Search the Community

By Robert Cunningham, Angelswin.com Senior Writer Special Request from Angelswin.com: This year, after discussion with Chuck, we have decided to tie-in the 2021 Angelswin.com Primer Series with a wonderful GoFundMe effort called “Hope for Education”. This is a focused fundraiser, to help ten needy families in Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico, obtain laptops for educational use in this challenging COVID-19 pandemic environment. These families are unable to afford these computers, themselves, and so it is up to charitable people and donors to help bridge the gap so these children can continue to learn, safely, from their homes. Education is very important to me, personally, and Chuck and I are asking our fellow Angels fans to contribute to this very worthy cause, organized and supported, in-part, by a former colleague of mine and her friend. Any amount is appreciated and you can donate here to help them reach, and even exceed, their initial goal: Donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/give-a-child-a-chance-4-education Introduction Chaos. That is probably the right word to describe the year 2020 and the disorder and bedlam around the country, combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, which has had a direct impact on baseball and sports in general. In addition to the country’s turmoil, a battle is looming between the Player’s Union and team owners. Real and potential reductions in scouts, Minor League farm systems, and front office personnel have plagued the professional ranks. Real or feigned cutbacks in team payroll are already heavily influencing the 2020-2021 off-season. Coronavirus impacts, to the industry as a whole, are striking players and families, now, while the long-term impact of a poor U.S. response to the pandemic now threatens the 2021 regular season as well. Yeah, lot’s of chaos. Set to this scene, the Angels entered the off-season without a Major League General Manager (GM), both Assistant General Managers, and a slew of personnel cuts and player non-tenders that seem destined to make this another challenging off-season for the Halos. More chaos, more entropy. The Angels appear to have set sail with their long-tenured shortstop Andrelton Simmons, although a very unlikely reunion is still a possibility in free agency. Steady reliever Cam Bedrosian is gone, after an outright assignment and subsequent decision to elect free agency. Relief pitcher (RP) Jacob Barnes, another looming arbitration decision in a depressed economic environment, was picked up by the Mets on waivers. Additionally, non-factor’s from our 2020 roster, like starting pitcher (SP) Julio Teheran, are mercifully off of our payroll. This leaves Mike Trout, a champion looking for a supporting cast, yearning for the changes needed to take the next step toward contention with an uncomfortable amount of signs possibly pointing in the wrong direction. Mr. Trout may or may not be growing concerned about when the Angels are planning to flip the script and shove; and fans, from the outside, looking in, are thinking the same thing, based on team standings and zero visits to the postseason over the last several years. Unless Albert Pujols suddenly decides to retire, the Angels will have some payroll space but will have to strategically determine where to spend it, to fill the multiple holes on their 40-man roster. Trades are certainly a possibility with an improved farm system but everything has a price and the Angels may not be able to absorb the loss of quality Minor League depth; you have to give to get. That could derail the long-term farm system rebuild that former GM Billy Eppler initiated and new GM Perry Minasian just inherited, which is just beginning to come to fruition but could provide controllable talent to address some, if not all, of the holes on the Angels roster. Save for a complete out-of-character turnaround by owner Arte Moreno to push the pedal-to-the-metal and exceed the Competitive Balance Threshold (CBT) by a hefty amount, the new Angels management team will have a finite set of resources to answer the pressing questions in the rotation and bullpen as well as at catcher (C) and shortstop (SS). To be clear it is not all doom and gloom. There were some bright spots in 2020 that gave some hope for the future. Mike Trout had another solid season. David Fletcher continued to shine on both sides of the ball. Young prospect Jo Adell got his feet wet, as our new right fielder (RF). Jared Walsh came up to play first base (1B) and showed why his reputation with the bat is so well deserved. Starting pitcher (SP) Dylan Bundy and relief pitcher (RP) Mike Mayers looked like stars on the mound. SP’s Griffin Canning and Jaime Barria had really solid showings this year, as well. The question is can they repeat or even build off of these performances? Can the rotation and team defense regress toward the mean, improving on the poor showings in 2020? As we do every year, Angelswin.com will attempt to answer these pressing team questions and provide some visibility into team decision-making. Because of the increased chaos and entropy in baseball, the conclusions will likely be more general and the Primer Series more succinct simply due to a historical lack of clear general manager guidance, quotes, and transactions and a disarray and lack of visibility around baseball in general. So, just like the 2020 baseball regular season, enjoy the abbreviated 2021 Angelswin.com Primer Series!

By Robert Cunningham, Angelswin.com Senior Writer NOTE: This article contains a detailed summary of each prospective bullpen candidate under the "Spoiler" bar. Some of you may just want to jump to the conclusion so the player contents are hidden from view. If you want to read that section, simply click on the bar and dive deeper into each of our reliever candidates, there are some interesting tidbits. In 2019, the Angels continued to develop a core group of relief options that produced to the tune of 2.5 Wins Above Replacement (WAR) across 761.2 innings pitched (IP). The latter number was the 2nd most IP, just behind the Rays bullpen at 772 IP. Assuredly, Eppler and staff would like to not only improve the bullpen's production, but also reduce the total number of IP, for the group as a whole, if possible. The good news is that most of that relief corps will remain this season and a key reliever, Keynan Middleton, should return to the fold, which could provide a real boost to a squad full of upside and potential, capable of closing out the later innings of any ballgame. It is the hope that the bullpen will potentially improve on their 2019 performances, giving reason to believe that the Angels relievers, as a collective, can build on last years 16th ranked production level and become a Top 10 relief staff. To start let us review 2019 results for the current, projected, 40-man relief staff as of December 16th, 2019: As you can see, the Halos bullpen was led by Hansel Robles (1.8 Wins Above Replacement (WAR)) and Ty Buttrey (1.4 WAR). Other contributors included Noe Ramirez, Cam Bedrosian, Taylor Cole, Felix Pena, and Justin Anderson. The belief is that the group can potentially take a nice step forward in 2020 and there is reason to feel this could be the case. Part of that solution will come directly from upgrades made in the rotation to, funny enough, relieve the relievers. If the starting rotation can eat up more quality innings, the bullpen will, ideally, be fresh on a more regular basis, which generally should equate to some modest level of improved performance. Additionally, some relievers may make some needed adjustments to improve their performance. Finally, there is a reasonable likelihood that Eppler and the front office staff will still add to this group prior to Opening Day, next year. To better understand what the Halos have let us take an in-depth look at each relief candidate and what they can bring to the table in 2020. Simply click on the Spoiler bar to unroll the comprehensive, individual player analysis. Note that data is pulled from FanGraphs.com, BrooksBaseball.net, and BaseballSavant.com: Likely Outcome: The Angels will continue to use the waiver wire to pick up relief targets of opportunity as the off-season continues and avoid expending resources as is typical for this front office. The next, most likely, alternative is to find a target of opportunity in free agency or trade, probably the latter. This is because the FA market lacks quality options whereas there are some interesting names that might be available in deals with other teams. Author's Choice: Personally, if the price is right, acquiring a name like Brad Hand (someone Eppler has inquired on previously) or Mychal Givens would be great. Since Eppler and his team love high spin rates so much, names like Drew Steckenrider, David McKay, Joe Jimenez, Buck Farmer, Jose Urena, Jeff Brigham, or Robert Gsellman might hold some level of interest. Ultimately this is not an area that I am to concerned about, as the Angels front office has done an outstanding job acquiring relievers that have the skills and tools to turn into effective relievers. All that the Angels need to do is start the season with an established group that can soak up innings and be effective to help the team reach the Trade Deadline in the right posture (wins) so that Eppler can reevaluate at that time whether the Halos need to acquire a rental bullpen option or two to help carry us over the Division finish line. Conclusion: Eppler probably understands that this unit, as a whole, might need some level of improvement, so it seems plausible that if he gets an opportunity to pick up a good reliever in trade (maybe names like Josh Hader, Jose LeClerc, Ken Giles, Mychal Givens, Scott Oberg, Keone Kela, Joe Jimenez, Jeurys Familia, Mark Melancon, Carlos Martinez, Richard Bleier, Ian Kennedy, Tim Hill, Paul Fry, Jared Hughes, Brad Hand, or Seth Lugo, among many others, might have some level of availability) or in free agency (maybe a guy like Arodys Vizcaino, Addison Reed, or, perhaps, Tyler Thornburg) he would do so, to help lift the squad a little further for the 2020 season and possibly beyond. Billy was recently quoted as saying, "There are a lot of ways to create a winning team." One of those ways is to build a really deep bullpen, not dissimilar to what the Yankees have done over the last couple of years, to help consistently build a bridge to success when transitioning from a starter to the later innings of a game. The good news is that the Angels have a good base of relievers to build upon, so the idea of a high quality relief corps is not a fantasy for the 2020 Angels. If Eppler was able to add a Hader, Giles, Givens, Hand, Martinez, or Jimenez type of player that would go a long way toward a consistent, sustainable run at the American League West Division championship. To be clear it does not have to be one of those names, either, there are plenty of other options out there to be had. Finally, the Angels could end up pulling one of their starters in and converting them to a relief role. Near the end of the season, the Halos used Jose Suarez in a long relief role four times, although they will likely start him in the Minors in the rotation. Jaime Barria and Dillon Peters made six and five long relief appearances, respectively, mostly early in the season. Jared Walsh is a two-way player, capable of relief work too, but he is most likely to do mop-up, low leverage work where the team is either ahead or behind by a significant amount of runs. Even Sandoval made a long relief appearance in early August. To be clear these guys are clear-cut starters (except Walsh) and will probably be used as such but they are available if the Halos switch course or have a need. Currently, it appears the Angels bullpen, barring an injury, trade or designation for assignment, will start the season with at least the following relievers in-tow: Hansel Robles Ty Buttrey Noe Ramirez Cam Bedrosian These four are the probable core base of the Angels 2020 bullpen. Behind them, the next group represents potential higher-probability adds and out-of-options players, in no particular order, that could be included on the 26-man active roster: Keynan Middleton Jake Jewell Taylor Cole Adalberto Mejia Mike Mayers Luke Bard Justin Anderson To be clear these seven will need to have good Spring Training outings to be included on the Opening Day roster, it will not be handed to any of them. Finally, the following names are very likely to start the year in the Minors no matter how well they perform in Spring Training (and in Pena's case he is on the IL for a while): Hector Yan Parker Markel Felix Pena So to wrap up this very long discussion, the author believes, based on the current 40-man roster, that the Opening Day starting eight (it is typical to start the season with eight relievers) will probably include these names: Hansel Robles Ty Buttrey Noe Ramirez Cam Bedrosian Keynan Middleton Adalberto Mejia Jake Jewell Mike Mayers If you do not feel we will carry eight out of the gate, then knock Mayers off the end of that list, probably. Also there is a real chance that if Eppler finds a reliever on the free agent or trade markets, that Mayers or Mejia (probably in that order) will be displaced off the 40-man and designated for assignment to make room for the new addition(s). This is what a good minimum resource bullpen looks like and this thriftiness allows the Halos to apply their monetary and trade resources elsewhere, for the betterment of the team as a whole. Longer term, once the Angels have an established rotation and position player group (which they are getting closer to this off-season), Eppler may be able to afford adding higher quality bullpen arms but, for now, he and the front office staff are doing this the right way. The Primer Series continues, next, with the Left Field article.

I haven't seen the lines but I am guessing it opens at Carolina -4. I think Carolina wins by 10. I really want Denver and Peyton to win but I think the difference between NE and Car is that Cam can move around and avoid the pressure that worked against the Patriots.