The Los Angels Angels of Anaheim sit atop the American League West and they just defated their closest competitor, the Texas Rangers, to solidify their spot at the top of the division.
And while they may be good enough to win the American League West the real teams in the American League play in the East and that's really who the Angels are competing against.
The good news for Angels fans is that right now it looks like Ervin Santana will be coming back some time this weekend to pitch against the Baltimore Orioles. The bad news is that Santana still doesn't have the same velocity on his fastball that made him an All-Star pitcher last year. Right now the Angels are just hoping that he has "enough fastball" to get guys out.
With or without Ervin Santana the Angels have two rookies to fill out the 4 and 5 spots in the starting rotation and that means they'll have to lean on their bullpen which is already without one of the best set up men in baseball in Scot Shields.
One of the problems with playing in such a weak division is that it hides some of your deficiencies and one of the A ngels weaknesses is their middle relief and their set up men.
Last year the Angels had Scot Shields and Jose Arredondo to set up Frankie Rodriguez. This year they had Arredondo, with a 5.55 ERA and now playing in the minors, setting up Brian Fuentes who has pitched well but has a 3.62 ERA and has blown 3 save opportunities but they recently switched to Justin Speier to pitch the 8th and he's striking fear in absolutely nobody.
It may sound like I'm nit picking here but the LA Angels have enough starting pitching to get into the playoffs and hold their own, they have enough offense as long as Kendry Morales and Juan Rivera continue to hit and Vladdy comes around but the back end of their bullpen is suspect in the regular season and will get pulvarized in the playoffs. It'll be intersting to see what the Angels do to shore up their bullpen for the post season run because what they have right now isn't going to cut it.
