Since I’m nowhere near Anaheim and don’t know - what do the Angels plan to do with the 2 first basemen they already have? Move Trumbo to OF? Give up on Morales?
As great as Albert is, this is a deal that could turn out really badly for the Angels.
If I were Anaheim I’d trade Trumbo, who I don’t think is really all that good a hitter and is probably now as valuable as he’ll ever be. He looks to me like Ron Kittle 2.0.
I’ve been thinking the Angels are expecting very little from Morales.
Get ready, in a few years, for sports columns talking about how the Angels have an “Albertross” around their neck. 
This contract is likely, in terms of its value, to look less like 10 years for $250 million than like 5 years for $200 million, followed by 5 years for $50 million. Signing a top-level free agent these days, especially one on the wrong side of 30, almost seems to require that the team effectively provide a huge pension for the player’s declining years that is largely a reward for past performance rather than actual value in the age-36+ period.
Moving Trumbo to the OF doesn’t make sense - right now by my count the Angels already have five OF/DH types in Hunter, Abreu, Wells, Bourjos and Trout.
Are they going to keep Abreu?
The co-owner of Pujols’ restaurant was on the radio today trying to defend Albert’s decision, he said that when all the details of the new contract come out it will be closer to 300-mil. FWIW
OK, so hearing that James Loney was arrested for DUI does not give me good vibes about the Dodgers’ pending season.
I thought that Abreu’s option had vested. I will admit I’m not positive.
According to Baseball-Reference, the option “vests with 550 PA in 2011 or 1,110 PA in 2010-2011”. Abreu got 585 PA in 2011, so it should be vested (at $9 million with a $1 million buyout).
According to a report on ESPN, NL MVP Ryan Braun has tested positive for a PED. He is disputing the finding, but faces a 50-game ban if it’s upheld.
Talk about your badly timed announcements. Ryan Braun’s MVP Award will now have a gigantic asterisk beside it in the minds of every baseball fan on the planet.
If this is the real deal, Braun is one hell of a colossal idiot. The testing is catching people. It’s just not worth it.
I’m very curious to hear what his “extenuating circumstances” are going to turn out to be. He doesn’t seem to be denying that he had PED in his system so much as he’s saying that there was a good reason for them to be there.
Certainly not a guy you watch and think he’s on steroids. Is there any legitimate reason to test positive for synthetic testosterone?
Something to do with his contract, getting the MVP award, and, oh yes, winning ballgames. Those extenuating enough for ya?
Somehow I don’t think he’ll present that defense.
Actually, it’s probably a bad sign that he seems to be presenting no defense at all. I know there’s an arbitration process, but I can’t help but think if he were legitimately innocent of the charge, he’d be screaming it from the rooftops and presenting the evidence his camp has implied he has.
Instead, he’s gone to ground. Maybe they’re working on the text of the apology.
You would think at some point people would stop believing they can tell who took steroids by looks, but that doesn’t appear to be the case. If anything the response to Braun’s failed test has been amazingly muted. Braun doesn’t look like he took steroids and is likeable (and possibly white), so people don’t care that much that he did. Compare that the case that has kept Jeff Bagwell out of the hall of fame thus far.
In actual baseball news various reports are saying that the Blue Jays have won the bidding on Yu Darvish, but nothing official yet. If the Blue Jays end up signing him and/or Fielder that is going to be one loaded division. And with the Angels and Rangers both stacked out west there might only be one team out of the east that makes the postseason, assuming that baseball leaves the 1 WC system in place one more year.
Uh yeah, the stereotype of the muscle-bound steroid abuser exists for no reason at all. :rolleyes: Certainly in baseball we’ve never seen any players suddenly bulk up. Most definitely no likable, white players.
I think Bagwell has the numbers to go in the hall, but the skepticism doesn’t exist because he was muscular, but rather that he was a skinny rookie who turned into Popeye.
Speaking of steroids…
I’m not quite sure this qualifies as “off-season” news, but Barry Bonds has avoided a jail sentence.