Quote of the day
"It stinks to play this long into the night and come out on the wrong end." -- Angels OF Peter Bourjos, after a 10-8 19-inning loss in OaklandDaily blurb
Big night for Albert Pujols: 4-8, 2HRs, 3R, 3RBI. That raised his BA for the last week up to .233. YTD, his slugging is now up to .439. While those numbers don’t sound Pujolsian, they are ahead of last year’s April, when he batted .217 and slugged .304. Of course, he picked up the pace thereafter, although his only period of top tier production was June-August.
But he’s not the biggest problem in the hitting lineup for the Angels. Remember Josh Hamilton? Last April, his slash line was .395/.438/.744. Of course, he didn’t maintain that pace for the season (although his May output was similar). But this year, his slash line is .202/.246/.298. Those three add up to last April’s slugging percentage. In this year’s RIBC drafts, Pujols was the 8th player drafted (on average), and Hamilton was 24th (late second round).
The consensus #1 RIBC pick, Mike Trout, isn’t off to a much better start - .252/.322/.402 with 4 SB. And this all helps to explain why the Angels are in the thick of the race for the worst record in the American League.