Halos Heaven

Yeah we're deep enough...

But what’s up with our pitchers? Now that we have hitting like crazy, we are giving up a lot more runs lately. I love seeing this run production but I don’t like the opponents keeping it close. Seems like we put up 10 runs and the other team puts up 6. Or something like that. I’d rather see 10 to 2. But with that said, I’m just being picky. Up 15 games, still winning, shouldn’t have much to say. What do you guys think?

Monkeyspanked - August 14, 2008 reply

Hello, it's August

It’s warmer. Balls fly further in warm air.

scareduck - August 14, 2008 reply

depth charts can be deceiving...

juan should be our number one dh, while he will continue to play a lot of of. if vlad is our #1 rf, he cant be our #1 dh at the same time, in my opinion. gmj is a solid defensive backup and should only play defense in late innings. naps is our top catcher in my mind, aybar is now officially our top ss. u-haul looks real good on there, by the way. all in all, i’m not mad at our situation.

NoDakHalo - August 14, 2008 reply

Naps is our top offensive catcher

but I think I just read that Mathis’ catching ERA is like, 8/10ths of a run lower than Napoli’s. Maybe it’s just the sample sizes, but that sounds rather substantial.

you forget that Napoli caught some fluke Moseley/Adenhart/Garland games in the beginning of the year

that really killed his CERA, which is a bogus stat anyway.

Garland is an inconsistent pitcher who gets shelled on occasion

nothing flukeish about those starts.

But yeah, Moseley sucks, and Adenhart was too young.

i was more referring to the April 28th debacle against the A's

that all goes on Napoli.

I hate CERA for that reason… it doesn’t really give an accurate reading of the catchers when there’s a platoon. Mathis, at this point, has caught mostly the solid guys (Lackey, Saunders, Santana) and Naps has caught the ones who have been inconsistent.

if i’m not mistaken, Mathis’ CERA has gone up during the last month that he’s been the everyday catcher, which leads me to believe that, for this year, both their CERA’s are flukey.

Yeah, I'm not entirely sold on the stat, either

but as a whole, I think Mathis plays a better defensive game than Napoli, even if Naps is obviously the superior offensive player.

i'm not entirely sold on that, either

yes, Mathis is a tad more athletic/flexible, but i’m not so sure that we’re better off with him behind the plate.
I’ve seen Napoli block balls that Mathis has missed/let under his legs, and Naps’ arm seems to be a lot more accurate. Jeff throws entirely too many balls into the outfield.

in fact, the stats are fairly similar.
Link To Stats

In those stats

Mathis has allowed fewer than half the passed balls of Napoli, in 28 more games. He’s also got a 29.03% caught stealing percentage, to Napoli’s 17.7%. Neither of those are particularly close. Mathis’s error rate/game is about twice as high though. That’s rather alarming…but I dunno. I guess based on previous reputation, I’ve always thought that Mathis had more ‘upside’ defensively than Napoli…even though I never bought for a minute that Mathis would be an above average contributor with the bat.

we've always been told that Mathis has the best defense

but really, it’s not all that great.

personally, i’d take Napoli any day of the week. his offense upside vastly outweighs his slight defensive shortcomings

Agree, but it looks like Soth has gone over to the Mathis side unfortunately.

unfortunately.

maybe he’ll see the error of his ways (like with GMJ) and switch to the better player.

If I were Nap, I would want to be traded to a team where I could play everyday

instead of spending prime time in my career rotting on the bench. He has the potential to be a very valuable offensive player to a team needing a bat as well as his ability to catch and call a good game. All he gets for hitting a home run in the few games he gets to play is a spot on the bench the following day. He could be extremely useful pinch hitting for the preferred Mathis in the eight or ninth innings of close games, but even that possibility is going wasted.

before he was hurt was playing practically every other day.....

plus you would have to think…..having less wear and tear on your body would lengthen your career…….

But ask any player, would you rather play everyday or sit on the bench at least half the time?

You know how they would answer that question.

I know.....plus imma NAPOLI guy myself........

he’s awesome…….but its not up to me who sits/plays….bummer isnt it? LOL

I would figure that Sosh knows a little bit more about

the true overall value of a catcher to the defensive effort than we bloggers know. Between bloggers and Sosh, I go with Sosh.

It ain’t as if Mathis is an over the hill vet that needs to be protected…

Stirrups - August 14, 2008 reply

Deep

Deeper than most, in fact.

You could include Izturis on the 3B depth chart as well. He has played there this year.

jjackflash - August 14, 2008 reply

Yeah the Halos are as deep (if not deeper) than every team in baseball methinks.....

off days after a loss blow….......seriously.

Seriously

eyespy - August 14, 2008 reply

How long is Willits on the DL?

I would hate to think that GMJ might see the field in the playoffs

KingF15h - August 14, 2008 reply

Yeah...

he’ll probably start a playoff game because of Scioscia’s mancrush on him.

jimmuscomp - August 14, 2008 reply

I meant...

GMJ, of course.

jimmuscomp - August 14, 2008 reply

I dunno

I think the mancrush has subsided heavily. He’s had 57 at-bats in the last month and a half and has started only 9 games since the all-star break. I think he’s learned well enough that Matthews needs to sit on the bench almost every day.

Sosh gives multiple opportunities to fail...

…it is like he wants to show the world (or at least Mr. Moreno) there is absolutely no pulse left in the rotting stinking corpse of a (former) ballplayer (Yan, Finley, Webber, Carrasco, and on and on), and the current “dead men walking” (Speir & HGH).

But like I said

that may have been true maybe two months ago, but GMJ is just not playing anymore, and there’s no indication that that’s gonna change at all.

after the Halos clinch homefield.......then Gary can play........

until the playoff roster is set…..then buh bye.

I hope you are right. You never know with Sosh.

HGH needs to take have knee surgery ASAP, and then prepare for 2009.

He's on the 15 day DL

Two concussions in like a week.

foxpaw - August 14, 2008 reply

What's Tampa's depth chart look like?

melvintoast - August 14, 2008 reply

Sorry for the

whoops hit Post a little early...

What I was going to say:
Sorry for the re-hatch, but I was at the game last night and I was looking for the answers to the following. I started going thru the game threads but my head started to hurt.

1) That double off attempt that Vladdy made to 2nd. Can’t remember the inning but it had Vladdy squatting in disbelief, HK reacted similarly and Soth cam out to argue… Was he out???

2) They were booing frankie pretty heavily (for the normally mild Angels fans) when he came off the field. Then just as he was dissapearing into the dugout, there went up a big cheer. I can’t imagine it was for Darren Oliver. Does anybody know? Did Frankie flip off the crowd or the Ump or something?

My answers:

1) no he was safe, but it was real close.

2) They probably started cheering because he got tossed as he walked off the field by the home plate ump .

WiHaloFan - August 14, 2008 reply

As K-Rod was leaving the mound, he appeared to be asking location of some pitches...

from there, it got a little murky. See this post for more…
y.

http://www.halosheaven.com/2008/8/14/593728/outside-the-boxscore-k-rod

Thanks to both of you...

depth chart looks great right now

with a few injuries, it may not look so great, so let’s hope for the best.

This team runs deep, so deep, SO deep put her ass to sleep.

Mayheminthehood - August 14, 2008 reply

Quinlan

Ahead of Morales because of his abilitiy to play other positions. Tex goes east then Morales will start, Quinlan still a backup.

vladtheimpaler - August 14, 2008 reply

Quinlan to NL where he becomes dependable Pinch hitter

He is a free agent after the years over

I think. Will be just over 5.0 years MLB after this year.

vladtheimpaler - August 15, 2008 reply

We need to start finding some AB's for Morales so we know what we have for next year.

LosAngel - August 14, 2008 reply

He did get a lot of AB's for us when

Kotch had the sleeping sickness. He should do ok.

vladtheimpaler - August 15, 2008 reply

YUP! Hit .294 last year which was his second shot in the Majors.

He is ready…..but should get some playing time just to get back on track with the MLB pitching.

acuda27 - August 15, 2008 reply

I think Reggie Willits has become the crash-test-dummy of the Angels baseball team.

Energizer bunny with human head instead of plastic composite.

Overall, the depth is better this year than any previous year I can recall.

The pitching depth is better this year than in 2002, although in 2002, Lackey’s June call-up helped stabilize the SP rotation,and K-Rod’s call up in September helped stabilize the bullpen. There were also some good lefty/righty platoons in 2002 (Spezio/Fullmer at 1B, Kennedy/Gil at 2B, Wooten/Fullmer at DH). Orlando Palmeiro was not a bad late inning defensive replacement.
The depth has made this team’s pitching better than 2002. If I had to choose, I would still take Angels offensive vintage 2002 over 2008. That team (2002) got on a roll than didn’t end until Erstad caught the final out in game 7. That team could rock! Vintage 2008 is still brewing, and the offense has been clicking pretty well for the last 6 weeks. I doubt they will match the consistency, depth, clutch hitting, and frenzy hitting we saw in 2002.
Regardless, there are 29 other teams that likely would be happy to trade their depth for ours (especially since the arrival of U-haul).