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Angels Outslug Yankees 10-5

June 22, 2017

The Angels rallied for four runs in the 7th inning on Thursday night, defeating the Yankees 10-5 at Yankee Stadium. The Halos took two out of three games from New York.

That 7th inning featured three errors and two wild pitches by the Yankees. Albert Pujols delivered a run-scoring single that gave the Angels the lead for good, scoring Cameron Maybin.

Maybin also lead off the game with a home run against Luis Severino, who took the loss and fell to 5-3 on the season. Maybin stole his AL-high 22nd base, and scored three times. He has safely reached in a career-high 26 straight games.

Yusmeiro Petit (2-0) threw two perfect innings in relief of starter Jesse Chavez to get the win. The Angels trailed 5-1 before scoring nine unanswered runs.

“You get knocked down,” Maybin said, “but we don’t get knocked out.”

Aaron Judge connected on a three-run homer that was his major league-leading 25th home run of the season.

The Angels are back at .500 with a record of 38-38. They are 1.5 games out of the 2nd and final AL Wild Card spot.

Alex Meyer (3-3, 3.52 ERA) will get the start on Friday as the Angels open up a 3-game series with the Red Sox at Fenway Park. Rick Porcello (3-9, 5.05 ERA) gets the ball for the Sox.

Kings & Ducks Lose D-Men in Expansion Draft

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June 21, 2017

The Kings and Ducks both lost defenseman in the NHL Expansion Draft on Wednesday night. The Las Vegas Golden Knights selected Brayden McNabb from the Kings, and Clayton Stoner from the Ducks.

In addition, the Ducks traded defenseman Shea Theodore to Las Vegas, and in exchange, the Golden Knights agreed not to select Ducks defenseman Sami Vatanen or Josh Manson.

Under the Expansion Draft rules, Las Vegas was required to select at least one player from each of the 32 NHL clubs. However, since some teams had trouble deciding which players they wanted to protect from selection, they made trades with Vegas, like the Ducks did, sending them additional players so other unprotected players could not be selected.

In the case of the Ducks, they were forced to leave talented defenseman Vatanen and Manson unprotected, caused by having several players on their team with no-movement clauses, which forced them to protect those players.

Stoner was injured for much of last season, and carried a cap hit of $3.25 million. That’s a big win for Anaheim. However, Theodore was a promising young defenseman that needed to be traded in order to prevent the loss of two very talented young defenseman.

In the case of the Kings, there were several players who were candidates to be selected by Vegas such as forward Trevor Lewis, Kyle Clifford, Nic Dowd, and possibly even Dustin Brown. However, the Golden Knights chose the young, hard-hitting defenseman McNabb.

The loss of McNabb gives the Kings an additional $1.8 million under the salary cap. Although the Kings can bear the loss of McNabb’s talent, they were likely hoping a higher salaried player like Brown would be taken.

Dodgers Stay Hot & Beat Mets

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June 21, 2017

Yasiel Puig hit a three-run homer and Yasmani Grandal hit a pair of homers as the Dodgers crushed the Mets 8-2 on Wednesday night at Chavez Ravine.

Rich Hill (4-3) got the win after pitching five strong innings. Hill gave up just one run on four hits, while striking out eight Mets. His 98-pitch performance was one of his best of the season.

The Dodgers have won six in a row, and twelve of their last thirteen games. They also moved into 1st place by .5 games over Colorado, who lost to Arizona.

Puig’s 4th inning homer came off of Tyler Pill. When Puig rounded first base, he angered Mets 1st baseman Wilmer Flores, The two exchanged words, and Puig looked back at him while heading toward second base, continuing the verbal exchange.

“I don’t think he knows what having respect for the game is,” Flores said. “We’re playing horrible right now. He disrespected us.”

Hill’s only blemish was a leadoff solo homer by Curtis Granderson. The Mets loaded the based on the 4th inning with nobody out, but Hill struck out the next three batters to get out of the jam.

The Dodgers have hit 12 home runs in the first three games of this four-game series. They’ve also outscored the Mets 30-8 over that three-game stretch.

Pill (0-3) yielded six runs and five hits in six innings. He walked three and struck out six in his third career start.

The Dodgers will go for the sweep tomorrow night at the Ravine. Hyun-Jin Ryu (3-6, 4.35 ERA) will be on the mound for LA looking for his 2nd straight win. Steve Matz (1-1, 3.21 ERA) makes this third start of the season for New York.

Yankees Double Up Angels 8-4

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June 21, 2017

Didi Gregorius and Matt Holiday each hit home runs, as the Yankees beat the Angels 8-4 on Wednesday night in Yankee Stadium. The Yankees snapped a 7-game losing skid.

Angel starter Ricky Nolasco was roughed up again, falling to 2-9 on the season. Nolasco went 5 1/3 innings, giving up five runs on seven hits, including two home runs.

After the Angels fell behind 2-0, Martin Maldonado tied the game with a 2-run shot in the 2nd inning, with Andrelton Simmons aboard. That came off of Yankee starter Jordan Montgomery.

Montgomery improved to 5-4 on the season, giving up two runs on five hits in 5 2/3 innings.

Maldonado tacked on another meaningless two-run homer in the 9th inning, pulling the Halos within 8-4, but that’s as close as they would come.

After Holiday’s home run gave the Yankees a 3-2 lead, New York would add two more runs in the sixth, and two more in the 7th to put the game out of reach.

Angels reliever Mike Morin came out of the bullpen to pitch 1 2/3 innings. He gave up three runs on five hits during that stretch.

The Angels and Yankees will do it again on Thursday, in the rubber game of the three-game set. Jesse Chavez (5-7, 4.85 ERA) is on the hill for the Halos. Luis Severino (5-2, 2.99 ERA) goes for New York.

Lakers Trade Russell & Mozgov To Nets

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June 20, 2017

The Lakers have traded D’Angelo Russell and Timofey Mozgov to the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for Brook Lopez and the 27th pick in Thursday’s NBA draft.

The move was largely driven by salary cap savings from the Lakers’ perspective. LA opens up an additional $22 million in cap space for the summer of 2018, and a total of nearly $60 million that will allow them to offer two max contracts.

It just so happens that the summer of 2018 free class is expected to include Lebron James, Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and DeMarcus Cousins.

Lopez will be entering the final year of his contract that will pay him just over $22 million in 2017-2018. The 7’0 center was an all-star in 2013, and averaged 20.5 points and 5.4 rebounds for the Nets last season. He also led the NBA in three-point attempts by centers, while making a reasonable 34% of them.

Moving Mozgov was the most significant part of the deal, after he signed a 4-year $64 million contract last summer. He fell out of the Laker rotation midway through the season. However, it was Russell who was a casualty of getting rid of Mozgov’s contract.

Russell was selected #2 overall in the draft by the Lakers two years ago. He averaged 15.6 points and 4.8 assists in 63 games.

It was an up and down two years for the 21-year-old. During his rookie year he video taped his teammate Nick Young admitting that he cheated on his then current fiancee, Iggy Azalea. That video was somehow released onto social media, causing a rift between Russell and his teammates.

This past season he was the team’s starting point, but went down with a knee injury in December, causing him to miss 12 games He was removed from the starting lineup for three games in March. Upon his return, he scored a career-high 40 points against the Cleveland Cavaliers. He had a strong statistical finish to the season, while starting at shooting guard.

The Lakers continue to be engaged in talks for Paul George according to multiple sources. However, it appears likely that they will keep the #2 overall pick for this Thursday’s draft and select UCLA’s Lonzo Ball with it.

Corey Seager Hits 3 Homers In Dodger Win

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June 20, 2017

Corey Seager hit three homers as the Dodgers defeated the Mets 12-0 on Tuesday night at Chavez Ravine.

It was the second time in Seager’s career that he’s hit three homers in a game. The Dodgers hit five home runs against the Mets on Tuesday night.

Cody Bellinger and Yasmani Grandal also hit homers for the Boys in Blue. Bellinger now leads the NL with 22 homers. He has 10 homers in his last 10 games. Seager finished the night with 6 RBI.

“We’re having a great time,” Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts said. “As much as we’re excited for Cody, we’re playing very good baseball and ready to go tomorrow.”

Brandon McCarthy started for LA, improving to 6-3 on the season. He pitched six shutout innings, allowing just four hits. Brock Stewart earned his first career save with three hitless innings.

“Hitting is contagious,” Seager said. “Everyone’s starting to roll. When one guy starts going — a guy like Bellinger comes in — everyone’s excited, everyone wants to get on base, everyone wants to be the guy.”

Rookie Robert Gsellman (5-5) gave up four homers and eight runs over 4 1/3 innings.

The Dodgers have won nine of their last 10 games, but still trail the 1st place Rockies by .5 games in the NL West. LA also has the best run differential in baseball at +114.

The Dodgers and Mets will go at it again tomorrow at the Ravine. Rich Hill (3-3, 5.14 ERA) will try to rebound from last week’s poor start for LA. Tyler Pill (0-2, 3.75 ERA) gets his third career start for the Mets.

Angels Top Yankees 8-3

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June 20, 2017

Cameron Maybin hit a tie-breaking solo homer in the 7th inning, as the Angels took down the Yankees 8-3 on Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium.

Maybin’s homer was part of a three-run 7th, which also included a Yunel Escobar RBI triple, and an RBI single from Luis Valbuena.

The three runs came against Yankees’ reliever Tyler Clippard, who took the loss and fell to 1-4 on the season.

The Halos would put the game out of reach with some insurance runs in the 8th and 9th inning. Maybin delivered an infield single, scoring Martin Maldonado. Luis Valubena hit a solo shot in the 9th.

Blake Parker (3-2) got credit for the win after coming in to pitch the 6th inning. He gave up a solo homer to Gary Sanchez that tied the game at 3-3.

The Angels took a 3-0 lead behind an Albert Pujols RBI single, and RBI double from Danny Espinosa, and a run-scoring single from Kole Calhoun.

The Yankees rallied against Halos’ starter Parker Bridwell, who allowed a sacrifice fly from Chase Headley in the 4th, followed by Aaron Judge’s 24th homer of the season in the 5th.

Bridwell went five innings, giving up two runs on on two hits, striking out three and walking five. He made 95 pitches.

The Angels moved back to .500, while the Yankees have now lost seven straight games.

Game 2 of the series will be tomorrow night in the Big Apple. Ricky Nolasco (2-8, 5.01 ERA) starts for the Angels. Jordan Montgomery (4-4, 3.78 ERA) goes for the Yankees.

Bellinger With 2 More Homers vs NY

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June 19, 2017

Cody Bellinger hit two homers and Clayton Kershaw became the MLB’s first 10-game winner this season as the Dodgers defeated the Mets 10-6 on Monday night at Chavez Ravine.

Bellinger connected on a three-run homer in the 1st inning, and a solo blast in the 2nd, which opened up a 7-0 lead for the Dodgers. He had four RBI on the night.

The Dodgers rookie now has 21 homers in his first 51 games, which is the best mark of all-time in the first 51 games for any MLB player. He now leads the league in home runs.

Justin Turner had an RBI single in the 1st inning inning, and had a solo blast in the 2nd inning. Turner and Bellinger’s 2nd inning long balls were back-to-back. Turner had four hits and four RBI.

Kershaw improved to 10-2 on the season, but had an unusually rough outing. He gave up six runs on six hits in 6 1/3 innings. He gave up four home runs on the night.

The Mets got two home runs from Jose Reyes, and one from Jay Bruce and Gavin Cecchini.

The Dodgers would add two more runs in the 7th inning on an RBI single from Chase Utley, and a solo homer from Chris Taylor.

Grant Dayton and Chris Hatcher pitched the final 2 2/3 innings, giving up just two hits over that stretch.

Zack Wheeler (3-5) took the loss, giving up seven runs on eight hits. He lasted just two innings, allowing the three homers to Bellinger and Turner.

The Dodgers and Mets will be back at it on Tuesday night at the Ravine. Brandon McCarthy (5-3, 3.14 ERA) will be on the mound for LA. Robert Gsellman (5-4, 5.50 ERA) goes for New York.

Monday Morning Coffee

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June 19, 2017

Now that the Warriors have won the title and assembled what’s going to be a tyrannical dynasty for the next five years, NBA super teams are about to go to a whole new level. This starts and ends with whatever Lebron James decides. Rumors are swirling that he’s going to leave the Cavs in 2018 to join either the Lakers or Clippers. Lebron has clearly expressed an interest in playing with his banana boating buddies before his career ends, but ultimately, he needs to decide if playing with his buddies and living in a better city is more comfortable, or winning championships. Lebron, CP3, Carmelo, and Dwyane Wade still aren’t going to beat the Warriors, and it would be that much tougher playing in their division. If Lebron is really serious about adding more rings, he’d stay in the East and figure out a way to team up with All-NBA players like Kawhi Leonard and Russell Westbrook. Still, it sounds more and more like he’s LA bound in 2018, and given CP3 and Carmelo’s likelihood of landing with the Clips this summer, it gives them the upper-hand getting Lebron next summer. By the way, check out this interesting stat. As Alabama football goes, so does Lebron……

The NBA Draft is already getting wild after the Celtics traded the #1 pick to Philly over the weekend. Boston wants Josh Jackson, but it would be great to Magic screw Danny Ainge and the Celtics by taking him with the #2 pick. However, Lonzo Ball is the guy the Lakers should take with that #2 pick. Shooting and ball handling can be improved upon by every NBA player, but you can’t teach the intangibles and leadership that Lonzo will bring to the table immediately. The Lakers should also feel pretty good about the fact that suddenly, more and more players are interested in joining the franchise again. In addition to Lebron’s rumored interest, Paul George has informed the Pacers he’s leaving in 2018, and prefers the Lakers, and Damian Lillard said if he ever left the Blazers he’d strongly consider the Lakers. It’s clear that the new Laker leadership is very appealing to stars around the league.

Speaking of leadership, the Clippers shocked us by getting Jerry West to join them as a consultant last week. Every team West has joined, he’s rebuilt from the ground up due to his greatness as a talent evaluator. The Clips don’t have any draft picks to work with, so how West guides them from here will be a huge challenge. The biggest issues with West’s hiring for the Lakers, is that it means they will likely lose the talented Ryan West, Jerry’s son, from their front office. The Clips are also making headlines by attempting to build a new arena in Inglewood. Despite all this, it would be extremely “Clipper-esque” of them to make these moves and then lose Chris Paul and Blake Griffin in free agency in a couple of weeks. I still think both of them are re-signing, but when Adrian Wojnarowski says that there will be meetings with other teams and that both are going to look at their other options, I’d be a lot more nervous about losing them if I were the Clips.

Did you watch the ESPN 30 For 30 on the Lakers and Celtics rivalry? It was spectacular. It’s funny how we have all forgotten that early in Magic’s career, he was actually booed by Laker fans for getting Paul Westhead fired. We also forget some of the horrible crunch time mistakes that Magic and James Worthy made in the ’84 NBA Finals against the Celtics. I still have no idea how LA managed to lose that series. They had so much more talent and we’re a far better team. The Lakers never disrespected the Celtics the way they disrespected the Lakers. I also still feel horrible for Jerry West, who lost eight straight times in the finals to Boston. You can tell how much it bothers him to this day. Finally, there were some horrible trades in the 1980’s! The Jazz gave the Lakers the pick that gave them Magic. The Cavs gave the Lakers the pick that gave them Worthy. The Sonics gave the Celtics the pick that gave them Len Bias (despite his tragic passing). It’s almost like every NBA team had Andrew Friedman working as their GM at the time.

The Reds took more abuse from the Dodgers over the weekend than Tiger Woods took from his ex-wife beating him with a golf club. Cody Bellinger is looking like one of the best power hitters in baseball. With 19 home runs coming into Sunday, only Gary Sanchez had a better 49-game start to his career. Sanchez is only a couple of years into his career so it’s hard to benchmark Bellinger against him. I’m not sure if Bellinger is among the likes of Mark McGwire, Frank Robinson, and Albert Pujols, or among the likes of James Loney and Lance Niekro. In all likelihood he’s probably somewhere in between complete greatness and complete bust. He’s certainly helping the Dodgers more than I thought this season, but they still need pitching. Then again, so does every contending MLB team. There’s just no real quality pitchers out there that can make a difference. For those of you that say Alex Wood is an ace, let’s see if you still feel that way come October when LA actually has to give him the ball to start playoff game.

I’m not a big fan of over-analyzing the MLB draft, but considering the Angels have one of the worst farm systems in baseball, their latest draft has to be criticized. Considering the Halos have one of the best players in the history of baseball playing on their team, they should take advantage of that. Instead, they spent their 1st pick on Jordon Adell, an outfielder who probably won’t make it to the big leagues before Mike Trout hits free agency in 2020. Also considering the fact the Angels have no good young pitching, it’s disappointing that two of their first three picks were not pitchers. However, considering that the one pitcher they did pick, Santa Margarita and UCLA product Griffin Canning, has injury concerns in his back, he should fit right in with all the other injured Halos pitchers.

So we’re actually going to get a Mayweather vs McGregor fight? The only thing dumber than this fight is the people that actually spend money to watch in on Pay-Per-View. Floyd Mayweather will probably receive a $10 million bonus if he can read one page of a Dr. Seuss book during the weigh in. This is what boxing has become. A sport that has absolutely no star power anymore. A sport where nobody can even identify who the heavyweight champion of the world is. The sport is dying, and in order to save it they are giving us a boring fighter coming out of retirement against a guy who doesn’t even box. Some are saying that it’s not the fight that’s going to be entertaining, but all the talk we will have leading up to it. Those people must really enjoy funerals, because we might as well be talking about the death of what was once a great sport between now and then.

Finally, the Bachelorette will return tonight on ABC, but the real headlines have been made over the last week with the taping of The Bachelor in Paradise. As many of you probably heard, taping was suspended over some alleged sexual misconduct between the infamous Corrine and the infamous DeMario. I will spare you the details of this encounter since this is a family blog, however, keep this in mind. If you have watched The Bachelor and The Bachelorette none of this is “allegedly” surprising. Is it hard to envision Corrine engaging in wild drunk behavior and passing out? Nope. Is it hard to envision DeMario as a total player who feels “entitled” to any woman he wants and engaging in that type of behavior? Nope. Once this all gets sorted out, bring everybody back and safely resume the taping. We all watch this stuff because it’s like watching a live train wreck on television. ABC wants drama and they got it, so let’s bring it back and not complain.

Royals Have Their Way With Angels

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June 18, 2017

Salvador Perez hit a three-run homer in the 4th inning, and the Royals took down the Angels 7-3 on Sunday afternoon at the Big A. The win was the third victory over the Halos during the four-game weekend series.

Former Angel Jason Vargas improved his record to 10-3 with six strong innings of work. He gave up three-runs on eight hits.

The Angels jumped in front 2-0 in the 1st inning on an RBI double from Kole Calhoun and a run-scoring single from Andrelton Simmons.

Mike Moustakas answered with a three-run double in the third inning off of Angels’ starter JC Ramirez to give the Royals the lead right back.

A sacrifice fly by Eric Hosmer in the 4th inning made it 4-2 Royals. Then came the big blow by Perez in the 4th.

A sacrifice fly by Ben Revere in the 6th got the Angels a run back, but that was all the offense they could put together on this afternoon.

Ramirez (6-5) took the loss after yielding five runs on five hits in three innings of work. He struck out six and walked four, while making a very inefficient 89 pitches.

The Halos had to burn five relievers over the next six innings. Keynan Middleton was charged with a pair of runs in the fourth inning.

Kelvin Herrera came in for the 9th inning to record his 15th save of the season for Kansas City.

The Halos fall one game under .500 now at 36-37. They are way out of the AL West race, but still have a shot at the AL Wild Card.

After an off-day on Monday, the Angels will travel to New York to open a 3-game series with the Yankees. Ricky Nolasco (2-8, 5.01 ERA) will start for the Halos in game 1. The Yankees will go with Michael Pineda (7-3, 3.71 ERA).