The January 10th, 2012 edition of daily news for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim including Salmon gets just five Hall of Fame votes, Angels showing interest in Brad Lidge, assessing the value of Kendrick’s extension and much more…
The Story: Tim Salmon got only five votes in the Hall of Fame voting.
The Monkey Says: You know my thoughts about this already, but others are mildly outraged that he got any votes at all. However you feel about it, you won’t have to feel that way again because Salmon is no longer on future Hall of Fame ballots since he did not get the necessary 5% of the votes.
The Story: The Angels have shown interest in former Phillies closer Brad Lidge.
The Monkey Says: Lidge isn’t nearly the pitcher that he used to be having lost a lot of velocity, but he was still very effective last year since his killer slider is still very effective. In fact, he throws the slider almost three-quarters of the time, which is kind of ridiculous. He is a big health risk, but out of all the veteran free agent relief arms not named Ryan Madson, Lidge is probably the best available. Don’t expect any imminent signing here though. Dipoto has kicked the tires on almost every single free agent reliever at some point, so this could easily be Jerry doing his normal due diligence or simply Lidge’s agent trying to drum up a bidding war (as Lidge has widely been thought to want to sign in his native Colorado).
The Monkey Says: The best part of this piece is the flyball distance heatmaps, something I have never seen before. That chart basically makes the case that Howie’s burgeoning power isn’t just a one-year fluke, but rather a trend of him hitting balls harder and farther as his career progresses, making it more likely that he will continue to produce at an All-Star level and thus make this new deal a potential bargain.
The Story: The Angels may have made their most shrewd move yet by locking up Howie Kendrick.
The Monkey Says: The title to the article is pretty misleading, but that is just what ESPN does (editors, not authors, generate the titles, usually to maximize pageviews). The article really talks about what exactly Kendrick has to do to earn his money. With that $/WAR value, I really don’t see how Kendrick doesn’t exceed his contract numbers by playing at a 2.0+ WAR level, especially since he has become such a fine defender now
The Monkey Says: That’s an interesting way to look at it, but I don’t think people are going to judge this deal by WAR, when it is all said and done.
The Story: A look at what it would take to extend Dan Haren and Ervin Santana.
The Monkey Says: I would be for extending Haren, but not Santana, simply because of Ervin’s health record. I wouldn’t extend either pitcher though until after the season, just because there is really no such thing as a “healthy” pitcher. No sense extending before they really have to.
The Story: The Onion claims the Angels added Pujols and Wilson just so they could trade for Mike Napoli.
The Monkey Says: OK, that’s pretty funny.