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Blog*Spot ArchivesContactRichard Ceccarelli Josh Mandir |
Saturday, March 20, 2004Starting slowThe Angels have been hovering around .500 this spring, and that really tells the story. They've been winning half their games by playing half the game of baseball. The offence has been excellent all spring (the new comers, Guerrero (.320) and Guillen (.417, 4 HR), have been especially impressive) but the pitching has been sorely lacking. They have allowed 133 runs in 19 Cactus League games. That's 7 runs a game! Going into camp it was clear that four of the five rotation spots were locked up by Bartolo Colon, Jarrod Washburn, Kelvim Escobar, John Lackey. The conventional wisdom was that the fifth-and-final spot would be decided by an open competition between veterans Aaron Sele and Ramon Ortiz. There are also two other names in the mix: Scot Shields, who impressed as a starter in the second half of last season, and Kevin Gregg, who impressed in a mid-season call-up (1.05 WHIP in 24.2 innings). Lets look at how these eight guys have preformed thus far:
Obviously it's too early to start drawing conclusions, but those numbers are pretty ugly. All these guys (with the exception of Gregg) have had the same problem: big innings. Unfortunately Gregg probably won't get much of a chance to prove himself this spring because the Angels are trying to showcase Sele and Ortiz for a possible trade. He is really the only guy who looks like he wants that fifth spot. |
