Things just got a lot better in Anaheim. Despite falling seven games behind the division rival Rangers, the Angels and their fans just received an injection of hope. Even if the addition of Dan Haren isn’t enough to push the Halos past Texas in 2010, it is a significant boost for the future of the organization. It was a move the Angels needed to make in order to stay in the group of baseball’s true “World Series contenders.”

After losing Chone Figgins, Vladimir Guerrero, Darren Oliver and John Lackey to free agency this past off-season, the effects have clearly been noted on the field. With significant cogs of the team gone, the Angels had lost both depth and some of their swagger. And when Kendry Morales went down for the season, it was easy to see just how thin the Halos were being stretched. But with Dan Haren on board for years to come, they may have taken a major step in getting some of that swagger back.

The addition of Haren gives the Angels their own Big Three. The front of the rotation now includes two legitimate aces in Haren and Weaver, and a strong number two in Ervin Santana. Joel Piniero is a better no. 4 than most teams can boast, and if Scott Kazmir can ever find his mojo, you could contend that the Halos have the best starting corps in the league – or at least match anyone else’s.

The game has shifted back to pitching and defense after years of bloated long-balls and gargantuan offensive numbers. Tony Reagins has obviously taken note. While the offense has seemed the biggest woe for the team in 2010, Reagins instead made his biggest splash on the mound. Perhaps he still intends to add another bat beyond Alberto Callaspo. Whether he does or not remains to be seen, but Reagins can now feel stellar about his starting pitching in the present and in the coming years, and refocus his attention on the lineup and the bullpen.

The Angels’ three-headed monster appears locked in through at least 2012. Haren is signed through the next two years and has a $15 million club option for 2013. Weaver won’t become an unrestricted free agent until after the 2013 season, and Santana, like Haren, also has a 2013 club option. This sets up the Halos as serious contenders the next couple years. Should they advance to the post-season, a playoff rotation of Weaver-Haren-Santana with Piniero as a fourth starter is as good as there is. As we’ve all seen in recent years, starting pitching wins championships, and the Angels staff is certainly now of that caliber.

The Angels answered Texas’ addition of Cliff Lee in a big way by snatching up Haren. It still might not be enough to overcome a seven game deficit, but it at least gives them a chance – especially with ten games left against the Rangers. But regardless, the Angels definitely improved themselves significantly, carrying a new three-headed monster into their future.

By Blake Warren

You may have noticed the Angels playing some very good baseball lately. They haven’t wilted despite numerous injuries to key players. Few people expected them to go 20-9 in the direct aftermath of Kendry Morales’ devastating injury at home plate on May 29. But that’s exactly what the Halos have done in the last month or so, even with injuries to Maicer Izturis and Erick Aybar adding to the difficulty of the challenge.

Problem is, this 20-9 stretch hasn’t been enough to gain any ground in the standings. As a matter of fact, they’ve lost ground. The Angels were 2.5 games behind Texas on the day of Morales’ injury (May 29), and as the calendar turns to July, they sit 4.5 back. The reason: the Rangers have been the hottest team in baseball the past month, going 21-6.

The Rangers have a reputation of being good up into the summer, then wilting in the Texas heat. But they sure look the part of a team that will finally hang around come this September. The Rangers’ starting rotation has been uncharacteristically solid and the team has solidified its usually-troubling bullpen, with Neftali Feliz emerging as one of the game’s top closers. Oh, and their lineup is pretty good too – the lowest batting average of their first six hitters is .294.

Making matters a little more troubling to Angel fans is the fact that the Rangers owe a good deal of their success to former Halos. Vlad Guerrero is absolutely crushing the ball for the Rangers this season as if he were 28 again, causing some to speculate that the fountain of youth may indeed be in Arlington, Texas. A big part of the Rangers’ bullpen success has been relievers Darren O’Day and Darren Oliver.

But while the Angels didn’t catch Texas with their 20-9 run, they did keep themselves within striking distance. They still have a good chance of claiming their sixth division title in seven years. And if they do, it will be perhaps their hardest earned AL West crown. In a division that has been relatively void of intense competition in recent years, the Halos look to finally have a formidable challenger on their hands.

Mike Scioscia’s steady guidance will keep the Angels surging towards their goal. The starting rotation has settled in nicely and the bullpen is continuing to get stronger. Role players have stepped in and done commendable jobs for injured starters. The Halos will likely be right there in the season’s final month. Whether they win the division will have a lot to do with how successful they are in messing with Texas from here on out.

In an odd scheduling twist, the teams have only met four times thus far, leaving 14 games between the two rivals going into Thursday’s series finale. The Angels and Rangers will meet for two series in late July and then again for two series in late September, which could go a long way to determining the division champ. The Halos conclude the regular season with a four-game set in Arlington. It certainly looks to be an interesting summer…

By Blake Warren

Major League Baseball’s regular season schedule presents a myriad of challenges to every ball club. When the calendar turns to April, there awaits 162 games on the docket over a stretch of six months. There are inevitable injuries and guaranteed slumps to contend with. Teams face long road trips and extensive traveling. There is also the familiar attrition of squaring off against each division foe 18 times a season.

So when the schedule presents opportunities to gain ground in the standings, playoff teams tend to take advantage. If you want to be playing in October, you’d better win the majority of the games that are most winnable. And that is exactly what the Angels have done recently.

When Kendry Morales broke his leg at home plate after hitting a walk-off grand slam ten days ago, it was hard to imagine a baseball team experiencing a higher high and such an immediate low in a matter of seconds. The Halos looked to be surging ahead and turning the corner coming off the walk-off win, only to find out their best offensive player would be sidelined for at least ten weeks. It looked grim and felt even grimmer. But there remained a looming potential for positivity on the horizon: the schedule – specifically the fledgling Royals and the underperforming Mariners.

With Morales sidelined, the Angels were looking at ten straight games against Kansas City and Seattle, two of the American League’s weaker teams. Anything less than a 6-4 record in this stretch would have been a missed opportunity. The Halos had to make hay.

Turns out, the Angels left Seattle Sunday night with bales of the stuff, finishing off a road sweep of the Mariners and ending the ten-game stretch with an 8-2 mark. They did what they had to do and it was good enough to propel the team back above the .500 mark and put them within striking distance of first place.

Monday’s combination of the Angels win over Oakland and a Texas loss remarkably has the Halos atop the AL West despite their early season struggles. They seem to finally be clicking on all cylinders, winning six in a row and nine out of ten. And it’s a good thing for Halo fans that they are, because the schedule won’t always be so kind.

The Angels have three games left in Oakland and complete their season-long 14-game road trip with a weekend set against the cross-town Dodgers. They finish the month of June at the Big A with series against LA, Colorado, and their division rivals from Texas. These teams are a combined 17 games over .500, while the Mariners and Royals are a combined 21 games under the .500 mark. There lies a much tougher road ahead for the Angels, but they have done what playoff teams traditionally do: beef up on the weak sisters of the league.

The Halos have rallied around their injured star and come together. They are playing their best ball of the season so far and appear to be rolling going into the upcoming tough stretch of games. They were supposed to beat Kansas City and Seattle. Now we’ll see how they carry their recent success forward when the schedule ceases to be so Halo-friendly.

- Blake Warren

State of the Angels Haiku:

“Real ugly road trip,

Many runs given, few runs scored,

Is the sky falling?”

It’s been a topsy-turvy start to the season for the Halos and their fans. It’s as if we’re all waiting for the Angels’ real season to start; to see the team we’ve become accustom to seeing on the field, playing Angels baseball. There have been glimpses so far, sure, but the team has failed to sustain any real momentum thus far. After 34 games last season, the Angels were 17-17 before they started to gain traction on the road to another AL West title. But last year felt a little different. Major injuries to the rotation and a young, inexperienced bullpen were much to blame for last year’s slow start. This season, fingers can’t be pointed in any one direction. At 15-19 at the 34 game-mark, fingers can be justifiably pointed in all directions.

Consistency and the Angel way have been the staples of the Mike Scioscia era. Fans have come to expect a sound starting rotation and a trust-worthy relief corps. We’ve come to expect timely hitting and aggressive tactics on the bases. So far, these attributes have yet to come together and complement each other. A baseball team is like an engine. You’re not going to get a desirable result unless all the pistons are firing when they’re supposed to.

Though the Angels snatched a much-needed win away from the Rays in the 11th inning Monday, there were plenty of signs of the Angels’ woes on display. It appeared nearly perfect at the start, then the inconsistencies reared their heads. After amassing four runs on six hits through the first 4 innings, the Angels’ bats went cold, getting just one hit until the 11th when Juan Rivera salvaged the night with a sacrifice fly. After scoring the second most runs in baseball in 2009, the Angels are in the bottom five this season, averaging just 4 runs per game.

After getting a brilliant 6 1/3 innings of shutout ball from Joel Pineiro, the bullpen faltered once more, with Brian Fuentes blowing his fourth save in six chances and bumping his ERA up to 7.04 (not the number you want to see from your closer). Of the Halos’ relievers, only Fernando Rodney boasts an ERA under 4.00.

It seems that when they pitch well, they aren’t hitting, and when they hit well, they aren’t pitching. The Angels are having more trouble putting it all together than in recent years, as evidenced by their most recent 2-8 road trip.

Mid-May is typically when the early-season grace period ends in baseball. You can get by with a slow start, but as Memorial Day approaches, the horses are getting further and further from the quarter-mile pole. At some point, it ceases to be early and starts to be mid-season. And you can’t get by with inconsistency in the summer. Inconsistencies get you much closer to .500 than the playoffs.

The remainder of this month is going to prove more critical than the Mays of seasons past. Fortunately, the rest of the West is also underperforming and staying bunched in a pack, with no one taking charge of the division thus far. But if the Angels are going to claim the division they’ve owned with consistency most of the past decade, they’re going to need to have their pistons firing on all cylinders sooner rather than later.

By; Blake Warren

Two hits, two walks, two runs, two-thirds of an inning, and one big question: should Brian Fuentes remain the Halos’ closer? We haven’t yet made it out of April, and the clamoring has already begun. Many Angel fans had seen enough from Fuentes last year to lose confidence, as he faltered in a number of key situations down the stretch, the biggest being a huge blown save against A-Rod and the Yankees in the ALCS. After already enduring a DL stint in the early season, Fuentes’ Wednesday night outing did little to soothe Angel fans’ concerns about the left hander.

Complicating matters is the shiny, off-season acquisition in fireballer Fernando Rodney. In Fuentes’ absence, Rodney was a stellar five for five in save opportunities, allowing only one hit and no walks, while striking out four. It’s not just the stats that have many Angel fans buzzing. It’s the old fashioned eye-test cliché that’s at work here. Rodney just looks a lot more like a closer. Maybe it’s the glove-snapping fastball that consistently reaches the mid to upper 90’s. Perhaps it is the devastating change-up, a pitch that Trevor Hoffman has ridden all the way to Cooperstown (eventually). Or it could just be Rodney’s presence and intensity. Regardless, Rodney surely seems to have all the tools.

Yes, Fuentes saved 48 games for the Halos in 2009, tops in the majors. But at times Fuentes seemed to lack confidence and command, bad things to be missing when your fastball maxes out at 90mph. When you rely on deception and pin-point control to be successful, it leaves little wiggle room to excel when one of your weapons is amiss. It’s a basic enough concept. When you miss your spot with a 97mph fastball, there is still a pretty fair chance that a batter won’t catch up to it. When you miss location with an 89-mph fastball, the percentage that the hitter misses it drops drastically. Simply put, the better the stuff, the more room for error.

Angel fans should understand this concept better than anybody. After watching Francisco Rodriguez get himself into and out of jams religiously for six years, you realized the importance of a devastating arsenal of pitches. Even when he was not at the top of his game, K-Rod continuously found a way to close the door by way of filthy pitches. It seems often enough that when Fuentes isn’t at the top of his game, the Angels usually lose theirs. In ’09, Fuentes ERA (3.93) and WHIP (1.40) were his highest since 2004, and while it may be too early to tell, it at least looks like a continuing trend so far.

Mike Scioscia is a loyal manager, and it seems that he’s going to give Fuentes an opportunity to determine the fate of the team’s closer role. But if Rodney continues to thrive and shut down the opponent while Fuentes struggles, it will be interesting to see how long Scioscia sticks with loyalty over straight nasty stuff.

- Blake Warren

The Angels have capitalized on playing in a division with teams in transition in recent years. They’ve won four of the last five A.L. West division titles as the Rangers, Mariners, and Athletics have been reshaping and retooling their respective organizations. With a strong farm system and a willing owner in Arte Moreno, the Halos have clearly been the class of the west for the last half decade. But it is clear that the gap between the Have’s and Have Not’s in the division is narrowing.

We are through the first stage of the off-season, and thus far, the Angels have taken some serious blows, and they are painful ones. They have seen their ace, John Lackey, defect to the playoff nemesis Red Sox. They’ve watched their spark plug, Chone Figgins, head to their rivals from the Pacific Northwest and seem to have watched Jason Bay drift out of their free agent price range. Perhaps due to a pitcher’s personal preference, the Angels lost out on the dominant Roy Halladay to the Phillies. The Halos watched this grizzly scene unfold in just a week’s time, and their lone response thus far is the signing of Hideki Matsui to a one-year deal – effectively replacing one aging right handed DH with bad knees, with an aging, left handed DH with bad knees.

The Mariners, who surprised the baseball world by contending into September in 2009, have shown that they are serious about contending in 2010. They not only landed Figgins to pair with Ichiro atop their order, but appear to have also snagged a former Cy Young Award winner in Cliff Lee. This gives Seattle an elite top of the order and an elite top of the rotation, pairing Lee with young stud Felix Hernandez. And Seattle may not be done dealing. The M’s won 85 games last year, and look well-poised to improve on that number.

Meanwhile, the new-look Rangers have been active as well, dealing the oft-injured Kevin Millwood to Baltimore for a solid, young reliever, and adding ace-when-healthy right-hander Rich Harden. They are also in the works of acquiring veteran slugger Mike Lowell to add to an already potent offense. If Nolan Ryan’s young pitching staff continues to improve on schedule, Texas could be a handful in 2010.

Oakland is the wild card in the division. They finished last season strong and with flashes of a budding young pitching stable. While quiet in the off season thus far, you can never predict the working of A’s GM Billy Beane. If Oakland can find some offense and their young pitching progresses, the AL West could very well take over the moniker of “best division in the AL.”

But it is not all doom and gloom for the Angels, who still have a lot of time to retool for 2010. Despite losing key contributors from their 2009 team, they bring back the majority of their roster from a team that won 97 games. They’ve added Matsui to give them what they hope will be a power bat from the left side. And there is plenty of time until Christmas and beyond for GM Tony Reagins to keep shopping.

Despite losing Lackey, the Angels still have a rotation many teams would be envious of. They bring back a young but experienced group including Weaver, Saunders, Kazmir, and Santana. And it has been rumored that the Halos are seriously considering dealing for Atlanta’s Derek Lowe. Lowe, while not an ace at this stage of his career, would provide a stabilizing and durable presence in the rotation, as he has thrown at least 180 innings for seven consecutive seasons. It would also give the Angels a surplus of quality starters, giving them the ability to make a possible trade for an ace, should one present itself mid-season.

Offensively, the Halos have plenty of bright spots. Erick Aybar has improved considerably over the past two seasons, and at 25, could be a fixture at short stop for years to come. Kendry Morales put up a monster season, validated by his 5th place finish in the A.L. MVP voting. He looks to be a cornerstone player with enormous upside and potential. Adding Matsui’s bat to a veteran outfield of Rivera, Hunter, and Abreu should provide sufficient pop in the middle of the order to score runs, but it would be safe to assume that Reagins would prefer to add another bat. Brandon Wood may be the X factor offensively. If Wood can fill in adequately for Figgins at third base and provide some extra power at the bottom of the order, it would ease the sting of losing Chone to free agency.

So let’s hope that Moreno and Reagins can pull a couple of rabbits out of their hats and improve the ballclub. There is still a lot of off-season wheeling and dealing to go down in the coming months and the Angels have done well improving the team in recent winters. But the Halos surely have their work cut out for them. After one really bad Monday in December, maintaining their grasp on A.L. West dominance seemingly just became a lot tougher.

By Blake Warren