Two Months In: Anaheim Angels
51 games in and the Anaheim Angels are 26-25. Considering the injuries that they had to deal with in the first two months, being .500 at this point should be considered a success for the defending AL West champions. The Angels were the favorite to repeat this season, with a slight acknowledgment that Oakland might give them a run at the title. That threat has vanished as Oakland has completely fizzled and but for an outside shot that the Seattle Mariners return to their early season form, the AL West will be decided between the Angels and the Texas Rangers.
The Angels might be the better team on paper now that they are healthy, but there’s the matter of a 4.5 game lead to make up and primarily for that reason, the Angels are listed at about a 40% chance of making the post season. The next four to six weeks will say a lot in this division.
What is interesting for the Angels is that they have a lot of soon to be free agents that are likely to command significant attention in the off season and if the Angels were to so choose and sell this year, they might be able to thoroughly re-stock a farm system that has been light on producing hitting talent. Vladimir Guerrero, Chone Figgins, Bobby Abreu and Robb Quinlan all have expiring contracts. The pressure for the Angels to keep Guerrero around might result in them making a bad financial decision, ditto on Figgins.
On the pitching front, John Lackey and Kelvim Escobar along with swing man Darren Oliver are free agents after this season. Lackey might be in the same situation as Guerrero, a team and fan favorite who looks to be on the verge of being paid far too much money for a significant decline phase.
If instead the Angels decide to giddy up and go for it one more time and are buyers this summer, the question of where to add is obvious, as always in the line up. The rotation, even with the injuries, has been fine and the bullpen adequate, but the offense is once again impotent especially on the right side of the infield.
25
26-51 record in 51 games.
Adds up for me!!!!
We’re watching different Angels games if you think the bullpen has been adequate.
It settled into a state of merely average-to-bad in the last 20 days or so from mind-blowingly awful but they still have issues. They’ve blown six leads after the 7th this year already, have the second-worst ERA in baseball (thanks, Nats) and it’s become a ‘pick your poison’ situation every time Scioscia has to make a decision.
And there’s not much pressure to retain Guerrero among the Angel fanbase. Heck, even Lackey has a decent amount of detractors, especially at the dollars he was demanding.
But I get the gist of your point. This could be a dramatically different team next year and the next four to six weeks will be key, for the team and for individual players. The schedule is pretty favorable after the conclusion of the current road trip.
Love the addition of Quinlan.
Agree that the Angels will not be pressured into keeping Guerrero and Lackey. Their front office is not sentimental. Here are some of the players they let walk away: Troy Percival, Adam Kennedy, Troy Glaus, David Eckstein, Scott Spiezio, Francisco Rodriguez, Jarrod Washburn. All were key contributors to the World Series Championship, but rather than be dictated by emotion the Angels smartly let them leave via free agency.
As noted, the Angels have a number of pending free agents.
(salary info sourced from espn.com)
Vladimir Guerrero……….$15 million
Kelvim Escobar…………$10 million
John Lackey……………..$10 million
Chone Figgins…………..$5.775 million
Bobby Abreu……………..$5 million
Darren Oliver……………$3.665 million
Robb Quinlan…………..$1.1 million
TOTAL: $50.54 million
The departures will create significant payroll capacity and allow the front office to make aggressive offers to free agents. As such, I think the Angels should make offers to Jason Bay (LF) and Nick Johnson (DH) this offseason.
“Vladimir Guerrero, Chone Figgins, Bobby Abreu and Robb Quinlan all have expiring contracts.”
One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn’t belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?
They could “giddy up and go for it” by doing the absolutely unpredictable and calling up Brandon Wood. Although that might interrupt Scioscia’s love affair with slick fielders who can’t hit.
It’s not so obvious to me where the Angels would add offense if they decided to become buyers. The offense hasn’t been great, to be sure, but when I go position by position I don’t see an obvious place to trade.
In the infield, 2B and SS have been weak, but if they make a move there it would be to bring up Brandon Wood or Sean Rodriguez. I won’t be surprised if they send Kendrick down, but I doubt they’re ready to close the book on him entirely. Figgins at 3B could be improved, but that seems unlikely. Morales has been far from impotent at 1B…one of the bright spots in the offense, I think. At catcher, Napoli (with Mathis filling in) is one of the best power threats they have.
The outfield is already overcrowded and not really a place I see the Angels targeting to upgrade.
So, while I agree the offense needs an upgrade, if it’s going to happen it’s going to have to come from within.
And I highly doubt the Angels will become sellers this year…that’s not really the organization’s style these days, so things would have to get really bad to come to that point.
Replace Kendrick with Wood, and shift Figgins to 2B.
Agree. They missed a perfect opportunity to sell high on Kendrick. I understand why they didn’t but the league has figured him out. Steady diet of sliders away and then jam him low and in. Works every freakin’ time.
Moving Figgins to second immediately increases his value. But that creates other problems, like finding out what to do with Kendrick and Sean Rodriguez.
Gonna be an active ten months for the Angels.
“Anaheim Angels”? I believe they fought hard to become the “Los Angeles Angels of the Greater Anaheim-Bakersfield-Rancho Cucamonga Metropolitan Area and Sewer District.” Call me old-fashioned but. I believe we should call them by their proper name.
Ok, then they’re the California Angels. If old-fashioned is your thing.
I find their current name almost hilariously incomprehensible, especially considering their bilingual owner (and region).
Literally, they are “The The Angels Angels of Anaheim”
¿Que what?
Well, actually, Los Angeles was their original team name, but that was back when they were actually in LA.
The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim of California of The United States of America
I would like to see the Angels bring up players like Wood and Sean Rodriguez and see what they can do this year.
I think trading Figgy could bring back something decent due to his versatility, ability to steal bases, and get on base. I don’t think trading Vlad right now would bring much due to his injury earlier this year and his regression, but you never know. Trading Lackey might bring back something to pitching starved teams like the Mets or Phils despite his injuries the past few years. I just don’t know what type of prospects the Mets or Phils have.
Though the Angels still have a good chance to make the playoffs, I don’t see them being able to do much in the playoffs with the team that they have. For that reason I think it would be wise to try and restock the farm system and get rid of some of your aging soon to be likely overpriced vets. I doubt that this will happen though considering the Angels haven’t been sellers under Moreno.
all teams and their fans tend to overvalue their own prospects
the trick is to find a buyer when their ‘overvalue’ is at a peak
the angels hang onto them too long
i don’t think kendrick is a lost cause (the next macpherson) but he’s not ready to help a team that needs major-league ready
but i’m convinced some kind of kendrick-wood-weaver package could have landed them peavy +
too late now
Anaheim went out with an O/U of 94.5 (after Santana, Lackey and Escobar were winged). As much as I love that team, I couldn’t let that investment opportunity pass.
Learn the team name. It’s Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, with Los Angeles Angels being the only acceptable substitute.
If you’d like, consider ignoring the geography and call then what everyone else does…the Angels.