The May 21st, 2013 edition of daily news for the Los Angeles Angels including Albert Pujols doesn't matter anymore, rekindling the Cabrera-Trout debate and much more...

The Story: Albert Pujols doesn't matter anymore.

The Monkey Says: I cannot counter any of this. Pujols just isn't a top player anymore, at least not while his body is broken down the way it is right now. The problem is that there is little reasont to believe that his body won't continue to betray him given his age and the chronic nature of his current injuries. He can still be a very good player, but only in spurts and that may not hold true for much longer.

The Story: Jon Heyman rekindles the Miguel Cabrera-Mike Trout MVP and WAR debate.

The Monkey Says: I'm pretty sure Heyman only brought this up to let us know that players think he is somehow the arbiter of such things. This, and similar pieces that came out after Miggy's three-homer Sunday, all directly or indirectly use Cabrera's stellar start to 2013 as some kind of justification for the 2012 MVP voting even though 2013 has nothing to do with last season by the very definition of the MVP award voting. The most irritating part though is that Heyman once again claims that the ONLY evidence that Trout was better was WAR. Statheads did call out WAR a lot in that argument, but it was just one of the many pieces of evidence in Trout's favor. No one who knows stats well would declare that WAR is the end-all, be-all. It is just a handy benchmark, not proof of anything.

The Angels continue to teeter on the edge of irrelevancy but that won't stop us from ranking the players under the (misguided?) belief that they can snap out of this funk....

RANK	PLAYER	CHANGE	COMMENTS
1		-- 0 Last Week: 1	Mike Trout - Trout had another great week but the looking strikeouts, of which he had four this week, are really starting to make my blood boil.
2		+1 Last Week: 3	Howie Kendrick - Not only is he beating the crap out of the ball right now, he hasn't GIDP'd in 11 games and counting.
3		-1 Last Week: 2	Mark Trumbo - He only had six hits last week, but five of them were extra-base hits. We can live with that.
4		+3 Last Week: 7	Jason Vargas - Vargas is either going to be a big reason the Angels got back into the Wild Card race or he is going to be a nice trade chip at the deadline.
5		-- 0 Last Week: 5	C.J. Wilson - He finally went seven innings! Hallelujah!
6		-- 0 Last Week: 6	Albert Pujols - It used to be that a week of an .852 OPS was a mild disappointment for The Machine. Now it is a sign of hope.
7		+3 Last Week: 10	Alberto Callaspo - Has Alberto Callaspo ever hit a homer that wasn't of critical importance?
8		-4 Last Week: 4	Ernesto Frieri - Frieri seemed to go out of his way this week to make sure that Ryan Madson gets pushed into the closer job sooner rather than alter.
9		+7 Last Week: 16	Jerome Williams - Williams is giving the Angels everything they thought they were getting from Blanton and yet I still fear he will be moved back to the bullpen when Weaver comes back.
10		+1 Last Week: 11	Scott Downs - With as bad as the rest of the pen has been, what does Scioscia have to lose by letting Downs face a few righties?
11		-3 Last Week: 8	Erick Aybar - You have to love a leadoff man with a .263 OBP.
12		+5 Last Week: 17	Chris Iannetta - Iannetta drew seven walks in the last week. Josh Hamilton has ten walks all season.
13		+2 Last Week: 15	Josh Hamilton - A .304 batting average and .478 slugging last week for Hamilton? Is this real life?
14		-5 Last Week: 9	Dane De La Rosa - His arm still hasn't fallen off, but it sure seems like his effectiveness has taken a big hit.
15		+8 Last Week: 23	Robert Coello - From completely anonymous to pitching six innings in four appearances this week to arguably make him a vital part of the Angel bullpen. Yeah, that is totally normal and sustainable.
16		-4 Last Week: 12	Michael Kohn - The first rule of relief pitching is you don't walk Jeff Keppinger on four pitches with the bases loaded.
17		+5 Last Week: 22	J.B. Shuck  - Alright, I give in. Shuck ain't half bad with the bat. He's kind of a circus in the field sometimes though.
18		+1 Last Week: 19	Brendan Harris - Going into the season, I think we an all safely say that there was no scenario that anyone envisioned in which Brendan Harris would have to play both left field and first base.
19		-1 Last Week: 18	Hank Conger - Since his defensive debacle in Houston, Conger has only made two starts, both with Wilson on the mound. So much for the proclamation that he'd start stealing playing time from Iannetta.
20		-7 Last Week: 13	Garrett Richards - So what do the Angels do with Richards now? They shifted him back to the bullpen because they thought he'd be a weapon and now he kind of stinks in that role.
21		-7 Last Week: 14	Joe Blanton - Nine innings pitched this week and 23(!) hits allowed. If he keeps his rotation spot after Weaver comes back, then Scioscia really does need to be fired.
22		-- 0 Last Week: n/a	Michael Roth - Roth has a future in this league but for now he is the designated sacrificial lamb.
23		-2 Last Week: 21	Luis Jimenez - Well, it was fun while it lasted. See you in September, Lucho.
24		-4 Last Week: 20	Mark Lowe - With Madson and Burnett due back in the coming week or two, Lowe should probably start looking for apartments in Salt Lake.
25		-1 Last Week: 24	Barry Enright - Finally., someone who can make Joe Blanton look good by comparison.

Dropped from rankings: Scott Cousins (kicked to curb)

Biggest Riser: Coello, up eight spots

Biggest Dropper: Blanton and Richards, down seven spots each

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The May 20th, 2013 edition of daily news for the Los Angeles Angels including Burnett on the verge of returning, Nelson claimed, Weaver progressing and much more...

The Story: Sean Burnett could be activated as soon as Tuesday.

The Monkey Says: The sooner the better as the bullpen seems like it is on the verge of just completely imploding.

The Story: The Angels claimed infielder Chris Nelson on waivers and Luis Jimenez was optioned to Triple-A.

The Monkey Says: Nelson isn't any good, but he can play multiple positions and is a better option to have sitting on the bench gathering rust than Luis Jimenez who could benefit from getting some regular playing time. Scott Cousins was DFA'd to make room on the 40-man roster for Nelson.

After a rather tumultuous series against the White Sox the Angels managed to keep the final game of the series under their control the entire 9 innings to record a much needed win. New ace of the staff Jason Vargas put up another 0'fer in 7 IP, though he lost his command at times leading to 3 walks in a 114 pitch out, although he did strike out 6. The Angels offense has settled nicely even if Hamilton is still struggling, though he's showing signs of being able to make consistent contact instead of K'ing on 3 pitches every AB. The pitching probably won't settle as nicely as the offense has in the past week, but if Vargas can keep putting up these ridiculously high quality starts the Angels will be in an improved position from a month ago.Once Weaver comes up you can chalk the Angels pitching staff up to being actually serviceable, with ace Weaver leading the charge and the refreshed C.J Wilson manning the #2 spot in the rotation.

Any good pitching staff builds itself off of 3 quality starters and having the off-and-on Hanson at 4 is something the team can work with, though Blanton is just something we'll have to deal with for now. Still think Garrett Richards should be pitching 5th since that spot is best used for developing young starters.The Angels are actually a couple steps away from solidifying their rotation, though it's still left to be seen whether or not they can get it together in time. 

We can be thankful the Angels pulled together a nice win on a Sunday, something we haven't seen in a good while. Let us rejoice and be glad.

Angels 6 White Sox 2

This is the kind of game that drives Angels fans crazy. The start of the game brought with all the usual heartbreak of a Joe Blanton start. Then all of a sudden an unknown reliever bails them out and the offense starts hitting the cover off the ball. Just when it looks like a laugher, the bullpen comes in and mucks it all up as the opposing team storms back. Finally, the Halos add on a couple of late runs to take a very much needed victory. A wild, weird way to win a ballgame.

Angels 12 White Sox 9

Confession time. I didn't actually watch this game. (full disclosure; I was chaperoning a high school prom...I know fun right?) The truth is I didn't really need to watch this game since I think we all could have guessed the outcome. The only questions we had were in the detail of the Angels losing, not the actual result. Would it be a blowout or a low scoring affair? Would the bullpen cause the loss or the inept Angel's offense? Would CJ Wilson try to break the scoreboard pitch counter by throwing 425 pitches in 4 innings? These days, it's all in the way the team sucks, not the actual losses that are piling up.

Angels 0 White Sox 3

Wow. Who would have thought we'd be seeing headlines like that only two years into the Pujols contract. Most people speculated we wouldn't be seeing any significant problems with him until about 5-6 years into the contract. It seems now that the Angels have some serious deliberating to do on the topic of what is going to happen with Pujols. I don't want to come off as sensationalist or anything, but Pujols has been facing some problems that have caused his on-field play to suffer in a big way. Fortunately these are problems that can be easily overcome, we can see Pujols get back to form, but it's going to take proactive measurements on the part of the Angels brass. Letting Pujols stick in the 3-hole indefinitely where he can rot away due to his foot and knee problems have already proven to do farm more harm to this team than good. On ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball this past weekend the announcers working over the Angels/White Sox game were in marvel at the fact that Pujols was playing through serious pain. They used words like "grinding" to describe his incredible fortitude to stay on the field every day and help his team win. They made it sound like a positive he's working through pain to play right now, but the fact is it's not even close to a positive.

Pujols' plantar fasciitis and weakened knee from offseason surgery are sapping his ability to drive the ball on consistent basis. No major league hitter can be expected to drive a ball on a consistent basis when they're losing a serious amount of drive from the lower body. No torque and no momentum to carry the upper body can do damage to a hitters power stroke, which has been made clear by Pujols dipping SLG%. From April 20th to May 14th Pujols SLG% had dropped nearly 100 points, from 508. to 416., marking a drop in his ability to drive a ball. We all know how much pride Pujols has, and as a veteran he wants to be able to inject leadership into the club and by that he wants to be on the field every day. However, should he be hitting in the lineup every day when his problems are costing this team?

As much as Pujols doesn't like it he needs to spend some time on the DL; not a lot of time, but enough to rest his feet and legs. It might seem daunting to lose Pujols to the 15 day DL when the Angels are strapped for depth and serious power hitters, but in all truthfulness are they really that strapped? If Pujols were to hit the DL Trumbo could easily man 1B every day, and while nobody wants to see J.B Shuck playing every single day he can hold down LF without serious problems. Even if the Angels don't want to see Shuck out there every day they could shift Trumbo to the OF and have Luis Jimenez play 1B every now and again, as he's proved to be able to do so. We all know how big the Angels fetish is for turning everyone on the roster into super-utility players; with Jimenez, Trumbo, Harris, Shuck and eventually Kole Calhoun, the Angels have enough depth to cover the field in Pujols absence.