Second Guessing Scioscia – It’s not easy being Green

Welcome to Second Guessing Scioscia, our look back at some of the questionable decisions that Mike Scioscia made in the last week. And, boy, there are some questionable decisions to be reviewed. In the history of this column, we have never once struggled for content. However, we aren’t anti-Scioscia. The official MWAH stance on Scioscia is pro-Scioscia overall. But his in-game tactics need some help and we are here to provide that help by nitpicking incessantly and grading them with our patented SciosciaFace grading system.

In this week’s installment of Second Guessing Scioscia, we learn that it is not easy being Green, Grant Green, specifically. After whiling away in the minors most of the season, it looked like Grant Green had been freed last month, but less than two weeks later and Scioscia has banished Green back to Triple-A purgatory for reasons that are not entirely clear.

What the hell did Grant Green ever do to you?
No, seriously, Scioscia. What the hell did Grant Green ever do to you? The Angels are in desperate need of offense and have very few bats in the minors that could potentially help with that problem. One of those bats belongs to Grant Green. When the Angels called up Green at the end of May, it seemed like he was finally going to get a legitimate shot at contributing after being repeatedly overlooked by Scioscia since he was first acquired in 2013.

NOPE.

Green got starts in four of his first five games after being recalled and apparently Scioscia decided that he’d seen quite enough, apparently. Grant went 2-for-12 with a walk in that short little stint which apparently was all the failure Scioscia needed to see because he needed to start giving more time to Kirk Nieuwenhuis.

To be fair, The Angels have yet to face a left-handed starter in the month of June, so it didn’t lend itself to using Green in a platoon and Nieuwenhuis is a vastly superior defender. Finding a way to get Green into the lineup wasn’t going to be be easy, but Scioscia didn’t really try either. He could easily have given David Freese, Johnny Giavotella or Kole Calhoun a day off, but he decided that wasn’t necessary.

The straw that broke the camel’s back though was on June 6th when the Angels decided to recall C.J. Cron. All of the sudden Scioscia doesn’t have a problem benching Nieuwenhuis so a right-handed batter could start against a right-handed pitcher.

More importantly, why is C.J. Cron getting another whack at the pinata? He’s already got over 100 plate appearances and a sub-.500 OPS to show for it, yet Scioscia forces him back into the lineup after less than two weeks in the minors. Green, he spends most of the year in Triple-A and gets a whopping 13 plate appearances to prove himself.

So, I ask once again, what the hell did Grant Green ever do to you, Scioscia?

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