gotbeer

What does this team need to be competitive in 2014? I am taking a look back to 2002. I see constant posts about wanting to trade big pieces of our team, in the hopes of getting young starting pitching. Santana is asking for over $100 million, Nolasco $75 million. Pitching isn't cheap right now. It's a sellers market. In 2002, the Angels starters had 1077.2 IP, a 1.22 WHIP, and a 4.00 ERA. In 2013, the Angels starters had 964 IP, a whopping 1.39 WHIP and a 4.30 ERA. But you look at who should be in the rotation next season. Weaver. He had a fluke injury that kept him out 1 month. People will say his fastball is decreasing, and he doesn't K people much. Maddux, the pitching coach of the Rangers had a saying I read once. A pitchers perfect inning isn't throwing 9 pitches and getting 3 k's. It's throwing 3 pitching and getting 3 outs. This is Weaver. 2013 1.14 WHIP, 3.27 ERA. Career of 1.14 WHIP, 3.24 ERA. Next season, I expect him to have a 1.14 WHIP and 3.27 ERA over 200 IP. CJ. He had one of his best seasons ever. And yet, his WHIP was still a 1.34 with a 3.39 ERA. His career average is a 1.31 WHIP with a 3.60 ERA. For 2014, take the low and high and go with a 1.34 WHIP and 3.60 ERA over 202 IP. Richards. Giving him the nod for a starting postion. He had a 1.34 WHIP and 4.16 ERA over 145 IP last season. Career of 1.43 WHIP 4.42 ERA. He has improved his WHIP and ERA each year, so I'll say he will match his numbers and be pleasantly surprised hopefully in 2014, so a 1.34 WHIP, 4.16 ERA over 175 IP. Williams. No he isn't going to get a starter spot. But he will start some games due to injury. He was a 1.39 WHIP 4.57 ERA guy last year. We will go worse case, and give him his same stats as starting last season, 1.49 WHIP, 5.06 ERA. He averaged 5.52 IP Per start last year. I am going to figure 10 emergency starts for a total of 55.2 IP. Math time. 632.2 IP, 814 Walks and Hits, 1.28 WHIP, 3.78 ERA. So for starting pitching to match around the 2002 total, we need to find 2 pitchers that can pitch around 400 IP, 4.34 ERA, 1.11 WHIP. In this case, ERA is a more important stat than WHIP because it's much more realistic to get 2 guys with a 4.34 ERA, and 1.30 WHIP than 2 guys like Weaver. So the list will comprise of, just going off of 2013's ERA numbers in order Tanaka (posting) Colon Santana (1st Round Pick) Burnett Jimenez (1st Round Pick) Kuroda (1st Round Pick) Lewis (Coming off injury) Nolasco Arroyo Garza Feldman Hudson Vargas Kazmir With the 'perceived' budget constraints. For instance a Vargas may cost $10-12 million a year, a Lewis might cost as low as $5 million a year, Kazmir (while I don't want him) could cost under $10 million, Colon (with his steroid cloud) could be under $10 million. Point being, this team doesn't need aces. It doesn't need to get younger, if it means signing a vet that won't cost us a trade or a pick, and only money for a short deal. Also it means, that if we spend under $20 million for 2 starters, it would put our estimated opening day salary at $167 million and luxury tax salary around $175 million. This is without making any other moves. With a $189 perceived cap, that gives us $14 million annual average value to spend on 2-3 relievers. And talking of relievers, we can spend half to nearly all of that on a closer, since great closers top out over $12 million, and good one's can be $6-10 million. But why, when we have a guy with a 1.24 WHIP, 3.80 ERA, 37 saves with 4 blown saves, and is 28 years old with 3 more years of control left. Relievers/setup men top out at $5 million. Heck Burnett, as unfortunate as his situation was last season, was still a top reliever in the offseason and we got him for an escalating $3.5 million. So that means we can significantly improve our pen on $14 million. As the Boston Red Sox showed us last year. It's not the big splash that you make in the offseason that wins you a championship. But assembling a competitive team top to bottom. IMO, the Angels, with all it's 'perceived' budgetary constraints can still do that, without changing much of the makeup of team.

Did you know, that MLBTraderumors.com estimated what Trumbo would make in arbitration this year? Trumbo is estimated to get $4.7 million. So he's worth his weight in gold.

Bravo Jess. You went to actually compare Trumbo's contract to his weight in gold. Something I never would have ever thought of. I guess for Pujols it would be his weight in adamantium.

At least we got a point out of it. Bu we should have won this game.

Penner 33 G 2 G 12 A 14 P -2 Penner 14 G 4 G 9 A 13 p +15 He is back home.

crap

Damn. What a 5 minutes for both teams. Night and day from last night.

No we cannot make something work for Price. Tampa Bay will want prospects that have huge upsides that they can control for many years, and pay league minimums for.

One or two late inning relievers, and cash to cover Trumbo's salary.

Here is a question. That injury usually requires rest. Why is he already taking batting practice in November? Shouldn't he have taken the winter off, and given his foot extra rest, and started training in January?

Texas is looking for an outfielder. He has proven success there. He has 4/$98 remaining on his contract. Would they be interested at 4/$60 if all it involved was a minor prospect? Would Hamilton go back? But the bad thing about his contract is it's severely backloaded. $15/$23/$30/$30.

Santa Monica? Although tourists should probably be warned about their strict smoking policy.

2013 Eye on Baseball 'Bronze Cleat' Awards: American League Interesting made up award. But when I think back to the 2002 team, this is what comes to mind. So I think an important, yet rarely followed stat/observation.

Step 1. Colonize the moon. Step 2. Send all landfill material to moon. Step 3. Have the rocket that supplies said moon to suddenly explode, shutting down rocket launches for a year.

i still don't get why people have some sort of aversion to trading Callhoun. His value is pretty high right now, and could net us the starting pitcher that we need.

It's a perfect movie. It's not a documentary.

Lol. Is that a serious trade? Trading for a pitcher that has a career 4.62 ERA with a 1.46 WHIP, and a minor league line of 3.96 ERA/1.33 WHIP. Or a thirdbaseman who isn't much better than what we have now? I guess Angels fans hate Trumbo and Bourjos that much, that they want to Napoli them. Which might become the best thing that ever happened to Trumbo and Bourjos, and will become AW.com Fodder for years to come.

I hear one time this kid Trout was bullied by his teammates. They made him take them out to a dinner, only to ditch him and stick him with a $1800 bill. It was so bad, he had to call mom to bail him out. But the team made up for it by paying him back, in quarters.

Only award I worry about is a World Series Championship. So Boston is the MVP, Cy Young, Silver Sluggers, and whatever other awards you can think of. All other awards are quickly forgotten, but a World Series Championship you remember.

Well, Etem isn't giving up.

Hiller looked stupid on that play.

I hope this trade is true. Just so that those whinning to get Trumbo Traded, can whine about who we get.

Very soft goal by Hiller.

This game could get ugly. Ducks are playing like they all have the flu

sloppy game by the Ducks so far.