The Angels have acquired righty Miguel Almonte from the Royals, per a club announcement. Cash or a player to be named later will head back in return for Almonte, who has been optioned to Triple-A by the Halos. To create an opening on the 40-man roster, the Los Angeles organization designated catcher Juan Graterol for assignment.
Almonte, who was removed from the 40-man recently to create space for a player of the same last name, will celebrate his 25th birthday today by joining a new organization after seven years in the Kansas City system. While he was once viewed as a quality prospect, Almonte has had trouble earning MLB opportunities and has in recent years been shifted mostly into a relief role.
Still, Almonte’s arm obviously caught the attention of the Angels front office. He threw 47 innings of 1.72 ERA ball last year in the upper minors, over which he recorded 52 strikeouts against just 13 walks. But injuries again limited him in 2017 and Almonte is slated for some further time off after dealing with shoulder problems this spring.
As for the 29-year-old Graterol, he has seen limited MLB chances with the Halos over the past two seasons. He does have plenty of experience in the upper minors over a dozen-year professional career. Graterol carries a .652 OPS in his 353 Triple-A plate appearances and a .690 mark over 477 turns with the bat at the penultimate level of the minors.
Dumb move by the Royals
Yep. This is a real head-scratcher.
The Royals have a terrible minor league system. Let’s hope these PTBNL guys turn into something more than AAA filler.
It’s the Angels what will the return be? I don’t think they rate players that low.
I think you’re a little harsh by that dumb move comment. Almonte has been around for quite a few years now and he’s had a couple of cups of coffee in KC and was hit hard and often. He is also another one that cannot stay on the field. I think the message here is if you’re in the Royals system you had better stay healthy, and make progress at each level or you’re going to get flushed out of the system. When these guys hit their mid 20s they had better be on the verge of a major league job and he wasn’t
I agree with this.
Gotta hand it to Eppler, he keeps busy trying to make moves to improve the club and provide depth at all levels. Will be interesting to see what he does at the trade deadline if the Angels are still in contention.
If? Astros better buckle up, angels rotation looks much better than advertised. Biggest hole is bullpen and with shrewd moves like these they could be shoring that area up too.
Well you never know how the season will go, but they certainly look better than last year and they were still within striking distance of a wild card spot at the start of September. Didn’t work out even with the addition of Upton and Phillips, but this is still a better ball club than they started or ended 2017 with. They’ve certainly got a good shot this year but they also have really bad luck with pitcher injuries the last few years.
Agree with most of the comments.. the pitching has never been a true weak spot and in fact this season they are off to good start yet again.. I wish people would just simply do their own research
Based off results seen so far, you have that completely backwards.
Their rotation has a 4.32 ERA off a non-sustainable .191 BABip -as can begin to see in the 5.31 FIP- and has already seen its first DL trip to one of the keys
The BP has been much better than hoped though, sporting a measly 2.05 and 2.50 FIP
Lol not sure how much babip tells you 1 time through the rotation…
You’re digging way too deep way too early.
It tells you they haven’t been giving up the amount of hits you should expect – meaning if they are “look(ing) much better” you have your reason for it
It’s the part of their game shown so far that won’t sustain itself
Please dont bring facts to a message board, it violates our “gritty” spirit.
That said, I think the fact that their starters are going more than 4 innings is enough to inspire fans across Southern California to call this a pitching renaissance.
Lol your right
Angels may very well get a wild card, but they’re still nowhere near the Astros.
Agreed! Houston is a juggernaut and LAA is a wild card team
There’s a whole lot that has to break right for the Angels to be in the same category as the Astros. Or a whole lot that has to go wrong for the Astros.
Houston deserves to be the favorite. I’m happy the Angels are trending upwards, though, after a rough couple of years.
As stated below its a lot closer than people think. Last years angels had a rotation in which chavez and nolasco were a part of it, this year the have a healthy skaggs, tropeano, heaney, richards, shoemaker. Not to mention a full year of upton, ohtani, trout, kinsler, and cozart. Astros were the hotest team all year and its unreasonable to expect players like reddick and gurriel to replicate those numbers. Also verlander has been awful the past few years and had a great 2nd half last year. Al west will come down to the wire mark my words.
“this year the have a healthy skaggs, tropeano, heaney, richards, shoemaker.”
You do realize that both Heaney and Shoemaker are on the DL right now, while Tropeano is in AAA, correct?
You did correctly get 2 guys actually currently in their rotation right tho, I will give you that!
Astros added gerrit Cole and a full season of Verlander. Again, it’s not even close
If I’m not mistaken, the top 5 pitchers in the angels rotation this season, barely pitched as many innings COMBINED as the top innings pitcher in the league last year. Yet now this year al those pitchers are going to magically pitch enough innings, and that bullpen is good enough to challenge the Astros? Get out of here
Cole is trash lmao, and verlander got rocked in his last start this year. Yes it is close, ohtani just rocked kluber with another bomb.
Recovering from tj is different from 10 day dl. Tropeano has no place in rotation yet! Jc ramierez will be moved back to bullpen at some point. Just trolling to troll. Gonna laugh when angels take division.
Heaney has been out since March 20th and will not be ready before April 12th at the earliest. And yes it’s his elbow, again, so better have those fingers crossed
Shoemaker is similarly out with a strained forearm after missing half of last year with similar forearm issues
Tropeano was already passed up once to fill Shoemakers hole, so the Angels don’t seem very interested in adding him to the Rotation
And I could honestly gaf about the Angels. I’m just trying to provide some actual facts in the face of your extreme hyperbole with factual errors. You don’t seem to handle reality very well, I must also say
You sadly have proven nothing but the fact that you dont actually watch the angels. Just another key board warrior fighting for the honor of fellow trolls. Shoemaker just pitched and went on 10 day dl mri was negative so again you are wrong. Tropeano was tearing it up in spring training warranting a spot in the rotation. So again you dont watch baseball you just regurgitate what the media tells you. Nice try though.
The roles were switched not that long ago. It’s very difficult to keep good teams together
Seriously?
Nope, no MRI done as of couple hours ago, and injury feels like last years did;
“Shoemaker is yet to undergo an MRI on the forearm, so the diagnosis of forearm strain could change. However, there is reason for Shoemaker to be concerned about any soreness in his arm. After making 14 starts last season, Shoemaker hit the DL in July with a forearm extensor strain. A month later, he underwent surgery to release the radial nerve in his forearm, causing him to miss the rest of the season.
“That did fix it from then until essentially now,” Shoemaker said of the surgery. “We don’t even know if that’s what it is now. The symptoms are a similar feeling. Where they decompressed that tunnel, that’s completely clear, so maybe scar tissue from the procedure is in the area. We have to do all this stuff to figure out what it is.”
And did the Angels bring up Tropeano to replace him in the Rotation?
No, no they did not – they brought up Bridwell who got torched in Spring. So despite your ranting and raving insisting he’s on the cusp of the rotation, the Angels are showing you they feel otherwise.
Btw, you are 100% emotions, largely absent fact, desperately trying to spark emotional fights. That is the definition of a troll. So if you’re really looking for one, I suggest you look in a mirror
Astros don’t need to worry about the Angels. Have they improved ? Yes. Houston is still the class of the division, and one of the best teams in MLB.
While you can make your claim based on last years numbers, all players on the astros outperformed there expected career averages and while it might seem plausable to think they can replicate those numbers its just not possible. Keep in mind angels had a banged up rotation all year while missing heaney and tropeano and richards due to injuries and still almost made playoffs. The gap is a lot closer than people want to believe and the angels have gotten vastly better on defense and on base percentage. If ohtani ends up being as good as advertised the al west will come down to the wire.
Just for the record, AA is the “penultimate” level of the minors, not AAA.
I gave his Triple-A OPS, then his Double-A OPS.
How much would it cost the Angels to acquire Raisel Iglesias from the Reds? I agree we still need bullpen help. Also disappointed we didn’t go after Greg Holland.
Probably at least two of Adell/Jones/Maitan, and possibly a little more to round out a package. They could do that, but with the way Eppler has seemed intent on rebuilding the farm system and adding depth, I’d be surprised if they did something that.
I wouldnt mortage the farm for an intriguing arm like iglesias. I also agree that a holland sign would have pushed them that much closer to the astros as far a talent prespective.
Also wouldnt cost that much to get him. Not a proven arm to mortage the entire farm for.
Hopefully the Blue Jays claim Graterol. He has been with the team in the past and would be a better back up catcher than Maile.