what he said although he did qualify it…Rosenthal is ok I guess. I like Jeff Passan though he really messed up with the Ohtani to Toronto story. Heyman I take with a grain of salt. 

Don't think that was Passan. Hoonstra and Moroni were the dupes behind that train wreck.