By Jason Sinner (aka, Dochalo), AngelsWin.com Contributor
His name is Billy. Not William. At least everything that the google machine produces about him has his given name as such. Not sure why that’s interesting. Maybe it’s because you’d expect it to be conventional but it’s not. Just like Billy. Billy the greenhorn. At least that was my first impression. He’s not Jerry Dipoto. Not some camera kind socal surfer with easy words. And that’s a good thing as it turns out. So instead of Billy short for William, he’s just Billy. The guy who inherited a sub .500 team with a bloated payroll, zero international spending capability, and the worst farm system in baseball history as well as an apparent upper extremity plague affecting any pitcher in a clubhouse radius. Apparently, the rally monkey is actually virus carrying anti-god from the movie outbreak. That inheritance also included Michael Nelson Trout. He’s pretty good.
Billy’s first order of business was to make our farm system worse by trading our top prospect and others for a defensive specialist. Actually, that was probably his second order of business. His first was to get a bigger boat and navigate the shark infested waters of the front office.
Fast forward two years later. So far so good right? But let the expectations begin.
So far, there really haven’t been any. If it wasn’t a mess, it would do till the mess got here. Well, the mess came and went and now we stand with a mediocre farm, international money, injuries healed (for the most part. maybe), kumbaya, payroll flexibility, and a major league roster that seems primed to take the next step forward.
There are holes to fill, yes. But now it looks like there are some actual resources to fill them. Would it be a tremendous surprise to not make the playoffs in 2018? probably not. Yet, it would be disappointing if we remained mired in mediocrity.
Over the next 5 months I have no doubt that we will parse out every last option and granulate every potential decision. It’s what we do. But the key component is that there are actual options. Lots of them. 2b, 3b, 1b. Do we trade Cron or Shoe or Kole? Do we tap into the farm? How much do we spend? A fairly savvy approach in just two years has put this franchise in a position we didn’t expect to be in two years ago. Pardon my frances, but don’t f**k it up now. Because the wrong trade or bad free agent move could turn that Viagra good feeling into the limp noodle of a Mike Trout departure.
There are lots of decisions to be made in the coming months. I don’t know what the right ones are, but Billy, not William better because pressure has resurfaced. Spaulding, this calls for the old Billy Baroo. Oh, Billy, Billy, Billy.
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