chrisisbuck#2

This year, the Angels decided to stay quiet at the trade deadline. Last season, we all know they acquired Mark Teixera, and in the end, it turned out to be a bogus move, as we exited in the first round then we couldn't resign him in the offseason. Maybe without signing that big name this year, we can sneak into the playoffs and not have a huge target on our back (As I think we would had we landed Halladay). Last season, we were the best team in baseball, clearly had the best team, and cruised to the playoffs without having played a meaningful game in 2 months. And it came back to bite us. This season, that won't happen. Not making a move was probably for the better.

While it has been a disappointing start to the season, I could see this coming from a mile away. Before the season started we had our 3 best pitchers on the DL, and we had to call up many minor leaguers who had no major league experience. It showed through their first couple of starts, but now they have pitched a few games and seem to be okay. The problem lies with the bullpen, as it is ranked LAST in all of baseball. Brian Fuentes has struggled mightily as the new closer on a bigger stage than Colorado. He is very wild most of the time and always has trouble when he pitches. Scot Shields has been very inconsistent and wild all the time. He needs to figure out what is wrong then fix it. These two guys are very important to this team's success, and when they struggle, the team will too (just look at the season so far). The offense has been very good so far. Torii Hunter is off to a fast start and Abreu has been well worth the money so far. GMJ has played very well since Vlad went on the DL. Howie Kendrick seems to have found his stroke after a little slump and Mike Napoli is starting to hit the ball well. Things look good on the offensive side, it's just up to the bullpen to get everything in order.

When Santana and Lackey get back at the end of the week, that will be a big morale booster for the team. When they get back and are totally healthy, that will affect the bullpen positively. These two will go 6 and 7 innings everytime they take the mound. That will take a lot of the workload off the bullpen which could help settle them down.

I still like this team to win the AL West. The division is not strong at all, and there are still 139 games to play. The season is so long. It has been a very frusturating start. This team should easily be over .500 right now, but bullpen struggles have caused that not to happen. I trust Mike Scoscia to get this turned around very quickly. He's one of the best managers in baseball.

Go Angels!