Angels History

by BruinHalo on May 31, 2008 11:34 AM PDT Comment 21 comments

So after reading the article about BoSox bandwagoners, I feel a distinct shame in that despite growing up in OC and cheering at early/mid-90s Angels games, I know very little about Angels history. Yeah, I'm only 20 (that wasn't THAT long ago right, old guys?), but if a random ESPN journalist were to ask me to name the only Angel to win the batting title (which I have since learned was Alex Johnson in 1970 with a .329 avg), I would have been unable to do so. And so, my question is this:

Outside of straight up memorization of every man on that top 100 list, what's the best way of bettering my knowledge of Angel lore? Are there are books on this? Documentaries? Crotchety old men I can talk to that can reflect on the good old days?

All help is appreciated.

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yeah, i'd be interested too

as i’m the same age, with the same problem.
i’d love to learn more about the team (especially if it’s from crotchety old men… they’re always funny)

Let Wood play!!!

by howiestheman on May 31, 2008 11:54 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Let's see...

I could organize the “Angel Debuts” that I did over the offseason into a sidebar section (upper left sidebar) ... I think it went thru 1981. there is a Ross Newhan book but personally I am waiting for Yetijuice’s encyclopedia to be published.

by Rev Halofan on May 31, 2008 12:15 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

The Newhan book is not bad ...

but Yetijuice’s book is one I am waiting for with bated breath. It’s one of those books that you wait for when you have a 3-4 year hiatus off to some monastery in the subcontinent and get tired of reading Joyce’s Ulysses.

Cmon Yetijuice! ... Bring on the Yetijuice Official History of Angels Baseball!

Don't call me Desmond

by highlandhalo on Jun 1, 2008 8:17 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Is he really writing a book...

or are you guys just pulling my cyber-leg?

"At some point, a veteran player will more often than not find his stroke. You just have to show them a little bit of patience."

by Downing Rules on Jun 2, 2008 10:07 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Ross Newhan's book (the one updated in 2000) is pretty good

The Rev’s Top 100 Angel series also gets you a flavor.

It’s a shame I had to scuttle my super-cool self-published book project, “The Los Angeles Angels: An Analytical History,” cuz you’d be the first customer!

Let’s see if I can cut & paste some html from a list of Angel books I have saved somewhere….:

The Anaheim Angels: A Complete History, Ross Newhan
*1982 edition

Once They Were Angels, Rob Goldman

Tales from the Angels Dugout: The Championship Season and Other Great Angels Stories , Steve Bisheff

Out of the Blue: The story of the Anaheim Angels’ improbable run to the 2002 World Series title, Joe Haakenson

Tales from the Angels Dugout: The Championship Season and Other Great Angels Stories , Steve Bisheff

Apologies if that’s gibberish. If I can find them, I’ll try to link to my “Top 10 Angels Seasons by Position” series, which I think might be useful. And don’t forget just geeking out on Baseball Reference!

by mattwelch on May 31, 2008 12:42 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

The first 2

are both good, and Angels Halo Haunted would be another one to understand why a lot of the long-time fans had always been so pessimistic about this team.

Lamest poster of all-time.

by ineptituderunsamok on May 31, 2008 1:21 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Top 10 series

With the indulgence of the Rev, here’s my Top 10 Angel Season series by position: catcher, 1Bman, 2Bman, shortstop, 3Bman, LFer, CFer, RFer, DH, starting pitcher, relief pitcher, player playing multiple positions.

Though each entry contains a number pile, there are also some hopefully interesting nuggets of history, and discussions of question like: Was Darin Erstad’s 2000 season a fluke?

by mattwelch on May 31, 2008 1:03 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Answer to the question has to be yes.

He never even sniffed numbers like that again. But Erstad is probably tops at outfield and maybe even infield because his D was so outstanding.

~Till the Halo burns out...

by Zu Long on May 31, 2008 9:25 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Read the essay before ye judge! (It's under LF)

Basically, the fluke was that Erstad after the age of 26 never hit remotely as well as he did at ages 23 and 24. This is extremely rare, and points to injuries sapping his power. Put another way, the Ersta of ‘97-98 projected as a serious star, a possible Rafael Palmeiro with speed, and then he happened to turn 26 (often a peak year) in the American League’s second biggest offensive season since the 1930s. Hilarious numbers ensue. But even if he had stayed in the .300/.360/.500 range that year, his numbers afterward don’t make any sense except in the context of him being hurt. So my argument was that yes, he really was that good.

As for Krotch, his 16.4 Win Shares last year don’t come close to knocking off the aforementioned age-23 year from Ersty.

by mattwelch on Jun 1, 2008 6:14 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I'm aware Erstad was a better player than he showed after that, but his 2000 year was still fluky.

To me he’s like a John Olerud who moved to the outfield but got injured. While occasionally they’d put up a season like Olerud’s ‘93 or ‘98 or Erstad’s 2000, the fact is that this sort of season was well beyond their true talent level. They were still pretty good players in their own right, but .350-360 averages were not their real ability level.

Erstad’s career path diverged from Olerud’s for a couple of reasons, namely getting injured after moving to the outfield, plus playing in Angel stadium vs Skydome, plus the unfortunate influence of Rod Carew and Mickey Hatcher as hitting coaches.

~Till the Halo burns out...

by Zu Long on Jun 1, 2008 10:57 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Huh?

One way to describe hitting over .350 twice is “well beyond” someone’s “talent level.” Another way to describe it is “this is how good this sumbitch was at his peak.” John Olerud was just a terrific baseball player, and the fact that he put up a .363 at age 24 and a .354 at age 29 just measures the highpoint of his talent. Bill Madlock hit .354 at 24 and .341 at 30—was that well beyond his talent level, or was it a great hitter finding his outer reaches? Nomar Garciaparra hit .357 and .372 … was he really that good? Well, yeah, and he was also A) healthy back then, B) in his 25-26 prime, C) hitting in a hitter’s park, and D) peaking at the exact same time that the American League was producing its gaudiest offensive numbers in six decades.

I mean David Segui hit .334 in 2000 (Erstad’s big year). Carlos Delgado, a career .279 hitter whose second-best mark was .302, hit .344. Johnny Damon - who, like Erstad, was lucky enough to turn 26 in the year 2000 - established career highs in Runs, Hits (214), 2Bs, RBIs, SBs, BA (.327), OBP (.382), and SLG (.495). Was that a fluke? Or did he just turn 26 in a magical year, then manage to avoid the kind of injuries that cut Erstad’s extremely promising career short?

Given how terrific Erstad’s numbers were at 23 and 24, his results at the peak age of 26 just weren’t a huge surprise, given that the American League was averaging 5.30 runs a game, its most since 1938. The season just looks flukey because he peaked during a peak year, then got hurt afterward.

by mattwelch on Jun 1, 2008 5:25 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

That year did have a lot of people going off the wall offense wise.

but I generally think of a players “true” ability level as the range they were in most often during the course of their careers when healthy. In that context, yes, Delgado had a fluke season. Damon, not so much. They might have been career highs, but the 118 OPS+ was only a tad on the high side of the 110-115-ish OPS+ he tends to put up every year. Delgado DID have a career year, with an OPS+ of 181 that he has never come within 20 OPS+ points of since.

Now maybe if Erstad stays healthy he proves me wrong and hits really well. But given that he played 142 games in 1999, 157 games in 2001, and 150 games in 2002, can we really blame it on just playing through injuries? If so, then it was a horribly bad decision on his part that clearly ruined his career, for reasons that are beyond me (No one on our team was playing well in 2001, and it was clear early on that Oakland and Seattle were going to dominate the division).

Olerud hit .360-ish twice in a career where his best batting average otherwise was .302. That seems to me to be the definition of a fluke year. If these aren’t examples of fluke seasons, then what COULD be considered a fluke season?

I should be clear though- I don’t believe that their being “fluky” in any way diminishes their right to those seasons on their career highs etc. You play through a season once, and the actual results are the ones that matter, not the simulated ones. To me calling it a fluke year is simply a recognition that the season was significantly off from the norms you would expect based on their career numbers.

~Till the Halo burns out...

by Zu Long on Jun 1, 2008 6:56 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Also- Does Kotchman's 2007 knock Ersty off the 1B list?

And if so, where does it rank?

~Till the Halo burns out...

by Zu Long on May 31, 2008 9:34 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Wow Welch, good work

I really enjoyed the breakdown. That is a lot of work. (I knew Grich owned 2b). Doug is the 3b man! (my favorite).

Now for the history guy.

Ah, history.

Can’t always be found in stats.

Paul Schaal. Schaal, Fregosi, Knoop. Yea, Schaal’s numbers may not look great….

But imagine you are a 10 year old little leaguer who plays for the Walnut Park (Huntington Park) Angels (true)........ OK I was 9 and lied about my age.

You stop and buy your pack of baseball cards at the store on the way to the game (yes, the bubble gum was an added bonus) and search through them hoping for an Angel (forget any other “Valuable” card) card.

At night, you listen to Schaal, Fregosi, and Knoop on your 9V transistor radio (ear plug so mom won’t know your awake). May not win much, but when they do!

Your an Angel fan. Win or Lose. Never Waver. Always Loyal.

A little History that can’t be found in the Stats.

Angels Defense. Angels Pitching. Get past that.

by vladtheimpaler on Jun 2, 2008 5:02 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Funny you say that...

If memory serves, it seems like I always had about 5 Paul Schaals for any other Halo. So, if I had a Knoop and a Reichardt, I had 10 Schaals. Schaals were what ended up in my Stingray spokes.

by Stirrups on Jun 2, 2008 10:01 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Love the Rick, and the card-in-spokes

Angels Defense. Angels Pitching. Get past that.

by vladtheimpaler on Jun 4, 2008 1:31 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Thanks guys...

I’ll look into these for sure. 1995 stuff and newer I’m pretty damn familiar with. Its really 60s, 70s, 80s stuff I want to get to know, and these resources should help.

by BruinHalo on May 31, 2008 1:09 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Also look for

“Angels Essential” by Steven Travers (with Ross Newhan). Kind of bubble-gum and focuses on Travers’ obsession with Bo Belinsky, but it gives you a nice, quick run-down of the Angels from their inception through about 2005, I think. Also includes some nifty trivia questions interspersed—the kind that said reporters might be likely to ask you.

Thanks for the tips, too, Matt! Outside of the one I referenced, I didn’t really know of any of these others…and will now try to read all of them!

Light Up That Halo!

by Clutch on May 31, 2008 5:57 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Start with Wikipedia. Click all the links.

Get familiar with the basic outline of the team and accomplishments of the players over the years. Then those books and stories will feel more substantial.

And spend some time looking back through the Angel team pages on baseball-reference.com. Note the alignment of teams of the AL in the 60’s and 70’s. Note also the attendance at games.

Ther is a lot of history here. It’s not all fun (Moore and Bostock), but it’s all interesting!

by Stirrups on May 31, 2008 11:59 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs