The December 7th, 2011 Winter Meetings edition of daily news for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim including Angels might have made a big offer to Albert Pujols, Scioscia would rather add good pitching than good hitting, Morales rehabbing but the Angels aren’t counting on him and much more…
The Story: The Angels might be the mystery third team who has made a 10-year offer to Albert Pujols.
The Monkey Says: This is HUUUUUUUUUUGE news. It also might be total BS because the Angels probably don’t have that kind of money. At this point, it is really just free agency porn for Angel fans. In fact, by the time this posts, the Angels might have totally debunked the rumor. All I know is the idea of Pujols playing for the Angels, even if it is for insane money, is giving me a John Holmes-esque baseball boner.
The Story: Mike Scioscia can’t get enough good pitching.
The Monkey Says: This sounds to me like Sosh just towing the party line. By the way, it also make sense. Let’s set aside the Pujols stuff for a minute. If the Angels really are going to limit their spending, then they should be sure to get the most bang for their buck. Right now, the value in this market is in starting pitching, not hitting. If they Angels can’t overhaul their lineup, they might as well double-down on their pitching strength and focus on winning a lot of 3-2 games instead of 9-7.
The Monkey Says: If memory serves, Kendrys is ahead of schedule compared to last year, but at least the Angels seem to be wisely approaching his potential contributions in 2012 by assuming he won’t make any.
The Story: The Angels apparently are unwilling to listen to any offers for Peter Bourjos.
The Monkey Says: Hallelujah! Sanity prevails. Someone please inform mindless rumor mongers like Jim Bowden and Joel Sherman of this news so that they will stop cooking up stupid trades involving Speedy Petey.
The Story: Selling high on Alberto Callaspo isn’t really a thing.
The Monkey Says: I don’t know if I totally agree with that assessment, but I do know that most teams are probably smart enough to buy into Callaspo’s one-year spike in walk rate. I also know that it only takes one team to be stupid enough to buy into it and overpay for him.
The Story: The Angels are getting calls on Ervin Santana.
The Monkey Says: This was expected, but it really doesn’t make sense. The Angels aren’t pursuing C.J. Wilson because they want to upgrade a rotation spot, they are doing it because they have two vacancies. It it illogical for them to spend so much time and money chasing Wilson if all they are going to do is re-open one of their vacancies which would require them to spend more money and assets yet again.
The Story: Jerry Dipoto says the whole baseball operations department is his analytics department.
The Monkey Says: That’s Jerry’s clever way of saying he considers number-crunching and scouting to both be forms of analytics.
The Story: New Angels assistant GM Scott Servais has an eye for talent.
The Monkey Says: That is a lovely puff piece on Servais and it fills me with hope, but at the same time, nobody but Servais and the Rangers front office really knows what his contributions were.
The Story: The All-Homegrown Angel team.
The Monkey Says: Napoli just had to be on it didn’t he?