@
Texas Rangers    (56-42) @  Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim  (52-46)

Pitching Probables: TEX – C.J Wilson (10-3, 3.11 ERA)  LAA – Jered Weaver (12-4, 1.90 ERA)

Game Info: 12:35 PM PT; TV - FS-W; Radio - KLAA 830 AM

Last night was one more game chipped off the standings and a huge momentum shift for this series. It only seems fit that this series would come down to this, a rubber match which could give the Angels a better chance at taking first earlier in the second half. God knows we don't want to deal with any late season dramatics by these two teams, I'd rather see the Angels head into the last month of the season leading the standings by at least 15 games. This has all the makings of a turning point in the Angels season, and a serious turning point at that. Not one of those "uh-oh, they've been hot for the past 4 days, could it be magic?", this is a real turning point here folks. This is about as big as a regular season series can get if it isn't a Red Sox v Yankees game, we all know how much ESPN fawns over those games. 

The Rangers dreaded 12 game winning streak has finally come to end, in spectacular fashion at that. Now that the Rangers have begun to lose their momentum now is the the perfect time for the Angels to get hot again and overtake the lead. Aside from when the Rangers go on their ridiculous tears every other month or so they play pretty average baseball, the only reason they are able to create big leads is because of a spectacular month or two in a full season. If the Angels can catch them on their way back down to earth that would set us up nicely for a strong post-season run.

Angels 9 Rangers 8 

@
Texas Rangers  (56-41) @ Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (51-46)

Pitching Probables: TEX – Derek Holland (8-4, 4.32 ERA)  LAA – Dan Haren (10-6, 2.75 ERA)

Game Info: 7:05 PM PT; TV - KCOP; Radio - KLAA 830 AM

Just a week ago everyone was clamoring and freaking out at the fact that the Angels were going into the second half just a game behind Texas with the necessary momentum to overtake them in one fell swoop. Now we're looking at a 5 game deficiet, and possibly more, if the Angels don't finish off this series strong. Good thing the baseball gods, or more likely the schedulers, have set up Haren and Weaver to finish off this series. The only bad thing about this game, which honestly terrifies the crap out of me, is Derek Holland. 

This week in the world of Angels on Twitter, we get some good and some bad.  The good?  Another Angel joins Twitter while another breaks some actual news.  The bad?  The news that was broken certainly sounds bad, as does reading tweets about Torii Hunter's erection.  Of course, nothing is as bad as Chevy Clarke who went upped his horrible Twittering to unprecedented levels of inanity.

Angel prospect Garrett Richards is the newest Angel to join Twitter - @GRICHARDS26 New to the twitter world. Thanks for following me. Much love.

• He's lucky his name is Garrett, otherwise I don't think I would be able to condone the incredibly dated use of the phrase "much love," especially from a white boy from Oklahoma.

Trevor Reckling with breaking news about his own health - @TRECKLING30 All my fans family and friends pray that my results for mri go well on friday

• Ugh, that sucks.  Reckling finally seemed to have his career back on track and now he could be facing major health problems.  On the other hand, this is why Twitter is so cool, because I doubt we would have heard about this injury otherwise.

Torii Hunter is getting older, but still makes boner jokes - @toriihunter48 Thanks to everyone who gave me a Bday s/o. I'm 36 years young and i don't need Viagra yet! LOL......

• He may not need Viagra, but given his flimsy OPS this season, I certainly wouldn't mind if he started popping some HGH pills.

Trevor Bell really likes women's soccer, but not for the reason you think - @TrevBe22 Would it be weird if I proposed via twitter to @alexmorgan13? Don't tempt me. #hottestfemaleathleteeverinvented

• Take it easy there, Trevor.  She's cute, but she isn't that hot.  Heck, with Hope Solo around, she probably isn't even the most attractive lady on the US Soccer team.

...and finally, my favorite part of this feature, Chevy Clarke.  This might've been the most painful week of Chevy tweets yet.  I honestly don't remember a single day when I didn't look at my "Angel tweets" list and see it eniterly comsumed by Clarke's moronic musings.  It is almost like he is trying to antagonize me, and when you see what he did the other day, you'll understand why I say that.  And as we remind you every week, if you don't follow Chevy... don't, especially now that he seems to be upping the blather to unprecedented levels.

@OfficialChevy #triviatime I'm about to ask a question to my followers. Whoever gets it right... I'm callin u...

• Oh my Lord, this was the worst Chevy has ever been.  I don't know why he thought this was a good idea but he kept trying to get this stupid quiz going, asking brain-busting questions like what his favorite ice cream is and what color his room is painted.  And the prize?  A call from Chevy.  Who in their right mind would want that?  Can you imagine how annoying he must be in person?  I almost joined in on the guessing in hopes that I could win and then have him call me so I could tell him in person to shut the hell up.

@OfficialChevy Everybody tweet me ur best smiley face and i'm retweeting them....#ChevyTrain

• If there is one thing I hate more than mindless retweets, it is freaking emoticons.  Why am I not surprised to see him heartily endorsing both.

Hank Conger says he understands why he was sent back down to Triple-A yesterday, but does he, and Angel fans in general, understand the entire line of logic behind returning the promising prospect to the minor leagues?

No, the real reason behind Conger getting demoted wasn't Jeff Mathis threatening once again to make public whatever compromising photos of Scioscia that we all suspect he's been lording over him for years.  OK, maybe that has a little bit to do with it, but the primary reason has more to do with the Angels desire to improve over Jeff Mathis both now and in the long-term.

The long-term benefit of this move is the most obvious.  Hank Conger may be one of the best catching prospects in baseball, but he just isn't quite ready for The Show yet.  The big knock on Conger before the season was that his defense may not be good enough to keep him in the majors.  At times, Conger has proven those doubters wrong, but at other points they looked very right.  The problem was that Conger was so focused on trying to gets his defense up to Mike Scioscia's lofty standards that it caused him to let the rest of his game to get away from him.

The July 20th, 2011 edition of daily news for the LA Angels including Hank Conger gets demoted to Triple-A, Tony Reagins could be on the hot seat, Mark Gubicza's daughter overcomes a serious medical condition and much more...

The Story: Hank Conger was demoted to Triple-A, but is taking it in stride.

The Monkey Says: This was pretty surprising and I know not everyone is happy about it, but it might actually have been the smart thing to do.  I'll explain that more later today, as well as why this move could mean a trade is in the works to bolster the catching position.  I will say now though that we should all be glad that Hank understands that this move is being made both in his and the club's best interests.

The Story: Ken Rosenthal believes that Tony Reagins' job security is starting to get shaky.

The Monkey Says: Rosenthal isn't saying he is on the hot seat yet, but he could be getting there after the backlash from the Wells trade and the fallout of the Kazmir trade.  Personally, I think Arte Moreno isn't much one for making heads roll, so I would be that he will give Tony another year to clean up the mess he has created of late.  However, if Reagins screws something up again at this deadline, that could change.

So much for the much anticipated Angels-Rangers showdown, eh?  Texas clearly came ready to throwdown, but all the Angels could manage to do was roll over and take their beating.

Rangers 7, Angels 0

If this game was in any way representative of how the rest of the AL West race is going to go, count me out.  This wasn't just about the Rangers being better than the Angels, this loss definitely had a little bit of that, but it had a whole lot more of the Angels just not having any fight in them.

There was never any threat of a rally to get back into the game.  There was never even any real frustration that the Halos were being completely stifled by Alexi Ogando.  There wasn't even any sense of shame or embarrassment that the Rangers got to pile on with three salt-in-the-wound homers off of Michael "The Human Gas Can" Kohn.

I have to say that I kind of saw this coming (thus my 9-2 loss pre-game prediction), but that doesn't mean it still doesn't hurt.  I just hope that this thumping snaps them out of this post-break malaise that the team is clearly mired in.