MondoLinks: Weaver Dreams up a sweep

Well, the Angels are tied with the Padres and Red Sox as the hottest MLB teams coming out of the All-Star Break, winning all three of their games and sweeping the White Sox. Well, technically, the Red Sox are hotter because they also won the last three games going into the break, but let's not quibble.

We have an offense that just ran out 16 runs and a pitching staff that lock down the opposition to but a single score. If this would only happen more than 43% of the time. Hey...it could happen!

Have some Dominating Baseball World Power Links:

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Everywhere In Baseball

Trout Porn: Mike Scioscia finally jumps on the Mike Trout bandwagon. "Every accolade he gets is well deserved. He’s as good a ballplayer as most of us have ever seen take the field, and that says a lot. I should say he’s the best ballplayer, the best ballplayer a lot of us have ever seen take the field. Yeah, period." Gee, congrats, Sosh. I see you have finally figured out that it ain't an MVP's fault that the rest of his team sucks.............

Bed Room: Not something I thought I would ever type, but Cam Bedrosian appears to have kicked Joe Smith off the 8th-inning mound and sent Smith to mop-up duty. Because Cam Bedrosian has been good...........

Weaving Tales: Now this is something even more difficult to type. Jered Weaver is being discussed as trade material...........

Shoe Shine: Hat tip to reddit, but Matt Shoemaker is kicking some seriously ass. His is now the 20th ranked WAR in Major League Baseball. This is a seriously rapid rise, as seen right here...........

Bumpires: Over the weekend Joe Torre, one-time bitch fest of his own against MLB umpires but now Front Office demi-god of law and order, sent out a memo to all managers instructing them to stop bitching about the umpires. It's The Law of Unintended Consequences in action. All that new-fangled pitch tracking imaging systems technology MLB installed in all the ballparks are revealing, in real-time, just how shitty umpires can be in calling balls and strikes.  So Joe Torre is wanting us all to emphatically focus on "the integrity of the game". Yeah. Because of strong executors of authority such as, well, umpire Ryan Blakney............

Hill of Beanes: Oakland is trying to rebuild form their latest rebuilding attempt. They are dangling Rich Hill. They almost had him moved to the Red Sox but demanded Anderson Espinoza in return. The Red Sox told Billy Beane to flip off, and sold Espinoza to the Padres for Drew Pomeranz. So half of MLB showed up to take a look at the merchandise and watch Hill pitch. Beane must have been thrilled. Well, for the first 5 pitches, anyway. Hill has a lingering blister problem and had to be puled immediately......By the way, Oakland sent out Andrew Triggs to relieve Rich Hill in the first, and Triggs didn't even make it to the second inning, leaving with an injury too.

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The Duffle Bag

The Koreans! Now THEY know how to put on an All-Star Skills contest!!!..........This is why we are all baseball nuts, because deep inside these emotions never leave us. Go forth in life and be strong, Young Baseball Fan. some day you can grow up to be like this Giants fan...........The Giants might be in the market for a new 8th-inning guy, a guy like our own Joe-Butterfingers-Smith. After all, they seem to have a thing with late-inning balks..............You know, that whole 100-pitch count limit is a thing for pansies. Three is no reason any kid couldn't do twice that much in a game. Hell, SEVEN TIMES THAT MUCH!............Poor Jonny Gomes. Moved from the Braves to the Royals at the first of September last year, and went .167 over their final 12 games before the Royals went off to the playoffs and won their World Series. And for all that, the Royals somehow chose to leave Gomes off the list of invitees for their celebratory trip to the White House???...........The Angels should be more efficient with their money. Brilliant insight............Daniel Murphy is enjoying a major case of the Big Pappys this season..........After linking to vids of people all across America snagging foul balls single-handed while holding and protecting in infant child in their arms, it's somewhat disappointing to report that professional athlete, and Cleveland Indians reliever, Tommy Hunter cracked his back and sent himself to the DL when he tripped down stairs carrying his child............Dammit, people! When you buy your tickets and take your seat at a ball game, the reason you are there is to stay focused and protect your beer!..........I have a new entry to my bucket list. Match secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus and throw out a first pitch in every MLB stadium..........

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(Thursday & Friday was the average fastball velocity for all 30 MLB teams prior to the resumption of the season, as pulled from FanGraphs. Yeah, that short red line way over on the right is LAA, thanks to Jered Weaver and Tim Lincecum. Now we can get to a bastard edition, made ever harder because it had to wait until Monday and is now less topical.)

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