Ervin Santana made his first start of the season, and like Dan Haren yesterday, his best stuff just wasn't there. Santana gave up 6 runs to the Kansas City Royals on 7 hits and 2 walks in 5 and 2/3 innings. Three of the 6 runs he gave up came in the first inning, putting the Angels in an early hole.
As a former baseball player, it's hard playing catch-up baseball before you've even had your first at-bats. Rather than going up there relaxed, looking for a pitch to hit, you start with the pressure that if you don't score X-amount of runs, you aren't going to win the game.
Even with the added pressure, the Angels always threatened. Despite the final score being 7-3 the Angels had plenty of opportunities to get back into the game, but they couldn't string enough hits together. The Angels finished the game 0-13 with runners in scoring position.
The 3rd Base Experiment
Even with Mark Trumbo's superior batting in the lineup, manager Mike Soscia is going to have to make an important decision very soon regarding the fate of his 3rd baseman. Trumbo committed his third error at 3rd base today in only his second game. The error led to a run scored, and one has to wonder, how many early games are worth sacrificing before Trumbo begins to feel comfortable at the position? The problem here is not lack of skill (Trumbo was more than an adequate 1st baseman last year), but more of a lack of confidence. After Friday's Opening Day game in which Trumbo made two errors, he was beating himself up after the game. He needs to go back and talk to his Little League coach from when he was a kid. He needs to be reminded that mistakes are unavoidable, but you have to do your best to move on from them and limit them in the future. Here's hoping he gets enough time to figure it out, or a move to the outfield might end up in the biggest traffic jam this side of the I-5 freeway.
Lineup Management
Kendrys Morales needs to bat fourth! The switching-hitting, comeback kid needs to be in the batting order right behind the million dollar man, Albert Pujols. Soscia, we don't want to hear it that you're playing matchups based on left-handed pitching. You have the most powerful lineup for the first time in your managerial career since the days of Troy Glaus, Tim Salmon, and Garrett Anderson. The speed is good. The speed is the Angel's identity, but not protecting your best hitter with the second bast bat on your team is just foolish.
The lineup could not put together a string of hits today, and I partially blame Soscia for this mess. The 1-2-3 spots in the lineup batted a combined total of 7 for 13 the Angel's best hitter from the first two games, Morales, dropped to sixth in the lineup followed by Trumbo batting seventh. We get it Mike, you've got a deep team, with Torii Hunter and Vernon Wells completely competent cleanup and number five hitters, but that doesn't mean you need to bat them there when you have better options. Let's accept that we're going to have to deal with lineup tinkering for at least the first month or so, but in Soscia's case, it will probably last the whole season.
That's it for today. Hope your day was filled with love, family, and an abundance of chocolate. I'll be back Monday, April 16th when the Angels host the Oakland A's for their next home game. I'm going to try to make it to Pujols Bobblehead night on the 17th, so wish me luck. As always, follow me on Twitter for my daily thoughts on sports and relevant links and retweets from across the NBA, NFL, and MLB.
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