The October 16th, 2012 edition of daily news for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim including a call to get rid of Wells, Joyner hired to Phillies coaching staff, Angels could reduce payroll and much more…
The Story: The Angels need to let Vernon Wells go to be able to properly shape their roster.
The Monkey Says: I don't totally agree with that. It isn't like the Halos are guying to save a significant amount of money or get a good prospect in return for him. The only real negative of having him around is the temptation of playing and/or using his presence to justify benching or trading Peter Bourjos. That is a good reason, but I don't think it means he has to go. It just means the Angels need to be smart enough to keep him properly buried as the 25th man. All that being said, yeah, they should probably wash their hands of him because I don't trust them to use him smartly (which is not at all).
The Story: The Phillies hired former Angel star Wally Joyner as their assistant hitting coach.
The Monkey Says: I already can't wait for people to start clamoring for the Angels to hire Joyner as their hitting coach even before he has a week's worth of experience under his belt because apparently being a former Angel is all it takes to be a good coach according to some people. These would be the same people who call for Troy Percival (along with his jorts and sandals) to replace Mike Butcher.
The Story: Alden Gonzalez believes the Angels could reduce payroll by as much as $15 million.
The Monkey Says: Using his math, that would but the Angels between $145 million and $150 million for their Opening Day payroll which translates to roughly $50 million to spend in the off-season. What's interesting about this is that the Angels have given no overt indication of where they will cap their payroll in 2013, so it makes me wonder what insider info (if any) Gonzalez has to make that statement other than basic logic.
The Story: A look at Kevin Jepsen's bounceback season.
The Monkey Says: This piece intrigued me and I dug into the data further. It turns out that Jepsen was actually throwing even harder when he got recalled in the second half. He was actually up well over 97 MPH with his fastball, a full mile per hour over his best season average. Yeah, turns out throwing harder helps. Also, the one thing that jumped out at me was Jepsen throwing a sinker, which is news to me. He really only threw that pitch with any kind of frequency in April. It rarely appeared after his recall, which kind of makes me wonder if it was a misclassification by Pitch f/x. My point is that I think he really buckled down, got healthy and started throwing harder than ever with a fastball that had more tailing action then before all while becoming less reliant on his cutter.
The Story: How will Torii Hunter perform in 2013?
The Monkey Says: Comparing him to Ibanez is wrong-headed. They are much different players and have been used differently as they have aged, specifically, Ibanez seldom faced lefties this season, which is why it looks like he rebounded some. I agree with the conclusion that re-signing Hunter is a risky proposition for the same reason I think is unfair to compare him to any other similar players, which is that how a player ages is unpredictable.
The Story: The worst anti-stats column used to justify David Ortiz as the AL MVP gets ripped apart.
The Monkey Says: I have no problem with people who don't like advanced stats, but I really can't tolerate people who don't understand them trying to denigrate them simply because of their lack of understanding. As such, I will link to FJM-style takedowns with glee.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
