HumpLinks: Angels scrap back to the W column

Josh Mayhood's Library of Mike Trout Hagiography

There is something rather intoxicating with nice round milestone numbers. They get the attention of the MSM, drawing them in like a pheromone calling to multiply column inches by deadline.

SBNation takes the bait

, glorifying in the spectacle of 1,000 hits............

Aaron Gleeman reminds us that Trout has more tools than hits and home runs. He also is an amazing stealer of bases............

For some number of years now I have been correcting many around here that the Angels have NOT been wasting Trout's prime years. Mostly, because the idea of "waste' in a team sport is stupid. And, second, a baseball player does hit his prime years until they get to 26/27 years of age. This is where Mike is. He is merely entering his prime. That means that, as great as he has been we are about to witness unbelievable. Case in point: Mike Trout's Shortest Season Is His Most Impressive Yet............In that link is a pure Trout porn tweet bu none other than Jonah Keri. But I want you to focus on the FanGraphs ZIPs projections. Don't they smell suspiciously conservative to you? They do to me. And when it comes to Trout, they always do. They always do.................

It doesn't stop with Deadspin and Jonah Keri. ESPN has stretched a toe back over in an effort to get a grip on the Trout Bandwagon............

Baseball Reference notes the rare company Trout keeps. I wonder how many games and PA's those other guys got before they reached their 1,000 hit?............

I'm just putting t his out there. Not because of the now-stale content, but because of the headline. Somebody NOT Halos Heaven leads with calling Mike Trout The Face of Baseball..........

A takeaway from the recent Saber Seminar: we have more statistical and scientific data that the baseball now has less drag (one way to believe it to be 'juiced'). Hence one contributor to the home run spike.

MLB caught up with Aaron Judge (who has essentially turned into Luis Valbuena). MFY fans can relax. Judge will catch back up to MLB. He just won't be catching back up to the point where he is better than Mike Trout............

Man. And I thought that the Angels had a problem getting players to stretch and exercise sufficiently. Imagine how the Braves feel today? They lost their starting shortstop, Johan Camargo, simply because jogging out to take his position at the start of the game was too much to handle............

The Angels are not one of Baseball's oldest teams. Nor have they been one of the most successful. But they do have history. and they have left a mark or two. Some of them rather dubious. You can see this in a retrospective of one of the game's most noteworthy non-achievement............

Barry Bonds is convinced that had he been given a chance to continue on with his mega-drug-fueled assault on baseball's basic integrity, he could have reached 800 career home runs. My guess is that if he had chosen to begin his chemical abuse earlier, he could have reached 2,000. Which is why his accomplishment should be considered absurd..........

Ernesto Frieri is still out there, making money. I know. Amazing, right?...........But, heck, he can eventually follow in the footsteps of other long-forgotten LAA relievers. He can be like Shigetoshi Hasagawa and pursue a golf career..............

Who is touchier? Joe West or the MLB Front Office? In this case, I would say the  MLB Front Office............

Fun times in Arizona. On the one hand we have the DBacks CEO, Derrick Hall, trying to do some ass covering when the local officials call the bluff of his attorney threatenign to move at MLB's insistence of money is not gifted to them...........Meanwhile, down the highway in the suburb of Gilbert (right next to Tempe), city officials are working overtime to hand over tens of millions, if not more than $100 million to the Brewers to relocate their Spring Training facility. The City didn't like their hired consultant telling them that there was no such thing as peripheral revenues, so the City is shopping around for a consultant who will tell them that there is such a thing............

Poof! Baseball as a game just changed. And you missed it. You were sitting too close, paying too much attention to the details. It's the game you grew up with. It certainly is not anything like the game your parents grew up with. And the question needs to be asked: is this the game to which we want to pay so much attention? I say, relax. Let's wait and see. Maybe it changes again real soon. Maybe back to what it was. Maybe to something even better than it ever was............

Disney is using their vast wealth acquired via legacy content delivery services to accelerate their takeover of the current leader in modern content delivery services, BAMtech. And now it will be ESPN-ified..............And they do need to hurry, since what Disney is doing with their traditional model is dying fast..........Meanwhile, Deadspin has an hilarious recap of poor FOX Sports trying to become a provider of audio/video only content. It's tough, since so much source material exists for consumption as the written word.............

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C.J. Wilson has some free time on his hands. Still likes playing baseball. Some of the replies are funnier............Looks like the Little League World Series will be playing a night game at mid-afternoon of the 21st............Billy Hamilton is getting truck loads of love for making the catch after overrunning his route............Something to look forward to: before all is said and done, Mike Trout is going to wipe Derek Jeter off of this map.............the Cleveland Indians might consider themselves above using Wild Thing from Major League to troll the Cubs, but they are certainly not above using Wild Thing's DC-3 to troll the NFL Patriots.............