The October 18th, 2011 edition of daily news for the LA Angels including Williams playing winter ball in Venezuela, a look at what service time considerations might mean for Mike Trout, wondering if Arte Moreno is the Angels biggest problem and much more…
The Story: Jerome Williams is pitching in the Venezuelan Winter League this off-season.
The Monkey Says: Nice to see that Jerome is keeping busy this off-season and working to stay in shape for next year. As I alluded to in yesterday’s article, Williams has had issues with staying in shape earlier in his career, so the fact that he is voluntarily still playing during the off-season, working on refining his craft is a great sign that he finally understands what it takes to have prolonged success in the big leagues.
The Story: Service time considerations could affect how the Angles handle Mike Trout next season.
The Monkey Says: I still don’t think Trout should play in the minors next season, but some other experts do. What I very much doubt is that the Angels will keep Trout in the minors solely to so that he doesn’t become a free agent until 2018 instead of 2017. That is the sort of move a non-contending and/or smaller market type of team might pull, but the Halos have never shown much of a penchant for small-minded maneuvers like that. The fact that they called him up at all in 2011 pretty much proves that.
The Story: T.J. Simers wonders if Arte Moreno is the real problem with the Angels?
The Monkey Says: I was ready to ignore this article since it is Simers and thus likely fueled with bile, but it actually isn’t that bad, by his standards. It is still generally a slam on Moreno, but in a measured way. Look, Arte isn’t perfect and clearly has issues with letting his emotions interfere with the team’s decision making process, but I still think he is one of the top owners in all of sports.