Saturday is the 30th anniversary of one of the great trades in Angels history. NEWSPAPER COVERAGE FROM BACK IN THE DAY. The Orioles made room for a young Cal Ripken Jr. by trading Doug DeCinces and a scrub pitcher to the Angels for Dan Ford. DeCinces went on to accrue 18 WAR in 5 seasons including a monster 7.4 n 1982 for the AL West division winners. Although Baltimore won the World Series with Ford in 1983, he accrued a total of 0.2 WAR for the birds. The sting of the lopsided trade is historically ameliorated by that championship and the tenure of Cal Ripken Jr. But still... 18 > 0.2 ...Wow just Wow.

Slow News Day, two articles...

A very long but detailed and amazing article destroying the credibility of PSA baseball memorabilia authentication. Absolute scum working out there.

Tests on Dustin Richardson Found 5 Banned Substances. Dustin Richardson, a former Chowd reliever, was suspended this week for 50 games after a random drug test came up positive for FIVE performance-enhancing drugs.

Every time that Mitch Moreland hits a harmless fly ball to end an inning for the Texas Rangers in 2012, send Tigers owner Mike Ilitch and team GM Dave Dombrowski a little thanks. Faced with the loss of Victor Martinez to a knee injury, the Big Cat Braintrust called the Bat Line. Prince Fielder signs for 9 years @ $23 MIllion per.

Scott Boras proved patience pays as much as it saves seasons, and Detroit's was not the only season that got saved in this epic turnaround. The Angels benefitted as well... they get the pleasure of Fielder not being on the Rangers and hitting in their roidesque women's softball ballpark for 81 home games.

Oh sure, the Rangers were favored, they are the golden child and everything Nolan wants, Nolan gets and they had squeezed Boras, didn't you read about it, it had to be a fact, Boras was going to get Prince a one-year deal in the same offseason Albert Pujols got a quarter billion dollars, Rangers fans analyze the whole thing objectively, they have it all figured out, just turdstomp your away around their cogent methodology.

With the addition of Yu Darvish for $111 Million, it was looking like the Rangers had their sites on stealthfully adding a player this offseason who had actually played in the major leagues. Always one strike away those Arlington Glory Hogs seem to be. Meanwhile, Erick Aybar has a bunt waiting for the 1B - 3B tandem of Fielder / Miguel Cabrera enough to put a smile on Justin Verlander's face. We can worry about Team Lay Land in October. Team Dallas String Bean just got more than a little skinnier today.

Take it away (with Spanish Subtitles) Morrissey...

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The Angels might make the bloggers sit at the kids table in the press box, but they send out real purty press releases for us to share with our readers (seeing as our blog's readers alone outnumber print-media dinosaur Mark Whicker's shrinking legion of old men in Orange County who still get the OC Register thrown on their lawn).

Click to make it bigger but here is the release announcing the TWENTY Non-Roster players that they have invited to Spring Training. Two pitchers, Francisco Rodriguez and Loek Van Mil were on the roster at the end of the season but were removed by Jerry Dipoto. Former major leaguer Jorge Cantu, signed to a minor league contract is also heading to Tempe on February 19, one month from Thursday!

Talk about a slow news day.

NEW YEAR - New Show - Our "New Look" Angels have kept Howie Kendrick around for four more years. Lots more was talked about Tuesday afternoon, January 10, 2012 with LunchTime HaloTalk hosted by Rev Halofan and Blast21Dave - listen to our archived show... Click--> to LINK HERE for Audio ...Enjoy!

Angels great Tim Salmon received five votes for the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. He needed five percent of the votes to remain on the ballot and did not get that. Barry Larkin was the only candidate elected by the writers this year. Full details at SBN's Baseball Nation. Full results follow here:

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Howie Kendrick has signed a four year (2012-15), $33.5 Million contract with the Angels, buying out one year of arbitration and three years of free agency.

Here are 47 Facts about #47:

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