I hope you had a Good Easter Sunday because the Angels sure didn’t. For the second time in 24 hours, the Angels allowed themselves to be shutout by a pitcher who had been struggling mightily before facing the pathetic Angel lineup.
I did a chat over at a Red Sox blog last night and as I signed off, I said the only way this series could get worse for the Angels is if they get shutdown by John Lackey today. Well, I guess I jinxed it because that is precisely what happened today. Six hits, one walk, no extra bases and no serious threat ever mounted against the traitor that is Big John. It didn’t even help that Mike Scioscia finally tried a drastic reshuffling of the lineup. I also expect he would have tried for some more aggressive baserunning too, but that would actually require baserunners. I don’t even know where Sosh goes to try and fix this epic offensive slump, I just know that he should consider every option at his disposal.
Game Notes:
- So apparently Maicer Izturis sat out this game because of a tight hamstring. If he wants to call people ignorant for calling him fragile, he’ll have to stop missing games because his hammy gets a little cranky every time the weather is less than perfect. Note, I am not complaining, Izturis might actually be the Angels’ best hitter right now, so they should continue to treat him with kid gloves. I just don’t think he should complain about it.
- What the hell happened to Mark Trumbo? The guy went from slamming opposite field homers and looking totally locked in to looking completely lost in like a week. Power hitters like Trumbo are notoriously streaky, but this swing just happened so quickly that it is almost unbelievable. For Trumbo’s sake, he better snap out of it soon because if he doesn’t, he is going to have a hard time finding ABs when Morales gets healthy, whenever that may be.
- You know how I know this lineup stinks? Because Alberto Callaspo hit cleanup today and I actually nodded along in agreement.
- Can we all just agree that Hisanori Takahashi stinks out loud? I’m done pretending that this guy is going to figure it out. He is lousy, end of story.
Halo A-Hole
I know it was the offense that was horrible, but Matt Palmer gets the lion’s share of the blame today. Knowing full well that the bats were struggling, Palmer had to come out strong and give the lineup a chance to get going, but instead, Chubs gave up three runs before the Halos ever even came to bat. That kind of early hole is the exact kind of pressure the hitters didn’t need and it obviously didn’t help the situation.