The Orange County Register

[Peter - Angels]

Cabrera, Martinez lead Angels to big opening series victory

After a busy winter and a long awaited opening day, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim were finally able to see the type of team they had built just a few months prior. Rookie general manager Peter Gregory was recruited from the Minnesota Wild of the DHL as he aims to become a dominant multi-sport GM. A lack of familiarity with fantasy baseball may serve Gregory as an advantage, or perhaps a disadvantage in the long term, but if the opening series against the Minnesota Twins is any indicator, this team should be just fine.

"It's obviously only one series. Not only can we not tell how we stack up, but we don't even know how good Minnesota is relative to the rest of the league. Give me another 14 or 15 weeks and we can discuss the degree of success we're having."

Both Gregory and manager Mike Scioscia were quick to sing the praises of top draft pick Miguel Cabrera and teammate JD Martinez. "We knew we'd be leaning heavily on Miggy all season," said Scioscia. "He's going to be the lynch pin on this team and it will be up to the rest of the guy to rally around that. Martinez was huge for us this weekend we're really happy to have him in left field."

At least early on, the Angels look to have made some strong draft choices down the back end of the inaugural draft. As the only two players selected by the Angels from rounds 21-25 who aren't on the DL, Anthony Gose and Edinson Volquez both had phenomenal weeks. Gose batted a .450 with 5 RBI's while Volquez got the win on Thursday after throwing 8 innings with only one earned run. Ace Johnny Cueto also had a strong week, allowing only 1 run over 14.0 innings with 14 strikeouts. 

The Angels also announced the signing of Mark Canha, who made a great impression after signing a PTO with the Angels on April 3rd. "We really only brought Mark on as an injury replacement for Melvin (Upton). He blew us away this week so it's only fair we award him with a contract going forward. He will likely be used quite often in our utility slot as he continues to gain more and more playing time."

Headed into their second series of the season, the Angels will now take on division rival Houston Astros. Gregory offered some less than encouraging words, "Yeah, same kind of deal. I don't really know anything about fantasy baseball so I don't know if Houston sucks or if the Rangers are amazing. If we know anything about Josh Mason, we can just assume that the Rangers got really, really, really lucky. We'll just play it out this week and see what happens!"

[Peter - Angels]

Night and day, Angels go from big win to big loss

As quickly as the good vibes entered the Angels locker room, the next week they were gone. The Angels were absolutely romped by the Houston Astros in Week 2 by a score of 9-2. 

"We don't really have many comments at this point," said Manager Mike Scioscia. "We started off the week great, we were pitching well, hitting well, then boom, the wheels fell off. We're still getting a feel for the type of team we have, and if we've landed an inconsistent group, that will be up to me to learn how to manage them properly."

"We're headed into Arlington this week to play the top ranked team in the league, so we could leave with a big confidence boost or we'll leave absolutely buried in the standings. Let's see what we can do!" offered General Manager Peter Gregory. "Our big players need to be our big players. We have some vets who are off to very poor starts, so we'll look to them to get this losing streak snapped before it starts rolling."

[Peter - Angels]

Angels qualify for playoffs amid AL West dominance

As of today, it's official. The AL West is the best division in baseball. With the Los Angeles Angels and rival Texas Rangers and Houston Astros all qualifying for the inaugural DBL Playoffs and the Rangers taking the pennant, there isn't much debate in the matter.

On the heels of a 8-3 victory over the Atlanta Braves, the Angels, led by superstar Buster Posey, will take their talents to Queens to face off with the NY Mets. In their only meeting of the season, the Angels romped the Mets 8-2-1 in Week 12. 

"There isn't much to fear on that team past Greinke and Bumgarner. We'll see Greinke twice, Bumgarner only has one start this week. We may have to punt the pitching, but our offence is much better than theirs. That will be our bread and butter this week." said Manager Mike Scioscia. "They're a wildly inconsistent team. They lost 9 different matchups this year, yet still ran away in a really weak division. We're not impressed."

The Angels came under some heat earlier in the year for a lack of moves, notably at the deadline, as they prepared for their playoff push. "We knew we had Miggy coming back, and Justin Turner was just about ready to come off the DL as well. Sure, we could have added some pitching and we had some discussions, but there was nobody notable available. If we can get Johnny [Cueto] back on track this week, that'll be huge for our run. We should also be able to work Randal Grichuk back in at the tail end of the week, and he was instrumental in us making it this far."