Daily Links for the LA Angels including Scioscia won’t commit to Trumbo as his full-time first baseman, Morales cleared for baseball activities, Opening Day roster announced and much more…
The Story: Mike Scioscia still won’t say that Mark Trumbo will start at first base in Kendrys Morales’ absence.
The Monkey Says: Seriously? C’mon, Sosh! Mike is saying he likes the infield defense better with Kendrick at first, which is a valid point, but is it really worth having Callaspo in the lineup rather than Trumbo? Methinks not and methinks that we better just start referring to Trumbo as Napoli v2.0.
The Monkey Says: This is pretty much what everyone expected in light of the recent injuries to the team. Bulger and Thompson avoid the chopping block for now, but one of them (probably Bulger) is likely going to be waived when Scott Downs comes off the DL. As for Conger, he just around as filler until Pineiro comes off the DL in a few days. Don’t be surprised if Hank doesn’t play at all. Pettit too will return to the minors in the near future, for him it will be when Reggie Willits gets healthy. That just leaves Brandon Wood, who came alive late in the spring, but still is in danger of losing his roster spot when Kendrys Morales finally makes his return to active duty.
The Story: Kendrys Morales has been cleared to resume baseball activities.
The Monkey Says: What does that even mean? I guess that means he can run and field now, but that wasn’t even totally clear. We are still probably at least two weeks from seeing Morales make his return.
The Story: Ervin Santana intends to use his new split-finger pitch during the regular season.
The Monkey Says: Interesting. Santana said he was experimenting with the pitch in the spring, but I just assumed it was a passing fancy. If the new pitch is any good, it could really help Ervin, as his changeup is merely passable as a third pitch.
The Story: Jon Heyman predicts that Mark Trumbo will win AL Rookie of the Year.
The Monkey Says: This is the first nice thing Heyman has said about the Halos in months. Funnily enough, it won’t come true. Whatever you think of Trumbo, I just don’t see how he is going to get enough playing time to put up the kind of numbers that would earn him the ROY, assuming he is even capable of doing so.
The Story: The league has created a special 7-day DL for players with concussions.
The Monkey Says: This is strictly on a trial basis, just in case teams abuse it. For example, the Angels could bash Scott Kazmir in the head after every time they have an off day that would allow them to skip his turn in the rotation, then stash him on this new DL and call up another reliever.
The Story: The Angels odds of winning the World Series have not changed since the end of last season.
The Monkey Says: Nor do I think they should have. They didn’t make the big acquisitions that were expected of them, but the roster is still probably on the same basic level talent-wise as the 2010 team, maybe a little bit better depending on how Morales’ recovery goes.
The Story: FanGraphs ranks the Angels #12 in their organizational rankings.
The Monkey Says: Your not going to believe this, but they don’t like what the Wells trade did to the Halos’ long-term outlook. Crazy, right? Right? Hello? Anyone? Dammit.
The Story: Mat Gleason is calling for a shake up of the Angel front office.
The Monkey Says: Regime change is the latest trend in the Middle East right now, so it is worth a shot, though I don’t think ousting Reagins is going to make a big difference since the general consensus is that Scioscia and Moreno are the ones really calling the shots in Anaheim.
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