Royals surge shows no trouble for Angels

The Angels might lament that they didn't last longer in the American League playoffs, but it's hard to argue that anyone in the AL was going to beat the Kansas City Royals, who are headed to the World Series. The Angels are headed to 2015 with a strong club with a good chance of making that trip.

The Angels need a big bounce back from Josh Hamilton if their five-year, $125 million contract with him is to be vidicated (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

By BILL PETERSON

Big Leagues in Los Angeles

An old saw in sports says that offense fluctuates and defense is a constant. The saw doesn't exactly explain what happened to the Angels in their American League Division Series (ALDS) loss to the Kansas City Royals. But it's a pretty good description.

The Angels finished the regular season with the best record in the game, 98-64, and they did it with hitting. And they lost the ALDS in three games because hitting fluctuates. 

That's really all there is to it. The Angels didn't hit for three days, and they lost three games. They batted only .170 in the series and scored only six runs, despite hitting four homers. It can happen to anyone, and it happens all the time. Playoffs magnify that, but they do not make it remarkable. It's probably, indeed, more likely to happen to a good team in the playoffs than the regular season because, in the playoffs, you're not playing the Houston Astros or the Minnesota Twins. No one gets to the baseball playoffs without being good enough to win them, and that's even after expanding the playoffs to five clubs in each league.

Thus, we find no deeper meaning in the Angels' rapid playoff demise. Explanations? It's three games. The season is a marathon containing many moments, good and bad. If the good moments outnumber the bad, you win in the end. The playoffs are only a moment, and, if the moment isn't right, you lose, right now, and it's over. The End.

The flip side to all of that is the Royals, who were sky high when they played the Angels and have remained that way ever since. After sweeping the Angels in a three-game ALDS, they swept the Baltimore Orioles in a four-game American League Championship Series (ALCS). The Royals will begin the World Series tonight at home against the San Francisco Giants.

The Angels are just going to have to process all of this. It can't be easy, but it's not as if they rolled over against a club they should have beaten. As well as the Royals are playing, it's ridiculous to say anyone should beat them.

During the six-month grind, the Angels were the best team in the game, only to be dispatched in three games by a club that couldn't even win a division. Responses along the lines of "So what?" are in play here. What's not in play is any notion that there's some flaw in the club's design that make it unsuitable for going deep into the playoffs. Perhaps, should the Angels flop in the playoffs the next couple of years, we might detect patterns, but, right now, it's just three games in the dumpster.

The Angels remain an outstanding club, and they took a huge step forward in 2014. They added two very good starting pitchers to their mix, Garrett Richards and Matt Shoemaker, entirely from within their organization. Missing Richards for the postseason certainly didn't help. At the very least, a healthy Richards would have enabled the Angels to delay C.J. Wilson's dreadful Game 3 start until Game 4. Might have harshed the Royals' high a little bit, changed the energy and given the Angels a chance to come back in the series. But maybe not.

Angels general manager Jerry Dipoto should get a nod or two for rebuilding the bullpen on the fly during the regular season. That was some fine work. Bringing in Huston Street to replace Ernesto Frieri for holding ninth-inning leads gave the whole operation a new breath of competence and confidence. With offseason free agent Joe Smith around to carry the eighth, the sixth and seventh innings become opportunities for mixing and matching the limited abilities of certain relievers against the limited demands of those circumstances.

Cole Kalhoun became the regular right fielder this year, and he probably is the guy we saw. Mike Trout finally will win his MVP award. Erick Aybar and Howie Kendrick once again were the players we've been seeing for a few years. The top catcher, Chris Iannetta, is a good baseball player. 

It quickly became irksome to hear the television commentators during the playoffs talk about the greatness of Albert Pujols in the postseason when anyone with just a lick of sense knows he isn't even approximately the same guy who used to win all those big games for the St. Louis Cardinals. Pujols once was the greatest player in the game. Now, he might be one of the best five first basemen in the American League. Still a very good player. But he won't build his Hall of Fame case on his years with the Angels. That doesn't mean he won't help the Angels win, or that the Angels need to upgrade at first base. He will make the day a little better, but he will not save the day. Those days are long gone.

Going forward, the Angels have the pieces together to win the division again in 2015, but there are a couple of red flags. Josh Hamilton and C.J. Wilson each will be in his age 34 season with lots of contract left and decline almost certainly in the future. The Angels received good value in the first couple years of Wilson's deal, but he fell off badly in 2014 and now has two years and $38 million of contract remaining. The Hamilton signing can only be characterized as a grievous mistake. He has delivered almost nothing in two seasons with the Angels and he enters 2015 with three years and $89 million of contract left.

Those are two old players eating a lot of salary and diminishing the club's flexibility by that much. Word from Anaheim has it that the Angels will work their club around the edges. They certainly want to come in with a payroll beneath the taxation threshold of $189 million and, according to the estimates on baseball-reference.com, they figure to come in around $160 million if the pick up all their contract options and go through arbitration with all who are eligible. So, they have a little room.

The club is set in the outfield with Calhoun in right, Trout in center and (lamentably) Hamilton in left. They've got Pujols at first, Kendrick at second base and shortstop Aybar all under contract for 2015. They've also got catcher Iannetta under contract and his backup, Hank Conger, is due for arbitration.

The only pending free agents of much interest are utility infielder John McDonald and reliever Joe Thatcher, both of whom would be well worth signing and neither of whom figure to be expensive. McDonald earned $850,000 in 2014 and he's well worth a million. Thatcher is a hard-throwing left-hander who would really give the Angels a lift if he's healthy. Questions about Thatcher's health and effectiveness, as well as the direction of the market, might take signing him out of the question for the Angels, but they do need a left-handed specialist out of their bullpen.

The Angels still have the pieces, and the question now is whether the pieces will fit again. A productive fitting of the piece would include left-hander Tyler Skaggs continuing his development and being around the whole year, and there's still the matter of how Richards will come back. But it's all there. It's still just a matter of fitting together.

A's made the trades, Angels made the pitches

The Angels put together a huge four-game sweep of the Oakland Athletics at Angel Stadium during Labor Day weekend, increasing their lead in the American League West to five games. The Angels heroes were pitchers, none of whom arrived with any fanfare this season.

Angels pitcher Jered Weaver doesn't have his fastball, but he has guts and guile, which was enough to defeat the heralded Oakland Athletics acquisition, Jon Lester, in a key game during the past weekend (Keith Allison, (UC International crop)/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

By BILL PETERSON

Big Leagues in Los Angeles

The Angels begin the rest of their life today after building a five-game lead in the American League West with a remarkable four-game sweep of the Oakland Athletics at Angel Stadium during Labor Day weekend.

And if it wasn't the Angels who made such bold and celebrated moves for pitching this summer, it was the Angels who received pitching when it really counted. Either that, or the A's didn’t receive hitting when it really counted. We'll say it's the first, but we don't rule out the second.

It has become tiring to labor over the grand error made by Oakland general manager Billy Beane when he traded his left fielder and the anchor of his batting order, Yoenis Cespedes, to the Boston Red Sox for left-hander Jon Lester, who he really didn’t need. But the weekend in Anaheim brought that error into the sharpest possible focus.

The series began with the only truly dramatic game in the bunch, a 4-3 Angels victory in 10 innings on Aug. 28. The A's entered the night one game down in the division and had their best pitcher, Sonny Gray, on the mound. But Gray came a bit unglued in the second inning. Josh Hamilton, Howie Kendrick and Erick Aybar began the inning with consecutive singles, the last of those driving in Hamilton for the game's first run. Then, Gray threw two wild pitches to place Kendrick on third and Aybar on second. A two-out single by Gordon Beckham drove in both runners and gave the Angels a 3-0 lead.

The Angels, countering with struggling left-hander C.J. Wilson, held that lead until the fifth, when the A's began hitting line drives. A leadoff single by Brandon Moss, followed by Geovany Soto's double, gave the A's their first run, then Coco Crisp hit a line-drive single to knock in Soto. In the sixth, the A's tied the game, 3-3, on solo homer by Josh Donaldson.

So, it became a battle of bullpens. And the Angels, who have been rebuilding their bullpen throughout the season, won. Five Angels relievers combined for 4 1/3 scoreless, hitless innings. The Angels won it in short order in the bottom of the tenth against Oakland reliever Ryan Cook. Albert Pujols led off with a walk and took third as he hustled out a single to center field by Hamilton. Kendrick hit a sacrifice fly to right field to drive in Pujols.

We witnessed that night the start of a remarkable occurrence  – the first four out of 29 consecutive scoreless innings by the Athletics, the AL's top scoring team, against an Angels rotation that is aged, unheralded, under-manned – everything but a sure thing. 

The second game, played on Aug. 29, was the definitive game. Not quite as improbable as the third game, perhaps, but what the second game said is in the standings today. The A's sent Lester, the guy for whom they spent heavily to win just this game, against Angels right-hander Jered Weaver, who is doing it all now with guts and guile. It was barely a fair fight.

The A's didn't reach base until Donaldson hit a double with two out in the fourth. They didn't get another hit until Sam Fuld's single with one out in the sixth. By then, the Angels had all the runs they needed, those coming on Chris Inannetta's two-run homer with no one out in the fifth after Aybar led off against Lester with a single. 

When the Angels batted in the bottom of the sixth, we could see the A's come apart at the seams. Watching the wheels come off of a baseball team is never a pretty sight, but the A's flailed all the way through August and it was just a matter of time. That time came with two out and nobody on, when Donaldson, the A's best player, made a fielding error allowing Kendrick to reach. Next, Eric Sogard, playing out of position at shortstop, made a throwing error, moving Kendrick to third and allowing the hitter, David Freese, to reach second base. Aybar then dropped a bunt in front of Lester and reached first base to load the bases. Flustered, Lester walked Iannetta for force in a run and give the Angels a 3-0 lead.

Pujols homered to make it 4-0 after seven innings, at which point Weaver departed, having allowed only three hits. Joe Smith and Huston Street finished out a 4-0 win the the Angels, giving them a robust three-game lead.

The importance of that game for the Angels can hardly be over-stated. They went to the third game of the series now assured that they would end the series with the division lead, even though their pitching plan for the third game – "the Garrett Richards start" that they will forever be trying to fill – was not one to inspire great confidence. That plan was Cory Rasmus, a reliever not even approximately stretched out for a start. The A's would go with Jeff Samardzija, famously acquired from the Chicago Cubs this summer.

No one could have or should have predicted that the team pitching Rasmus would beat the team pitching Samardzija. But the team pitching Samardzija doesn't have any hitters now. Missing Cespedes is some of it, but not all. The A's three-headed catcher (Derek Norris, John Jaso and Steven Vogt) has hit a bit over its head. Donaldson still has decent numbers for the season (.259/.348/.471/.819), but he hasn't been a force since May 30, which ended with him at .285/.379/.561/.940. 

Then there's Crisp, the key and unsung player of the A's surge in 2012 and their continued excellence in 2013. The A's committed themselves to Crisp as their leadoff hitter and center fielder on June 14, 2012, putting Cespedes in left field. Crisp was batting .172 with a .466 OPS. The A's were 28-35. From that point forward, Crisp batted .296 with a .857 OPS. The A's went 66-33, charging from five games back with 10 days left in the season to overtake the Texas Rangers for the AL West title.

The 2013 season was more of the same. The A's spent the entire season either in front or very close to it and easily won the division by five games. Crisp, the leadoff center fielder, had a solid year, if not great, tacking up a 4.3 WAR. He led the club with 93 runs scored and gave the club a solid all-around presence.

Beane has mentioned, correctly, that the A's already were struggling offensively when they traded Cespedes at this year's non-waiver trading deadline, which further mystifies the Cespedes trade. But there's no mystery that the A's decline offensively can be indexed some bit to Crisp. From July 5 to today, Crisp is batting .183 with a .559 OPS. The A's actually peaked offensively on June 4 (.253/.340/.421/.761). From that point to now, they are .244/.311/.372/.683.

Perhaps, then, it's not such a huge surprise that eight Angels pitchers, led by a three-inning start by Rasmus, shut the A's out on three hits to beat Samardzija, 2-0. The A's mounted one threat, that against lefty reliever Michael Roth, in the fourth. A walk, a single and an intentional walk loaded the bass, then Athletics manager Bob Melvin pinch-hit right-handed Jonny Gomes for left-handed Josh Reddick and Angels manager Mike Scioscia brought in right-handed Yoslan Herrera for Roth. Herrera induced a ground ball on which Kendrick at second base made an outstanding play for a double play to end the inning.

And with Reddick out of the game, the Athletics were without a left-handed stick who might have punished the ensuing parade of right-handed Angels relievers. The Angels walked out of the game with a 2-0 win no one could have predicted or expected, as well as a four-game lead.

The final game, on Aug. 31, was icing on the cake, an easy 8-1 Angels win behind rookie right-hander Matt Shoemaker, this season's surprise sensation, who improved his marks to 14-4 and a 3.14 ERA with seven innings of five-hit, shutout pitching. The Angels sacked Athletics left-hander Scott Kazmir with six runs in the second inning. The A's finally scored in the eighth. Angels, 8-1.

With only three games left between the Angels and the A's (Sept. 22-24 in Oakland), the Angels now still have a two-game cushion even if the A's win all three, which means the A's still have to be two games better than the Angels against everyone else just to force a one-game playoff for the division title. None of that seems likely to happen, especially after the Angels exploded and the A's imploded during these last four games in Anaheim.

Moreno: LA's unsung baseball hero in 2014

After taking the heat for over-reaching his baseball operation to saddle the Angels with a poor club in 2013, Angels owner Arte Moreno doesn't receive enough praise for reversing his own course and giving the baseball people room to operate in 2014. The Angels are back to being an elite club this season, and Moreno's new patience has a lot to do with it.

Angels owner Arte Moreno has left his baseball club to his baseball people in 2014, and the results are obvious (public domain image).

By BILL PETERSON

Big Leagues in Los Angeles

They don't give an annual award for the most reviled person in baseball across Los Angeles. If they did, they'd have to retire it, anyway. Frank McCourt would win it every year. Still.

If, however, active participation were a requirement, then it's hard to imagine a more likely winner in 2013 than Angels owner Arte Moreno.

As of one year ago right now, no rhetorical task across the game would have been much tougher than defending Moreno's leadership of the Angels' baseball operation. In short, he was an ignoramus and a busy-body, the proverbial  – and all-too-real – rich guy with a baseball club for his plaything. These guys never understand the game because they think baseball is like other sports, replete with game faces and outcomes dictated by brute force.

Moreover, Moreno is a marketing guy who saw his club as a marketing project because, you know, when you're a hammer, everything is a nail. Thus, Moreno reached past his baseball people for two consecutive offseasons, signing the likes of Albert Pujols, C.J. Wilson and Josh Hamilton to $500 million worth of free-agent contracts while the organization's player development operation languished as one of the least promising across professional baseball.

It wasn't really until last season that the entire mess came home to roost. Pujols produced his worst season ever before finally going on the disabled list with a plantar fasciitis in his left foot, the Angels made the characteristic error of thinking Hamilton could whisk into a new position (right field) just because he was on a deal worth an annual $25 million, the club decided to sign Joe Blanton  instead of giving those starts to Garrett Richards, and a disjointed club turned in a disjointed season.

The Angels finished 78-84, their worst season since 2001, when they finished 75-87 in Mike Scioscia's first year as the club's manager. The Angels that had been built by Bill Stoneman had run their course, and the new direction was not promising. Some fans believed Moreno should respond with something big, like firing Scioscia, or firing general manager Jerry Dipoto.

But Moreno did nothing of the sort. In his darkest moment as the Angels' owner, Moreno instead did something really big.

He pointed the finger at himself. In interview after interview across the national media (since he deals so seldom with the local media), Moreno made himself accountable, said he's the owner and it's on him. Moreno couldn't be led into selling out his high-priced players for under-producing. He refused to pin it on his manager, and he said outright that he wanted to give Dipoto's systems a chance.

So, when the 2013 season ended amid speculation that Moreno might actually eat the last five years of Scioscia's contract, there was, indeed, no news. And throughout the offseason, there was little news – just a couple of trades and a couple of changes on the coaching staff, the kind of events to characterize an ordinary offseason for any club. But there was no news, no headline news, no big initiative designed to scream across the media. 

It was, in fact, rather a dull offseason, an offseason of baseball people making baseball decisions. The owner kept his hands off.

Now, if we didn't want to give Moreno credit for seeing the light, that would be easy to do. Surely, it wasn't an attractive proposition for the Angels to go into the big free-agent market again, since the club opened the season with a $155 million payroll and has so much money committed to future seasons that another big contract would remove any remaining flexibility, particularly with the club angling for a long-term deal with Mike Trout. Additionally, anyone looking at the talent on this club had to know it really wasn't as bad as the 2013 season showed.

In fact, the Angels enter Wednesday's game against the Dodgers at Angel Stadium with a 67-45 record, the second best across Major League Baseball. And it has a lot to do with the fact that the owner didn't make a chaotic situation even more chaotic by going crazy on his top people. Instead of pressing the baseball operation with marketing initiatives, Moreno let the baseball operation operate a baseball club. 

Everyone around the Angels, it seemed, could take a deep breath, which is for the best because the Angels run like mad and they needed a breath. The Angels are back to playing baseball a lot like we remember from their best days under Scioscia. The focus is on players already with the club. The new guys giving new blood to the club are their own guys.

There's Richards, starting every fifth day instead of some mediocre free agent. There's Erick Aybar at his demonic best, and Howie Kendrick hitting at his best, and Trout having his best year ever, and Jered Weaver getting hitters out without his old stuff, and C.J. Cron up from the minor leagues to lend a bat, and so on.

The owner has left the club alone, and the club is responding with a fierce brand of baseball unlike any other club around the game today. No club in the major leagues is more aggressive on the bases or on the field or, for that matter, in the batter's box. 

Credit the players because they are playing, and credit the manager because he dictates how the game is going to be played, and credit the general manager because he assembles the playing roster.

But also credit the owner for allowing all of that to happen just by staying away. It's not an easy thing to do. If any of us owned the Angels, or any other club, we'd probably have our mitts all over it. Some of us might figure out when the bottom goes out that we don't know what we're doing, but you can look around sports and find plenty of owners who never get the picture. Moreno has.

A year ago, Moreno was the most reviled man in baseball across Los Angeles. This season, Moreno is the city's unsung baseball hero.

The Angels according to WAR

The statistical confection known as Wins Above Replacement (WAR) has become something of a new religion among a certain strain of baseball fans. As such, it requires a leap of faith, which some of us aren't quite willing to take. Here's what WAR says about the Angels in 2013.

According to WAR, Angels pitchers are considerably better than they were last season, and Scott Downs, in particular, is about five times as good (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).


By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

The Angels have become a dangerous team since this season's terrible start, which was even worse than last year's terrible start. It remains that, at 43-45, they are well behind the pace of last year's outfit, which finished 89-73. At the rate that the Angels have won through their first 88 games, they would finish 79-83.

Again, though, the Angels started this year 15-27. Since then, they are 28-18. If they can keep playing at that 28-18 pace (a .609 percentage), they would finish 88-74, which gets them very close to the present pace for the Tampa Bay Rays, who are 50-40 and positioned for the second wild card at 90-72.

The question before us is this: Considering that the Angels, taking the first 88 games in total, are paced to finish ten games worse than they finished last year, what is that difference? How, specifically, are the Angels ten games behind last year's rate of victory?

Like many other commentators, we're intrigued by Wins Above Replacement (WAR) as a way to measure specific player contributions to winning games. Unlike many of those same commentators, who talk as though WAR should be the last word on important questions like a player's worthiness for the Hall of Fame or a Most Valuable Player award, we're not sold on WAR. We're still kicking the tires and checking under the hood.

A check under the hood involves a critique of the methodology, a critical look at the assumptions involved in working out the formula for determining WAR. Tire kicking involves putting certain questions to WAR and seeing how it answers. What follows is an exercise in tire kicking.

Baseball-reference.com (insert deep bow here) bases WAR on the assumption that a team composed entirely of "replacement" players, players of the "4A" type who are easily available to every team, would win 48 games in a 162-game major league season. Thus, a team that wins 90 games in a season would have 42 games of WAR value -- the 48 games that a team full of replacements would win, plus 42 "wins above replacement."

One legitimate criticism of WAR is that it misses by a little. One of WAR's virtues is that it doesn't miss by much. But it does miss by enough to be questionable. For example, as the Angels won 89 games last year, we would expect their WAR to total 41. Instead, by the Baseball-reference.com version of WAR, it totaled 46.3. If the Angels had won at the rate that WAR would predict, they would have finished with 94 wins, which would have put them into the playoffs. In the world according to WAR, the Oakland Athletics would have won 95 instead 94, the Texas Rangers would have won the same 93 and the Baltimore Orioles would have won 87 instead of 93. So, the Angels would have been in and the Orioles would have been out.

That's a pretty different world. So, WAR raises at least as many questions about itself as it answers about player value, and that should be kept in mind as we put it to work. It's a long way from being perfected.

It's also a lot of fun. So, back to the fun. Let's look at the Angels.

So far in 2013, Angels pitchers have produced 6.6 WAR, which works out to 12.2 WAR over 162 games. As it happens, Angels pitchers produced 4.8 WAR for all of last season. If WAR is to be believed, then Angels pitchers actually are better this year than last year, even though they rank 11th in American League ERA this year (4.23) and they ranked eighth last year (4.02).

At the end of last season, the Angels let go of Dan Haren (-0.4 WAR in 2012) and Ervin Santana (-1.3) and, essentially, replaced them with Jason Vargas and Joe Blanton. Vargas, with a 1.9 WAR so far this year, projects out to about 3.7 WAR over a full season, though we know we're not getting that because he'll miss about six weeks with a blood clot. Blanton has a -0.4 WAR, which works out to about -0.8 over the full season. Between Vargas and Blanton, the Angels would realize about 3.0 WAR over the full season, an improvement of 4.7 WAR over the combination of Haren and Santana in 2012.

C.J. Wilson finished with 0.7 WAR last year and now has 1.3 WAR in 2013, which would take him to about 2.5 over the full season. That's an upgrade of 1.8 WAR. Jered Weaver last year had 4.0 WAR and, so far this year, has 1.4 WAR, which would get him to about 2.8 over the full season. But Weaver is the reverse side of Vargas in that the former already has been injured and we might expect him to outpace the WAR he has established so far. The way Weaver is going lately, he might match last year's 4.0.

Last year, the Angels brought in Zach Greinke as a short timer and he gave them 1.4 WAR. He's pitching across town now and the Angels don't have an obvious replacement. However, Jerome Williams is good enough for WAR purposes. Last season, Williams totaled -0.2 WAR. This year, so far, he is 0.6, which rates out to about 1.2. That's an improvement of 1.4, which was precisely Greinke's contribution last season.

Ernesto Frieri last year totaled 1.4 WAR and he has 0.9 WAR so far this year, so he would come in around 1.8 for a small increase. But Scott Downs is showing a big increase, up from 0.4 WAR last year to 1.2 so far this season. He would pace out to about 2.4 WAR this year, a full two games better for a situational left-handed reliever. Even Garrett Richards works out better this season. Last year, he finished with -1.0 WAR and this year he projects to about -0.2 WAR.

Taking the next five Angels pitchers by appearances in 2013, we find Michael Kohn (0.7 so far), Kevin Jepsen (-0.0), Dane De La Rosa (0.5), Robert Coello (0.0) and Sean Burnett (0.6). They total 1.8, which would bring them in around 3.5. Compare them with the Angels next five pitchers from 2012 in appearances: Jason Isringhausen (0.1 in 2012), Jepsen (0.4), Jordan Walden (0.3), LaTroy Hawkins (0.0) and Hisanori Takahashi (-0.3). They total 0.5. So, the Angels, considering the solid back of their staff, are about 3.0 WAR better than last year.

Assuming that the discrepancies involving Weaver and Vargas will come out in the wash, the body of pitchers so far considered would come in right about 12 WAR better than last year. As to the remaining pitchers from each year, the guys who come and go, the Angels are about two WAR worse in 2013.

Position play, WAR tells us, is where the Angels really suffer this year in comparison with 2012. Defensively, in particular, WAR tells us exactly what the eye tells us. The Angels are ghastly this year. In 2012, they totaled 4.6 defensive WAR. In 2013, they are -4.7 WAR, which comes to about -9.0 over the full season. Perhaps WAR is telling us something about the relationship between pitching and defense, because the common measures tell us that the Angels pitching is worse this year, while WAR tells us that the pitching actually is better and it's the defense that's worse.

Offensively, WAR tells us that the Angels are a little worse than last year. Their offensive WAR last year was 36.7 and their offensive WAR so far this year is 17.1, which paces out to about 33. The less mysterious measurements tell us that that the Angels are more than a little worse offensively this year. The Angels are down from third in the league to seventh in runs, down from third to fifth in OPS and their OPS-plus is down from 116 to 111.

The big differences are found in individual position players, where we see enormous declines in WAR. That 12-game improvement in WAR among the pitchers is much more than offset by a projected decline of about 20 WAR among the position players.

Erick Aybar last year was 4.3 WAR and he's 0.2 WAR so far in 2013, so he paces out to a four-game WAR drop. Alberto Callaspo has dropped from 3.5 WAR to 0.0 WAR, so his decline is that large. By letting go of Torii Hunter, who had a 5.8 WAR last year, and replacing him with Josh Hamilton, who is 0.2 this year, the Angels figure to be another five WAR in the red. Albert Pujols did 5.0 WAR last year and he's 0.8 so far in 2013, a drop of about 3.5 over the full season. Mike Trout has followed last year's incredible 10.9 WAR with 3.9 so far this year. He paces out to about 7.7 WAR in 2013, another drop of three games. Were these players to maintain their WAR levels, they would end up being about 20 WAR worse in 2013 than 2012.

All of that is somewhat offset by improvements from other players. Howie Kendrick, who finished last year with 3.1 WAR, already has 2.8 in 2013 and would come in around 5.5, an increase of about 2.5 games. Chris Iannetta finished 1.4 in 2013 and already has 1.3 in 2013, so he figures to come in about 2.5, an increase of about one game. Peter Bourjos last year had 1.2 WAR and he has 1.3 already this year, so he would be about 1.2 better over this full season, except that he can't stay in the lineup. Mark Trumbo, 2.7 WAR last year, is 1.5 so far this year, so he would come out about the same. So, we see an improvement of about five WAR in 2013 among these players.

But when we go to the secondary position players, we see mostly decline. The next five Angels position players by appearance in 2012 were Kendrys Morales (2.2), Maicer Izturis (0.3), Vernon Wells (0.6), Bobby Wilson (0.9) and John Hester (-0.1). They total up to 3.9 WAR in 2012. The next five of those players for 2013 are J.B. Shuck (0.3), Brendan Harris (-0.6), Hank Conger (1.0), Luis Jimenez (-0.0) and Andrew Romine (-0.3). They add up to 0.4, which paces out to about 0.8, another drop of three games from the comparable players of 2012.

Putting it all together, WAR tells us that the Angels, over 162 games, would be going on four games worse offensively (down from 36.7 WAR in 2012 to about 33 this year), about seven or eight games better in their pitching (up from 4.8 to 12.2) and about 14 games worse defensively (down from 4.6 to about -9.0). That accounts, give or take, for the 10-game difference to the bad this year for the Angels.

Outside of WAR's suggestion here that pitching really isn't the Angels' problem, which is a little surprising, this quick and dirty study supports much of what we can plainly see by quantifing our qualitative intuitions. We could already tell that Hamilton instead of Hunter has turned out to be a bad exchange. WAR gives us an inkling of how bad. We could already see that Pujols, Callaspo and Aybar aren't as good as they were last year. WAR gives us some purchase on the extent of those declines.

In some respects, though, we're finding WAR quite hard to believe. WAR tells us that Trout is -1.3 defensively in 2013. Really? This season, the Angels are 10th in American League ERA by starters at 4.43, compared with fifth last year at 4.04. But WAR would have us believe that they get better starts this season. According to WAR, the Angels are a couple of wins better behind the plate this year. That isn't obvious.

WAR certainly is a salty concoction. It makes our discussions, like our food, tastier and more interesting, in the right amounts. In excess, it causes thirst, bloating, high blood pressure and weakening of the bones (osteoporosis), which might also characterize a good many baseball arguments that take WAR as gospel. Perhaps, WAR should be taken with a grain of salt. Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t use it. But it’s not a good main course.

Grounding one out: Angels 7, Seattle 1

Some are saying the Angels' 7-1 win against Seattle in Anaheim Thursday demonstrates that they are exploding offensively. Really, though, the Angels just took what Seattle gave them, which was practically every ground ball they hit.

C.J. Wilson pitched another beauty for the Angels Thursday, and finally won one of them (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike Generic 3.0 license).

By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

The game: May 22, Seattle at Angels, American League. Seattle entered the game 20-26, third place AL West, nine games behind Texas. The Angels entered the game 18-27, fourth place AL West, 10 1/2 games behind Texas.

The pitchers: Seattle, Brandon Maurer, right hander (2-5, 5.75). Angels, C.J. Wilson, left hander (3-3, 3.72).

The result: Angels 7, Seattle 1 (Baseball-reference box score).

Summary: The Angels swept their two-game series against Seattle by the continuation of trends that preceded it -- strong Angels hitting and weak Seattle pitching (and defense). Cumulative score over the two games: Angels 19, Seattle 1. The Angels have won four games in a row.

The pitching: Angels starter C.J. Wilson had lost his two most recent starts, despite pitching well, because, in each instance, his own hitters were overmatched by Chicago left hander Chris Sale. Against the considerably less formidable Brandon Maurer, Wilson received considerably more offensive support, and Wilson fed off of it. Wilson retired the Mariners in order in the second, fourth and seventh innings. In the third, fifth and sixth innings, Wilson retired the first two hitters before the Mariners put someone on, only for Wilson to retire the next batter and finish the frame. Through seven innings, Wilson struck out eight and walked one, despite throwing only 89 pitches ... He briefly lost control in the eighth, when he walked leadoff hitter Brendan Ryan, then threw a wild pitch, which, combined with a throwing error by catcher Hank Conger, placed Ryan on third. A ground ball plated Ryan with Seattle's only run, then Wilson ended his night characteristically, picking up his tenth strikeout of the game to set down Justin Smoak and finish the eighth inning ...

Seattle starter Brandon Maurer, who went to high school at Orange County Lutheran, fell behind, 5-0, before he could get three hitters out and eeked out three innings. But don't blame Maurer, who would have been out of that inning without damage if he had decent infield play behind him ... His replacement, Charlie Furbush, struck out three in three innings, tossing 23 strikes out of 27 pitches. But the game was all but over by the time he entered to start the fourth inning ...

The hitting: Is the Angels hitting really surging? Or is the Seattle pitching and defense really tanking? The Angels have scored 37 runs in their last four games, while Seattle has allowed 35 runs in its last four games ... We're going with the latter, because the Angels received a lot of help from the Seattle infielders -- and the official scorer at Angel Stadium. In the first inning, hits by Albert Pujols and Mark Trumbo were easily playable by Seattle infielders, and the inning stayed alive because the Mariners muffed a double-play ball and could only get a force at second. In the second inning, Mark Trumbo's infield single was a ground out that received a favor (see below, "The fielding") ... Of the six hits the Angels put together in the first inning, the worst count on any of those was 2-2. Four of the hits came with hitters ahead in the count, and Mark Trumbo hit his single on the first pitch ... First-pitch hitting is quite Trumbo’s style this year, when he is 14-for-33 (.424) with five homers on that first offering. For his career, Trumbo is hitting .323 (52-for-161) with 15 homers on the first pitch, .367 (97-for-264) with 19 homers when he is ahead in the count, .277 (133-for-480) with 33 homers when the count is even, and .196 (106-for-540) with 19 homers when he is behind in the count ...

Mike Trout hit for the cycle Wednesday night in the Angels' 12-0 win against the Mariners, becoming the sixth youngest player ever to cycle at 21 years and 288 days. The Angels attributed the following to ESPN Stats & Info: Trout became only the third player in history to cycle, drive in five runs and steal a base in the same game, and the first since 1932. The others were Babe Herman with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1931 and Tony Lazzeri with the New York Yankees in 1932 ... Thursday, Trout was two-for-four with two runs. The Angels are 15-9 when Trout scores and 4-18 when he doesn't ... Since April 29, when the Angels lost, 10-8, in 19 innings at Oakland, Trout is batting .359 (28-for-78) with five doubles, four triples, seven homers and 22 RBI in 21 games ... When Albert Pujols scored in the first inning, it put him at 1,400 runs in his career, 90th on the all-time list ... Pujols appears to be waking up at the plate, with five multi-hit games in his last eight. His average in those games is .333, bringing his average for the season up to .253 ...

The base running: In a game like this for the Angels, the manager need only fill out the lineup card and let them play ... Erick Aybar led off the first inning with a walk for the Angels, then got thrown out trying to steal, and the Angels still scored five runs in the frame ... With all the infield hits for the Angels, this game was a simple matter of station-to-station base running ...

The fielding: Wednesday's performance by Seattle infielders had to be among the worst in Major League Baseball this season ... In the first inning, Albert Pujols singled on a popup that really should have been caught by Seattle second baseman Dustin Ackley. Next, Mark Trumbo hit a ball to the hole between short and third. Mariners shortstop Brendan Ryan, who usually is a sure hand, had the ball in his glove and dropped it. Two hitters later, Howie Kendrick hit a tailor-made double-play ball to Ackley, who dropped it, and the Mariners could only get a force at second. In the second inning, Mark Trumbo's ground ball to third baseman Robert Andino found a glove, then lost it ... No errors scored in any of that ... The Angels defense came frayed late in the game. Angels left fielder J.B. Shuck appeared to get at least slightly lost on a Kendrys Morales double, which dropped to Shuck's right. In the ninth, Angels shortstop Erick Aybar dropped a pop-up fly in short left field by Brendan Ryan ...

Strategic moves: The Angels were good enough in this game, but they were even luckier enough. Luck isn't what you would call a strategy, but the Angels didn't generally push their luck, and that is a strategy. They just put the ball in play and let the Mariners drop it ... Try putting this together: The Mariners are 15-10 when Jesus Montero is their starting catcher, and 5-17 when he isn't. Yet, Montero is having a terrible season, batting .208, dropping pitches and throwing out only one out of 24 runners who have attempted stolen bases against him. By at least one report, the Mariners are about to send him down ...

What now: The Angels improved to 19-27, still fourth in the AL West and 10 1/2 games behind Texas. But they are breathing heavily on Seattle, which is the third-place team in the AL West at 20-27, 10 games down ... The Angels now go to Kansas City, which is really flagging since winning two of three in Anaheim May 13-15. Since then, the Royals have lost five of six, scoring one run in three of those losses. They just lost two out of three at Houston ... Friday night's series opener (5:10 p.m. PDT) illustrates a real twist of fate for the Angels, who decided that their rotation would be better off if it included Joe Blanton and didn’t include Ervin Santana. The right hander Blanton (0-7, 6.62) will take the ball for the Angels against the right hander Santana (3-3, 2.77) for the Royals.

One baseball season, three distinctive Dodger teams

This fragmented 2012 season has given us not one Dodgers team, but three. The third, which is before us today, is, by far, the most talented. The first Dodgers team this season was the most successful on the field. The second? Glad to see 'em go.

By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

The 2012 Dodgers season, with two weeks remaining, breaks down into three distinct seasons, due largely to major events that have changed the team's composition throughout 2012. We can think of the 2012 Dodgers, therefore, almost as three distinctive teams.

The third Dodgers team of 2012, the team playing before us now, is unquestionably the best of the three in terms of raw major league firepower, even if a lot of it is on the disabled list. However, in terms of results on the field, this third Dodgers team runs well behind the first Dodgers team of 2012, which fought through injuries to win behind the awesome feats of Matt Kemp and a group of old players who prevailed by presence of mind. Sadly, that group gave way to the second Dodgers of 2012, broken by injuries and a lost step here and there as the older players lost their spring. The system had no one to step in and the general lack of ready players was exposed by the requirements of staying on top. So, on came the third Dodgers, from well outside of the organization.

For the purposes of clarity, we'll refer to the Dodgers until May 28, the day Kemp came off the disabled list the first time, as the first Dodgers. To that point, the Dodgers were 32-15, cruising along with the best record in the game. They even survived a couple weeks without Kemp as hitters like A.J. Ellis and Andre Ethier -- and who can forget Bobby Abreu? -- picked up the slack. The first Dodgers were 21-6 in games started by opposing right handers.

However, that week of May 28 brought some ill portents, and the second Dodgers came with them. Kemp didn't last the week before going back on the disabled list. Milwaukee came to Dodger Stadium and swept four games. Dodgers manager Don Mattingly went away from his effective lineup against right-handed starters. Later, bats slowed down throughout the lineup and the club put on displays of remarkable offensive listlessness, such as being no-hit by six pitchers in Seattle and going an entire three-game series in San Francisco without scoring a run. This second version of the 2012 Dodgers was 21-30. The second Dodgers inherited a 7 1/2 game lead in the NL West. When the second Dodgers handed off to the third Dodgers, the Dodgers were 2 1/2 down in the NL West, a net loss of ten games on the division lead.

The hand-off occurred on July 25, when the new Dodgers ownership made its first imprint on the team by picking up Hanley Ramirez from the Florida Marlins. The Dodgers were willing to take on the remaining $38 million of Ramirez' contract through 2014. Since then, we've seen all the other deals, including the blockbuster with Boston. To improve their dying club, the Dodgers went on a $300 million shopping spree in the middle of the season.

And the Dodgers did improve their club. They just didn't improve enough to take the National League by storm. The Dodgers were 53-45 when they acquired Ramirez. So, they had a good record. But they did not have a good team. Indeed, by the end of July, the Dodgers were so far from being a good team that adding $20 million to the payroll for August and September wasn't enough to make them good in 2012. Fortunately, these trades are about way more than 2012.

Thus, this third iteration of the Dodgers is 23-25. It doesn't sound like much, but we have to remember that the second iteration of the Dodgers was truly terrible, a predictable outcome of the first iteration, which was an aging group playing over its head. There's a lot to be said for playing over one's head. Whatever that is, it certainly can't be said about the Dodgers in front of us right now. The third iteration of the Dodgers plainly lacks the magic of the first iteration. But the third iteration has something the first iteration doesn't. It has 2013. And something else. Real depth in the batting order, when it all comes together.

No one expected anything from the Dodgers this season. Then, the team came out of the gate so well that everyone forgot that they expected nothing from the Dodgers, and they especially forgot why. The way Kemp was swinging the bat, who could think about anything else? At the end of May, it seemed the Dodgers couldn't fail to win 90 games this year.

Now, with 15 games remaining, 90 wins is all but a mathematical impossibility. By the end of June, we remembered again that we expected nothing from the Dodgers, and why. And here we have to give the new Dodgers owners credit. They saw this light hitting club going flaccid, they saw the injuries on the pitching staff and they dug deep to add players.

We might say that all the improvements for the third Dodgers are for naught if they are only 23-25, but a mix like this isn't going to express itself in 50 games, and the Dodgers still have a chance in the next 15 games, anyway, however slight it is now that Clayton Kershaw is out indefinitely with hip problems. Either way, imagine where the Dodgers would be right now without the improvements.

The Dodgers are better. It's just not obvious enough how they are better. Some of the improvements are lost in the shuffle. For example, the Dodgers brought in Ramirez partly so they could back off on Dee Gordon as the everyday shortstop. And Ramirez has given the offense a jolt. If, at times, it seems that Ramirez doesn't flake out any less than Gordon, he has produced an .809 OPS and he scores or drives in a run per game. But since Ramirez arrived, Kemp has a .700 OPS. Kemp has almost become Dee Gordon, though he is few doubles better than Gordon's .562 OPS this year.

Adrian Gonzalez has disappointed since he arrived from Boston, but he's still miles more productive at first base than James Loney, who went the other way in that deal. Gonzalez has a .659 OPS with the Dodgers. Terrible. But Loney was only at .646. Gonzalez has driven in a run about every five at-bats for the Dodgers, while Loney drove in a run only ten at-bats for them this year.

The definitive truth about the third iteration of the Dodgers, the ones in front of us right now, is that they have two great hitters in Kemp and Gonzalez who are struggling. But we've seen how Kemp can carry the Dodgers when he is hot. And Gonzalez is a 100-RBI man even this year, which is his worst since he became an everyday player.

The Dodgers have 15 games remaining. They're only a game out of the second wild card. It's not everything the Dodgers would have wanted at the end of July, but it's a lot more than they would have without the improvements. And it is, by far, a better lineup than they had at the end of July, or at the end of any month before then. The group just isn't hitting. That can happen to any team for a month. Problem is, it's been happening to the Dodgers since the beginning of June.

The Los Angeles Times noted the other day that what this new group of Dodgers really needs is spring training. Point taken, but we would add that what the Dodgers are going through now ultimately will surpass the value of spring training.

During this past offseason, the Angels made big moves, signing Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson to $317 million worth of contracts. So, this new Angels team went to spring training this year with a fresh start. And that start, we remember, was terrible. In April, the Angels had a better team than the Dodgers, and they also had a worse start. Now, in September, the Angels are finishing better, but the Dodgers still are in a more favorable playoff position.

Might the Angels have started better this year if they had a futile piece of last season together that they could have stewed upon? Just wondering. One imagines that Dodgers players are a little embarrassed that the last few weeks have gone down like they have after ownership did its part. As one watches this hastily assembled All-Star cast struggle at Dodger Stadium, one expects that players will talk next spring about a fresh start and unfinished business, all at the same time. Fresh starts aren't everything they're cracked up to be. There's a bit to be said for in sports for payback, vindication, whatever you will.

But we really ought to not speak of payback and vindication next year until we know more specifically what's being paid back and what's being vindicated from this year. And we still have 15 games this year to find out. Maybe more.

Angels going great, but others are just as good

Since falling to 62-60 on Aug. 19 and all but eliminating themselves from the playoff race, the Angels are 18-7. And it has been barely enough to keep them alive, because Oakland and Baltimore have been as good or better. Now, the Angels are righted with about two weeks left, but Baltimore has a clear schedule advantage for the second wild card.

By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

When last we left the Angels four weeks ago, they had suffered three weeks of unfathomably poor pitching, lost 13 of 18 and fell from wild card leader only two games down in the AL West to 62-60 and 4 1/2 games short of any playoff spot.

With 12 of their next 15 coming on the road, including a series each at playoff contenders Detroit and Oakland, the obituaries were being written for the Angels when they began that run on Aug. 21.

Since then, the Angels are playing about as well as anyone in the game, 18-7, including 11-4 on the road. And they've needed every bit of it. If the Angels were 15-10, we would be saying it's too little too late. The Angels would be about six games down for the second wild card with three teams to jump. As it is, they are 2 1/2 behind Baltimore for the second wild card, and no one stands between them.

One has to love how the Angels are playing while also lamenting that it hasn't helped very much. Often enough, a club goes on a hot streak and some feeble nemesis helps out by going on a cold streak. But it doesn't go like that for the Angels.

All the clubs the Angels are or would be trying to catch are as hot as they are, including AL West leader Texas (17-9), first wild card leader Oakland (19-7) and second wild card leader Baltimore (16-9). Thus, for going 18-7, the Angels have only gained 1 1/2 games in the AL West (they are down 7 1/2 games now), they have gained only one game on the first wild card (they are down 4 1/2 games) and they have gained two games on the second wild card (they are down 2 1/2 games).

But the good news runs deeper for the Angels, because they now have their starting rotation back in order, making those wins possible. Since Aug. 19, Zack Greinke has a 1.70 ERA, eating 37 innings with his five starts. Since then, Dan Haren has a 2.35 ERA in five starts covering 30 2/3 innings. Jered Weaver has a 2.73 ERA in four starts. Ervin Santana has a 3.00 ERA in five starts. The worst of the lot is C.J. Wilson, who has a 4.40 ERA in his last five starts, but the Angels have won all five of those starts.

And, again, the Angels will need all of it to stay in the race to the end, because outside factors are not in their favor. It seems they never are this year.

The Angels play three at home this week against the Texas Rangers, then three at home against the Chicago White Sox. That’s two division leaders. Baltimore, the team the Angels are trying to catch, stays on the road this week for three at Seattle and three at Boston. That’s two teams that are playing out the string. Next week, the Orioles go home for four against Toronto and three against Boston. The Angels start next week at home against Seattle, then they go to Texas for three.

Remember, the Angels need to gain 2 ½ games on the Orioles, basically in the next two weeks. Those schedules are not promising. The Orioles will close out their season with three at Tampa Bay, while the Angels will close with three at Seattle. But it’s hard to believe the Angels will be in striking distance as the last series begins.

The playoff race is shaping up as something of a hard luck story for the Angels. The moment they went to the trouble to trade for Greinke, the pitching rotation tanked. Then, the Angels righted themselves and went on a roll, but everyone they needed to catch matched them practically win for win since Aug. 20. So, now the Angels have crawled into view of the playoffs, but that view is obstructed by Baltimore’s very easy schedule.

Wait ‘til next year for the Angels? Probably, but with all the talent they’ve put together, we’ve still got two interesting weeks of this year. This club still has a chance. It just isn’t a very good one, unless Baltimore unaccountably collapses.

Angels starters sputter through August

On paper, and often on the field, the Angels have featured one of the best starting rotations in baseball, from the back to the front. Now, all of a sudden, their veteran starting superstars are falling behind hitters. The Angels have 40 games to climb into the wild-card playoff, but the next 15 are critical.

By BILL PETERSON
Big Leagues in Los Angeles

Less than a week after the non-waiver trading deadline, the Angels had all of the baseball world thinking they were about as good as it gets. And they were.

The Angels were, and remain, a club with jolting offensive capacity, very good defense and a starting rotation of front-line talent.

But there was something about the Angels that gave pause going back into July. Because the Texas Rangers are so strong atop the AL West, the Angels were going to the playoffs as a wild-card team, meaning as a road team. And July taught the Angels that they would not succeed that way. They lost three of four at Detroit, two of three at New York, then two of three at home against Tampa Bay.

To succeed in the playoffs, the Angels knew they needed another piece, so they added Zack Greinke. We think they overpaid for Greinke because a wild-card playoff position isn't worth the talent they gave up. However, we totally understand the serious motivation for bringing in Greinke. This organization is trying hard to win.

The next big indicator of road warring would be a four-game series at Texas July 30-August 2. The Angels won the first two. Good sign. And at the end of business on July 31, they were 57-47, a mere two games out of first place in the American League West. This space said right as the series started that the Angels had no chance of catching Texas. But after winning those first two games, the Angels could have left Arlington tied for first place.

What has happened to the Angels since Aug. 1 almost defies any possibility that it could have been predicted. Veteran pitchers who know how to pitch and who have been top-level producers suddenly are falling behind hitters. The manager, Mike Scioscia, says the pitchers aren't "controlling counts."

Since that high point of their season, the Angels now have lost 13 of their last 18, falling all the way to nine games behind the Rangers. Indeed, the Angels also have fallen beneath the Oakland Athletics in the division and the wild card race, where the Angels led at that high point. But they now have dropped also behind Detroit, Tampa Bay and Baltimore and they must now make up 4 1/2 games just to nudge into the second wild card.

In August, C.J. Wilson is 0-2 in four starts, allowing 24 runs (20 earned) in 21 2/3 innings. Opposing hitters are torching him for a .326 batting average and a .972 OPS. In August, Dan Haren is 0-2 in three starts, allowing 13 runs (11 earned) in 13 innings. Against 61 batters in August, Haren has allowed four homers. In August, Greinke is 1-1 in four starts, but he has allowed 20 runs (all earned) in 25 innings, allowing a .316 batting average and an .892 OPS.

Even the great Jered Weaver has kicked in a bad start, giving up nine runs in three innings on Aug. 17 against Tampa Bay. Oddly, the only reliable Angels starter in August is Ervin Santana, who is 1-0 three starts with 19.1 innings, a 3.26 ERA, and a .192 OBA.

Haren has struggled all year with a bad back. Wilson's trouble is more recent, as is Greinke's. On the whole, then, the collapse of the Angels' starting rotation is a very new development. Perhaps, also, it is to be short-lived.

But it can't live for any longer if the Angels are to remain serious contenders. They now face 12 of their next 15 on the road, including trips to Detroit and Oakland for wild-card scraps. One hates to think of the Angels pitchers, with their recent failures, taking on the green monster in Fenway Park, but that's the task, Tuesday through Thursday.

If these starting pitchers don't come around right now, the Angels are going to bury themselves in a hurry. Kind of a strange ultimatum for a pitching staff that has always been four deep in quality pitchers (if not quality results), then added a fifth.

Of all that might have side-tracked the Angels this year, is it going to end up being big-salaried starting pitchers losing track of the strike zone and throwing up home runs? Sadly, we might soon find out.