Orange County Register

It’s another installment of “On the Internet, Nobody Knows You’re a Blog,” our semi-regular conversations with Angels bloggers. Rev Halofan (of Halos Heaven) and I discussed Vladimir Guerrero’s future — how he ages, where he ages, what we’ll say about him when he leaves and why the past five years of Angels baseball might live on forever, like classic rock.

me: What do you think Vlad Guerrero’s decline phase will look like?

Rev: ugh
Well this part is cloudy as I am a huge fan and I want a slow, slow decline
The last thing to go in a player is reflexes, so Vladdy may end up hitting .290 with singles
The speed is gone
The power will go next

me: The speed looks painful. I’ve never seen a guy who hurts MY knees more to watch run.

Rev: But he can still turn on pitches anywhere a mile near the strike zone
so if his ego goes into check, he can become a singles hitter

me: A singles hitter with no speed, power or defense. … does that play anywhere?

Rev: If that singles hitter is batting .300
or .350
perhaps.

me: He’s got 393 homers, 2150 hits .. does he get 500, does he get 3000?

Rev: No on 500
he is going to have to give that up or the decline will be laughable (this assumes worse case scenarios that as a fan I repudiate, but
as an honest look, yeah, what is likely)
200 hits average over less than five full seasons gets him to 3K
so SURE he gets to 3K!

me: I don’t know how you feel about PECOTA, but its comps for him at age 34 are mainly guys who collapsed around now (Juan Gonzalez, Jim Rice, Joe Torre, George Scott) but led by Dave Winfield, who seems fitting in a lot of ways and had a very gentle and satisfying descent. Any of those seem right to you?

Rev: Well Torre was a catcher and Juan-Gone was likely a juicer, so Wilie Mays and Dave Winfield are good comps

me: I think the hits will be hard because I can’t necessarily see him playing more than 110 games per season any more. The homers … I don’t know, go DH in Texas or something and he might have 150 more homers in him.

Rev: plus Juan Gone - like Vlad, was probably older than his birth certificate initially said

Rev: When Vlad tries to hit a single he succeeds. So many of his strikeouts are dreaming of moon shots.

me: If I’m not mistaken, you weren’t blogging anywhere when the Angels signed him. If you had been, what would you have written about the contract at the time?

Rev: I was too
And I was joyous, I will find you the link

Rev: http://halofan.livejournal.com/2004/01/11/

me: You wrote:
“This feels like when I was 17 and Reggie Jackson signed with the team. The papers hype you into a state of frenzy. Fans of other teams who are cool get excited for you. Jerks are revealed as they sneer that this nothing worth getting excited about. You learn a lot as you live large.”

me: Did you have any concerns? The length of the deal? His back?

Rev: the Mets were concerned about his back
HA HA HA HA HA

me: I did find this lineup you devised with Vlad batting second: http://halofan.livejournal.com/2004/04/22/ What the heck?

Rev: Funny how sloppy you get with a blog when nobody is reading it
There are quite a few embarrassments in the old blog
actually that lineup is not half bad
it was predicated on the assumption Vlad should steal 40 bags

me: The media write glowing pieces about guys who take hometown discounts to stay with a team, right? Well, now there’s speculation that Vlad might be the next guy to get screwed by the free agent market, economy plus age plus injury this year… As a fan, do you think it’s ever appropriate for a team to give the player an extra generous deal for sentimental reasons?

Rev: Oh yeah.
The reason Vlad is on thin ice is summed up in two words:
Torii Hunter
The charisma makes him the face of the franchise
that smile supplants the stats

me: Do you support bringing him back? Even if he’s singles-hitting Vlad?

Rev: Yes, for sentimental reasons
and I do believe he still might have a lot of that pop left
nobody is going to bowl him over with an offer so we are bound to come to some sort of agreement

Rev: maybe 3+1, 8 a year, some incentives

me: So, let’s assume he doesn’t sign… he goes to Texas or Detroit or something…
How well will fans remember him? I mean, the guy is undeniably awesome,
one of the great signings in team history,

Rev: I have him at #2 or #3 all time Angel

me: but he sort of plays weird, you know? He’s all floppy and awkward looking, and swings at terrible pitches,

Rev: that is his game
and it works

me: right. It’s great for the game … but will fans remember him justly?
I mean, GA’s game was what it was and they bashed him as lazy.

me: Frankie’s was what it was and they bashed him as nerve-inducing

Rev: People bash Vlad for being casual, reflexive and not speaking English, but anyone who seriously looks at what he has produced cannot even consider bashing him
His worst years as an Angel was better than all but a handful of Angel offensive seasons
but no ring, no love as far as this crowd is concerned

me: so he’s No. 2 or 3 on your list now… if we polled fans in five years, you think 2 or 3?
That’s another thing — the postseason record might hang around him when he leaves.
Hits like Mathis in the postseason. Now, I don’t hold that against him, and you probably don’t, but when a guy leaves it seems like fans remember the worst

Rev: depends on the next 5 years - if Brandon Wood leads us to 2 titles in that span, no. If we tank it off the deep end and wander in the desert, he might be recalled as better than Salmon
the fog of memory

Rev: I think if the Angels have four or five lousy years, no postseason, 3rd place finish, that the legion of fans these golden years produced will control the public memory of the team

me: Ah, interesting. So, like, the fact that all the music of the 80s sucked means we still idolize the music of the 70s
(obviously not all the music of the 80s sucked. But close enough)

Rev: exactly
a matter of demographics - more boomers and less gen-xers means Hendrix is worth more legacy wise than U2

me: If the Angels were to fall out of it — say, more than 12 back at the trading deadline — is Vlad trade bait?

Rev: no way
there is something that class organizations do and don’t do and trading Vlad is no-no
The Angels want to be seen as a west coast Yankees and they maintain their
p’s and q’s

me: It seems like Vlad, as much as anybody this side of Arte and Stoneman, is responsible for them being the Yanks of the West, too.
I mean, 2002 could have EASILY been a fluke, one and done
Vlad made them a perennial

Rev: I counted the miracles of the 2002 postseason and lost count even before game 6. Meanwhile Vlad punches the clock of greatness on a regular basis.

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