Angels manage rare trick – a come-from-behind win - The Orange County Register
Monday's triple-digit temperatures were far more intense than the stakes as the Angels and Oakland A's fight it out for second place in the AL West. But the A's bullpen melted down in the seventh inning of a 6-5 Angels victory. The win moved the Angels within one game of the second-place A's and kept alive their hopes of avoiding their first losing season since 2003 (they need to go 5-1 the rest of the way).
It's come down to this, playing for second-place during a heatwave. Even the highlights are lacking drama, RBI singles and HBP: Angels rally in seventh to take down the A's - The Angels battled from behind in the seventh, plating three runs in the frame, and held on for a 6-5 win over the A's, Napoli beats Anderson's throw to the plate -Mike Napoli just beats Brett Anderson's throw home on Erick Aybar's fielder's choice, Matsui ties the game with an RBI single - Hideki Matsui plates the tying run with a single to center field in the seventh.
Athletics-Angels Preview - MLB News - FOX Sports on MSN
Though Los Angeles will fail to win its sixth West crown in seven years, Haren is certainly not to blame. The right-hander has received three runs or fewer in 11 of 12 starts for his new club. He has compiled a 1.32 ERA over his last six outings, but has only two wins to show for it. The A's are trying to avoid matching their season-high five-game slide from May 12-16. They need to win five of six to finish with a winning record for the first time since 2006, when they last won the West. Another strong start from Dallas Braden (10-13, 3.49) could move them within one game of .500. The left-hander was superb last Thursday, tossing eight one-hit innings while striking out seven in a 5-0 victory over the Rangers. He had lost each of his previous four starts, compiling a 6.23 ERA while pitching through the sixth inning just once.
Angels hope verdict will bring closure - latimes.com
"I have mixed feelings," said infielder Brandon Wood, a close friend of Adenhart, 22, and Henry Pearson, 25, who was also killed in the crash. "It's a way for all of the families and us to get some closure, but it's unfortunate all the way around. "A kid goes to jail for maybe the rest of his life. If that's not a wake-up call . . . you drink and drive, and now you have 50 years in a cell to think about what your drinking did one night. It's a sad story."
Can Angels reverse RISP struggles in 2011? - The Orange County Register
Going into Monday's game, the Angels had batted .186 (62 for 333) with runners in scoring position over their past 43 games. That has continued a season-long problem, leaving the Angels 27th in the majors in hitting with RISP (.244) just a year after they led the majors and set a club record by hitting .297 with RISP. Like their average with runners in scoring position, the Angels also rank 27th in the number of at-bats they have had with RISP. A year ago, they were third in RISP at-bats, first in hits and runs generated in those at-bats (by a wide margin).
The most important thing to take away from the above clip is the Angels reduced chances to score. This is directly attributed to the plummeting on base percentage. This season, the team's OBP ranked second to last in the A.L. (currently .312) compared to last season's OBP of .350 which ranked 3rd. How big is the difference between anOBP of .312 and .350? It's about 2 base runners per game, or roughly projected to be around 350 less guys on base this season. To move this along further (without any scientific formulas, which means I'm pulling numbers out of...the air), if the Angels continued to get runners on base at the same rate as last season, and hit at the same clip with runners in scoring position as they have this season, the team would have scored roughly 80 more runs. About a 12% increase.
Will the Los Angeles Angels have the cash to back up their offseason aspirations? - ESPN Los Angeles
Moreno has been oddly absent during this disappointing Angels season. When was the last time you saw a quote from him? The All-Star Game, maybe? The last time I saw him, he politely declined an interview request. I've been covering this team since 2003 and hadn't before seen Moreno do that. From a media and fan perspective, he's one of the game's most approachable owners.
Saxon points out something I hadn't noticed until reading his post, where's Arte? I haven't read anything where he's quoted, and for him to miss the organizational meeting held a couple weeks ago is confusing. During a season where there are so many questions popping up, this is the time he is needed most. Hopefully, everything is well with the Moreno family.
Texas Rangers to receive $3 billion in new 20-year TV deal - USATODAY.com
It is the highest TV package for a team that doesn't own its own channel. And yes, that's $150 million a year before even playing a game, plenty enough to re-sign ace Cliff Lee, bring in free-agent outfielder Carl Crawford, or whoever else they wish. In comparison, the Dodgers make about $45 million a year off their TV deal with Fox.
There are reports that the amount might not be that high. This article from the Dallas Morning News mentions the price paid by Fox could be closer to $1.5-$1.6 billion, but could include a sort of signing bonus. Any infusion of cash to the Ranger organization is bad news to Halo fans. We've been used to the inept Tom Hicks' money management style, now things may have gotten tougher for the Angels.
Angels " Win Probability " Monday, September 27, 2010 - FanGraphs Baseball
MLB extends negotiating period for free agents - USATODAY.com
The Major League Players Association, trying to avoid a glut on the free-agent market, has reached an agreement with the Commissioner's office to extend the negotiating period for free agents and accelerate other key deadline dates, mlbtraderumors.com reported Monday.
They've moved up some of the dates for off season dealings. Revise your calendars.
Ten thoughts on Ken Burns' 'Baseball: The Tenth Inning' - Yahoo! Sports
After waiting 15 years for the present to turn into ripe history suitable for his documenting, Ken Burns returns to his PBS "Baseball" world with the airing of "The Tenth Inning" on Tuesday and Wednesday night.
Just in case you might have missed the news, there's a new Ken Burns PBS Baseball documentary tonight (at the same time as the game). Set your DVRs.
The Sabermetric Project and the "Science of Words" - FanGraphs Baseball
Still, it’s a fact: especially in the early years of the Abstract, when he was writing and publishing his annual almost entirely by himself, James’ output was incredible. For not only was he doing all that junk on his own, but he was, more or less, inventing a genre of literature.
Long article, but very good.
How Liriano became a staff ace again - The Hardball Times
While you can attribute some of that to Liriano's returning arm strength, he's also adjusted his mechanics to maximize his output.
Cool graphics, something that'd be interesting to see done with Kazmir.
Watch This High School Quarterback Hurdle A Standing Defender (Update) - Deadspin.com
Watch in awe as Marky Thompkins of the East Liverpool (Ohio) Potters shows off his ridiculous athleticism by jumping clear over a defender to get into the end zone. H/T Nic. Update: It's necessary to add that the play was called back. According to JJHUddle.com, in Ohio high school football, "hurdling a player who has a one or two feet on the ground is a penalty."
Although the play was called back, it's still a cool video.
September 28 - BR Bullpen
Events, births and deaths that occurred on September 28.
1919 - In the shortest nine-inning game in major league history, lasting only 51 minutes, the New York Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 6 - 1. About 6 minutes per inning.
1920 - A grand jury indicts eight members of the Chicago White Sox on charges of fixing the 1919 World Series in the "Black Sox Scandal."
1974 - Nolan Ryan pitches his third of seven career no-hitters, striking out 15 batters and beating the Minnesota Twins, 4 - 0, at Anaheim Stadium. He also walks eight to run his season total to 202 bases on balls, joining Bob Feller in 1938 as the only pitcher to walk more than 200 in a season. Ryan will again top 200 in 1977.
1975 - For the first time in MLB, four pitchers share a no-hitter when Vida Blue, Glenn Abbott, Paul Lindblad and Rollie Fingers of the Oakland Athletics combine to no-hit the California Angels, 5 - 0, on the final day of the season.
2008 - The Angels set a franchise record with 100 wins with a 7 - 0 romp of the Rangers. They finish with the best MLB record of 2008.
2009 - The Angels crush Texas, 11 - 0, to clinch the AL West title for the third straight year. Kendry Morales, who has emerged as a top hitter this year, leads the charge with a homer and 3 RBI. The Angels have dedicated the season to pitcher Nick Adenhart, who died in a car crash in April, and honor his memory during the post-game celebrations. I can still see it in my mind (and probably always will)
Second place, here we come:
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0 recs | 26 comments
If the Rangers put a team together like this with one of the lowest payrolls in MLB
I’m not looking forward to what they can do with cash.
Reagins better put his thinking cap on.
clover_black - September 28, 2010
Luxury tax, revenue sharing
Just means that we might have an equal in terms of finances.
Commander_Nate - September 28, 2010
Texas is now reaping the benefit...
…of high draft picks accumulated over so many poor seasons. They have a decent core of young, inexpensive, talented players.They can supplement weaknesses with trades or free agents. All this and more competent management.
Yes, they should be more competitive for years to come.
sothball - September 28, 2010 via mobile
they got a bunch of their young players
in the Texeira trade. Feliz and Andrus I believe were both part of that deal, among a couple other guys.
2pintsofbooze - September 28, 2010
and the Halos are reaping from all of the bad decisions the organization has made...
Dono Romantico - September 28, 2010
This just means Arte will get that much more from Fox
If he decides to stay with FSN after their current deal is up.
AndyHogan14 - September 29, 2010
Texas is good BUT...
That cheap team is only going to get more expensive if they want to maintain it. In addition, the Rangers still have a lot of surprises this year. Tommy Hunter going 13-4? Neftali Feliz becoming a lights-out closer?
Not saying they’re lucky, just saying that some of there have been some surprises and the players who have been performing will only get more expensive. Additionally, Josh Hamilton is always banged-up, so is Nelson Cruz, Vlad is getting older and they still have gaps at catcher and the first base position. They’re a good team but its a team that we can still beat.
BryanHarvey'sMoustache - September 28, 2010
this was suppose to be in response to Clover_Black...
in case it seems kinda out of context. Whoops…
BryanHarvey'sMoustache - September 28, 2010
I'd wager vlad puts on 20 pounds in the offseason to match the 20 he lost last year.
Balls and Strikes - September 28, 2010
Another "Where's Arte?" Question
I can’t find my Fan Appreciation Day pix from years past, but Arte is not in this year’s photo. Was he in the 2008 or 2009 photo?
red floyd - September 28, 2010
I tend to believe that DMN article about the Rangers deal
$3 billion is just an insane figure for the only the 5th largest market. 1.5 is more likely. The article also later states, correctly, that this means bookoo bucks for other MLB teams. We occupy a market 3 ranks higher than the Rangers, which means any future deal we make should net significantly more cash.
The Rangers’ new deal likely has a bonus now, but doesn’t kick in until 2014 at something like $80 million a year. That’s a $60 mil raise over what they get now, which is nice, but doesn’t put them past us. They also have to spend that money wisely in order for it to be effective.
Don’t forget, Arte could get together with some of the other local sports teams and form his own network as some have suggested in the past.
Commander_Nate - September 28, 2010
It's 1.6B from the latest reports but either way...
…it’s much better than what Arte got which is amazing given this market.
And now they have competent, agrressive ownership and leadership…with the potential of $$$ and a much better, younger pitching staff than we are used to seeing. That achilles heel is gone.
And Oakland could put things together as well. Which only leaves Seattle to suck more.
I find it funny how everything that has looked so awful all year willl just magically get better next year because…well…the alternative is unthinkable. The fact is, as much as one might just wish it will get better because it just must – it can actually get worse.
And this assumes Texas and Oakland don’t improve as much as the Angels might in the offseason – and I don’t see an exciting offseason but we’ll see.
RedFog - September 28, 2010
Some good points here. I'm pretty scared to think we aren't going to improve though.
Out of the 14 teams in the AL, we are:
11th in OPS
11th in BA
and in all of baseball we are 26th in OBP, which is worse than the mets and baltimore, but better than Seattle and the Pirates.
I did find something we’re 2nd in all of baseball in, and that’s times caught stealing.
In all of baseball we are in the middle of the of the pack in team ERA, wins, and shut outs, in terms of starting pitching.
In relief we are 20th in ERA, 23rd in K’s, 21st in BAA, and 29th in WHIP and K/BB ratio, only team with a worse than us here is Arizona.
Something tells me our starting rotation being set and a healthy Kendry Morales is going to be a little less than we need to turn this around. Something like huge banner seasons by Bourjos, Napoli, Morales. And at minimum, league average from all the guys who regressed so bad this season, namely Aybar.
Rant over.
RexTookMyStash - September 28, 2010
Well...
Purely grabbing nuggets from my ass like we all are right now:
1) Napoli has had his stats drop enough that despite his HRs, he doesn’t offer enough to get anything ‘impact’-wise from another team, unless they are very desperate at the catcher spot. I still think he will be traded unless the value is so low that it’s not worth trading him just for the sake of trading him. I still think he will be bundled and traded.
2) I really hope Kendry can come back like nothing ever happened, but this is another one of those situations where we just assume he’ll be back and swinging away at an all-star level. The reality is many other things can happen, although with the Angels pathetic offense, even Kendry at 3/4-productivity is better than most.
3) The bullpen will not fix itself. Kaz is not going to fix himself. Rodney is not going to kill himself (yeah I know a closer is part of the pen but I look at it differently). Not sure how those three areas will get better. I can, however, see them getting worse. And if we’re going after offense as priority #1 in the offseason, there isn’t much $$$ for improving this area in a really meaningful way other than praying Jespen can be born again, Walden can hold his own, etc. etc. Again, we’re hoping for great things but the opposite can happen as well.
4) Matsui, Hunter, and Abreu are not drinking from the fountain of youth.
5) All of our prospects have promise but have yet to really deliver. I think you can count on Peter being the CF fixture but what if he hovers around the low .200’s for a while? And just like with Wood, you can’t just say “Oh, it can only get better! We’ll kick ass!” Clearly, it has gotten historically, epic-fail low.
So while I’d love to just blindly thing the Angels can only be better next year, there is a chance some things get better and some worse and we’re still a borderline mediocre team…or things can get worse.
/cutwrist
RedFog - September 28, 2010
Thanks to Comm Nate's post below.
My optimism is now less blind.
RexTookMyStash - September 28, 2010
Next year...
You’re right, Texas will still be around and Oakland might be too. I also expect, at the most, 1 major FA signing and perhaps a minor one, like a reliever. Other than that, it will probably be trades.
Let’s look at what we’ve got next year, though. It’s arguable that we have already made three significant moves for next year. We will be getting a power hitting first baseman back in Kendry Morales, and we will have a full year of Dan Haren in the rotation and Bourjos on defense and the basepaths. Those three things alone make this team look significantly better going into next year and the 2010 offseason hasn’t even started yet. On top of that, the pen is looking more promising with guys like Walden, and possibly Thompson, Kohn and Rodriguez all seeing more time. The right free agent(s) would just be that much more of an improvement.
Furthermore, I look at guys like Aybar, Rivera and especially Abreu and think they’re not this bad. Aybar just hit .312 last year and now he’s in the .250’s? He’s really more of a .270+ hitter for his career if he stays in the bottom of the order where he belongs.
Abreu has lost 40 something points off his career numbers a year after being right in line with them at .293. I don’t care what his age is, nobody drops off that badly in one year unless they are developing Alzheimers or pressing too hard combined with a string of bad luck. If he gains just 20 of those points back (still below his career numbers), then his OBP looks pretty good.
Torii is having an OK year for someone who is also probably pressing too hard. Kendrick is quietly having a decent year at 2B. Matsui has turned out to be basically what we all expected. Point is, this offense isn’t great without Morales. His mere presence will make it better next year. Adding another impact hitter somehow would only help further.
Will we go to the playoffs next year? I have no idea. I am willing to bet, however, that barring another “ankle slam”, the 2011 Angels finish 8-10 games better than the 2010 Angels.
Commander_Nate - September 28, 2010
Aybar needs to stay at the bottom of the order...
which begs the question… Who will bat leadoff in 2011?
This schmorgasboard of a lineup sosh lays out daily isn’t going to fly… there needs to be a solid leadoff. Bourjos looks like he is being groomed for that role, but, like RedFog said, what if he can’t break the mendoza next year?
One of our main assets was having a solid leadoff with speed on the bags. Aybar, even if he gets on, doesn’t pose that much of a speed threat.
If we could somehow spring for Ellsbury that would be a great addition and could solve several of our problems.
clover_black - September 28, 2010
Ellsbury would be nice
Although, I think we would all like to avoid putting Napoli in a Red Sox uniform to do it. We’ll have to see what Tony does.
I also don’t like this musical chairs business. If we don’t bring in an outside leadoff option, I say try Abreu or Willits there to start the year. I’d probably go with Abreu first and see how that works for a couple weeks. If he gets his BA to the .270’s like I think he can, his OBP gets near the .370 range, which is fine. Plus, he will only be leading off once. The rest of the game he will have Boujos, Aybar, etc hitting in front of him.
If that doesn’t pan out, then work the trade market next year. We’ve got enough middle IF, OF and catchers around to do something.
Commander_Nate - September 28, 2010
See... I understand your logic...
…as I’m extremely analytical.
But there are numerous examples – including with this team – where just wanting the laws of averages, career norms, etc. to happen, and they don’t.
And while I want to just close my eyes and wish and expect them to happen so my fandom problems with this team will go away, I don’t see it happening.
I’m not being negative just for the sake of being negative because I’m way over being let down by this years product…but maybe I’ve now become too much of a realist.
I have NO faith that Reagins can guide this team where it needs to be. Can he get lucky? Any GM can, but he just doesn’t cause me to ooze confidence. I don’t know what the answer is, but he just doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies I’d like. Of course we all bitched with Stoneman too but in a weird, wierd…WEIRD way, I felt much better with him at the helm. Can’t explain it, just is.
And yeah, I don’t see a big name FA signing either – at least not at the superstar level. Vlad was the last and will be for some time I fear. So whatever we pick up, it will probably be platoon piece #67512. Not exciting, sorry.
And yes, 2002 can remind us you don’t need a superstar to win it all (duh), but as a fan, I also like to wake up and be excited about a player or two to set my imagination on fire. Unlike 2002, this team has ZERO chemistry and that won’t develop magically over some winterball and a few beers.
And unlike you, I want some youngin’s on this team. At least Peter can get me wet with his speed cough, but thats about it on this team.
I miss the speed, control of the bases, and creativity that came from small-ball.
I want Angels baseball to return.
RedFog - September 28, 2010
Green Monster
Napoli would kill it in Boston. He’s always hit well there and that Green Monster plays to his advantage.
SMUangelFan - September 28, 2010
The post-game celebration in 2009 was AWESOME...
standing above the dugout in F112 after the game, seeing the players flood back out from the clubhouse and jogging out to centerfield … hearing the players chant “ADENHART, ADENHART.” It was tear-inducing.
Downing Rules - September 28, 2010
I would love to hear some speculations about Arte.
It all starts with Arte. This offseason will tell us all we need to know about where Arte and his organization is headed.
Dono Romantico - September 28, 2010
Anyone notice that today's PGP answer
asked for a text-based answer? Wonder if you still get credit if you type in “maybe”?
blast21dave - September 28, 2010
Geez!
They just showed Arte sitting in his suite with Reagins last week. Saxon is trying to bait him. Why would he give any interviews right now?? OH I know! So he can field questions about Tony Reagins!
firebird81 - September 28, 2010
Arte
He’s paying $50m to Scoscia and he hired Reagins, so what is everyone expecting – he’ll start making decisions for them? Arte is smart enough to know the problem is with the talent level on the field, so he’s letting the baseball operations organizational leaders figure out the solutions. When Arte gets hands-on involved, it will be to write the checks or to replace the baseball operations leaders.
mustard_man - September 29, 2010
I would say this pretty much guarantees that
Arte will establish his own station after his deal with FSN is done. Texas should not in any way be receiving more money from TV than any team in Los Angeles, New York, Boston, or Chicago (yes I’m aware that NYY and BOS own their own stations). Moreno had to fight to get the 10 year 500 million dollar deal and they just give Texas this large TV deal?? FSN better be making it up to the Angels by offering them a better deal or they will lose them and possibly the entire Los Angeles market (if the Doyers jump ship as well when their ownership situation gets under control). I would say the Angels/Doyers deserve about $125-150 million a year if Texas gets $80 million a year and $100 million a year at the absolute lowest.
AndyHogan14 - September 29, 2010
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