Friday, April 15, 2011

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By Jeff Flinn - AngelsWin.com Contributor

Thumbs Up:
  • Haren, to quote the late Johnny Carson (per the late Jim Healy), was bleeping brilliant on Tuesday night. I love Choo as a player, but hate what he always does to the Halos, especially costing Haren a potential no-hitter.
  • Chatwood had a decent first outing, especially for a 21 year-old. He had some struggles, but showed some moxie in getting one of the ultimate Halos nemeses in Choo to GIDP in the 5th inning with the bases loaded.
  • The defense continues to be solid. Way better than what we witnessed in 2010.
  • The bullpen is also light years ahead of where they were a year ago, with 9 more scoreless innings in the series. Rodney has allowed just two baserunners in the past 4 1/3 innings. Walden has yet to allow a run this season. Thompson continues to be solid, when getting work. Takahashi is slowly coming along, and had a nice 2 innings on Wednesday. Downs finally got in his first work in 2011, and was fine. He allowed an inherited runner to score on Wednesday, only through some luck.
  • Abreu continues to reach base at a great clip.
  • Hunter, Trumbo and Bourjos all had critical home runs in the series.
  • Wells finally broke a dry-spell with a key single in the 12th inning on Wednesday. FINALLY!!!!!!!
  • Mathis' sacrifice fly was huge as in that spot, I was thinking he'd strikeout or ground into a double play to end the threat.

Thumbs down:
  • The hitting really took a step back against a Cleveland pitching staff that was not very good in 2010, albeit their stats are surprising so far in 2011 and they had a sub 3.50 ERA by the end of the series.
  • Halos scored a whopping SIX runs in three games, and although they only stranded 16 runners in three games, they were 0-13 with RISP and only cashed in on Mathis' game winning sac fly.
  • Three home runs in the series produced 4 of the 6 total runs scored by the Halos.
  • Wednesday was just one bad game at the plate for Bourjos, but striking out 4 times hopefully doesn't send him into a tailspin.
Love to hear what you think!
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