Halo Headlines: players vote Trout best player, Street extension held up by Hamilton suspension delay

The April 1st, 2015 edition of Los Angeles Angels news including players vote Trout best player, Street extension held up by Hamilton suspension delay and much more…

The Story: A poll of MLB players shows that 61% think Mike Trout is the best player in the world.
The Monkey Says: Which means that 39% don’t, which is kind of freaky. In fact, 18% thought it was either Cabrera or Kershaw, so I’m very curious to see who comprises the unlisted 21%.

The Story: The Huston Street extension might be getting held up by the lack of clarity on Josh Hamilton’s suspension.
The Monkey Says: Or it is a very convenient excuse to not give Street an extension that would surely end up being a bad idea. With Street setting an Opening Day deadline for a new deal and Hamilton’s suspension to be decided by Opening Day, the sooner the suspension is decided upon, the better the odds of an extension. So, take your time Mr. Manfred.

The Story: Baseball Tonight ranked Garrett Richards as the 76th best player and Albert Pujols the 83rd best player.
The Monkey Says: Pujols fell quite a bit from last year and arguably might be ranked too high still. I’m genuinely impressed that Richards made the list based off of one strong year.

The Story: Nick Tropeano has been optioned to Triple-A.
The Monkey Says: As expected. Andrew Heaney hasn’t been sent down yet, so maybe he will get one more shot at changing Scioscia’s mind before they commit to the four-man rotation. That seems unlikely though.

The Story: Hector Santiago believes moving over on the pitching rubber has helped improve his stuff.
The Monkey Says: In particular, he believes his slider now has more depth. Moving over on the mound has helped guys before, so maybe this is real or maybe this is going to lead Santiago to throw his crappy slider more than he should because he doesn’t realize that the move on the rubber didn’t really help that much and that what really helped was pitching against a bunch of minor leaguers.

The Story: Mike Scioscia is expecting a big year from C.J. Wilson.
The Monkey Says: This reads to me less like a vote of confidence and more like a challenge to Wilson.

The Story: The Angels believe they can maintain their top offensive performance from last year.
The Monkey Says: I do too! Losing Kendrick hurts, but if Freese steps up like he did in the second half and Cron develops, they should be able to erase much of the hit they took by losing Kendrick. Joyce should effectively replace what Hamilton provided in 2014, if not more. They really just need Albert Pujols to not decline much.

The Story: Matt Joyce is having more hamstring problems and might start the season on the disabled list.
The Monkey Says: OK, so maybe their offense will be in trouble, especially if C.J. Cron doesn’t hit. Losing Joyce would mean a whole lot of Cowgill and Navarro. That kind of worked last year, but it seems unlikely to be as effective this year.

The Story: Three reasons to watch the Angels in 2015.
The Monkey Says: Let’s see if Neyer feels that way after he actually watches motley crew of second baseman play.

The Story: Albert Pujols being “back” is one of the top ten storylines of 2015.
The Monkey Says: By “back” they mean he had a good Spring Training. Wait until six weeks into the season when his body starts breaking down and he is no longer facing rusty pitchers and minor leaguers and then let’s talk about whether or not he is actually “back.”

The Story: Fangraphs previews the AL West.
The Monkey Says: Shockingly, the site founded by Dave Cameron and featuring the work of Jeff Sullivan projects the Mariners to win the division.

The Story: Will Leitch previews the AL West and predicts doom for the Angels.
The Monkey Says: Apparently if you look at the lineup and rotation, which is very similar to the 98-win team from last year, from “30,000 feet up” they look like a 78-win team and not a division winner. OKAY.

The Story: The anatomy of a Mike Trout GIDP.
The Monkey Says: Trout doesn’t hit ground into double plays, they ground into him. It is also worth mentioning that while Trout is the best at avoiding GIDPs, Albert Pujols is the second-worst. So, yeah.