Donn Beach wrote: ↑Mon Jul 31, 2023 8:43 am
Seattle or Bust wrote: ↑Mon Jul 31, 2023 8:17 am
Donn Beach wrote: ↑Mon Jul 31, 2023 8:11 am
The angels are trying harder than the mariners, a lot harder. Is that a good thing or bad for them? They seem to have shoved whatever chips they can come up with on an attempt to make the playoffs this season.
I think they're pretty much screwed and are just trying to save some sort of face before a massive rebuild.
Ohtani isn't signing there even if they somehow make a wild card.
Trout has become injury prone and is making $35.5 million the next 8 seasons. Rendon is always injured and is making $38 million the next 3 years. You can't have 2x players eating $80 million in payroll who don't see the field.
Their farm is now by far the worst in the league after trading for Giolito and others.
They can continue to try to pay guys to play there for one year... but depth will always be an issue and they won't have Ohtani to cover their sins.
I don't know what ohtani might be thinking. I've always felt there could be a possibility he re-signed with the angels, if he felt comfortable there. Now whether Arty should be throwing recourses at the attempt, i don't know. I don't think it's about saving face, i think Arty is fully committed to trying to get ohtani signed again.
If Ohtani has a brain cell he can see the walls crumbling around this Angels franchise. He says he wants to win... the Angels have never finished above .500 with him on the team and that was with more payroll flexibility and functioning farm systems in his earlier years with the club.
Whatever contract he signs will be somewhere in the range of around $50 million AAV. They're going to be paying him, Trout, and Rendon some $130 million moving forward... the Angels have shown a willingness to go just south of the luxury tax threshold meaning they'll have $100 million to go out and fill out a roster that is losing every player they just traded for, and many others that they gave 1-year contracts to. And they have to do so with 0 farm system options that keep depth cheap.
Judge back to the Yankees made every bit of sense given the tradition and such (although he might be regretting that decisions as the Yanks are now in a similar position to the Angels)... the Angels have no tradition and Ohtani's achievements have far less flair because they haven't come with any winning attached to them.
There is just no blueprint for them to be a winning baseball team moving forward.
Here is the Angels next 22 games... I'll be shocked if they come out of that with a .500 record.