ANAHEIM — Was it wild to wonder whether the Angels could make the playoffs?
I know it’s been 10 years, but be honest: Didn’t it seem within the realm of possibility while the Halos were riding a run-scoring spree to eight consecutive wins last week, including three against the defending World Series champion Dodgers?
Be open-minded and remember, a few days ago we did witness the Angels pull up and out of a 4-15 nosedive that had left them 12-19 and draw even at .500 – and do it without their sole superstar Mike Trout, who is inching his way back from the bruised left knee that has sidelined him all month.
Be kind, dear reader, and indulge me. Give me this, at least: It’s not like anyone in the American League West is running away with the division. The Seattle Mariners, preseason favorites to win it, are in first place, yes. But they’ve lost four of six games and, at 29-23, are just four games ahead of the Angels, who entered play Monday in third.
Oh, but be for real, Manager Ron Washington said.
Be serious.
The playoffs? It’s May; the postseason might as well be a million years away.
The goal now for the Angels is to imagineer meaningful playing opportunities. To give their young stars game reps of real import. Here, now, in the regular season. That’s a tough enough assignment.
“When you have a stretch like that and you’re in May, you ain’t thinking about the playoffs,” Washington said. “You thinking about the moment you are having right there. Create the memories there; we never had a thought about no playoff.”
No, after the major league’s longest postseason drought, the Angels probably shouldn’t spend energy picturing themselves among baseball’s playoff participants – even if that’s supposed to be the whole point of this sporting enterprise.
But be realistic.
Their stay at .500 lasted just one day, and Monday’s 5-1 Memorial Day loss to the visiting New York Yankees was the Halos’ third in a row, another ticket to a tailspin in hand.
As much fun as the Angels had during their torrid eight-game joyride against the Dodgers and Athletics – 7.6 runs per game; a .291 team batting average with a .903 OPS and 61 runs – all that offense only obscured a host of issues, like the fact that they issue too many walks and strike out too few hitters.
Angels pitchers have walked 216 batters this season – more than any other major league club. And they have registered 387 strikeouts, fourth-fewest in baseball.
The Angels’ defense is also suspect. They’ve made 36 errors in 43 games, the fourth-most in baseball and a tally that included an error in six of the eight games during their winning streak – what normally would have been a sign of a team struggling and not surging.
Alas, baseball be like that.
Winning cures all; hitting hides your warts. And when you live and die with the long ball, as the Angels do, you’re living real well when you hit 19 home runs in eight games, including a franchise-record seven consecutive games with at least two homers.
Binge-homering like that isn’t sustainable, though. Washington, the baseball lifer, stressed as much Monday afternoon: “Sustaining that offense we had? That’s impossible, that’s impossible.”
He’s right, you can’t replicate it – the Angels’ hitters went from having all the answers at the plate to getting schooled by the Miami Marlins’ Janson Junk this past weekend and the Yankees’ Ryan Yarbrough on Monday, when they were off-key all night to the tune of five hits and 11 strikeouts.
“It’s not what it was, the way we were swinging the bat, you’d think we’d have three or four guys in that lineup clicking,” Washington said after the loss. “But Miami came up in here and put us away, and now we’re trying to find it back again.
“It is what it is. Seems like, my offense, when everybody is going well, it’s going well. And when they’re not going well, it’s not going well. If we had the formula, we’d fix it. Just gotta keep coming every day and keep workin’.”
But you can learn from the good times too, and spending eight days taking in the view at the top of the world might even alter your team DNA a few strands.
“You’re thinking about the moment you are having, creating the memories there,” Washington said pregame. “But we never had a thought about no playoff.”
So, no, the Angels are not thinking crazy, they’re not concerned with the postseason – nor is any sensible onlooker; as of Monday morning, fangraphs.com gave the Halos have only a 2.7% chance of reaching the postseason and baseball-reference.com had them at 1.4% to sneak in as a wild-card team.
Be that as it may, but … “If it was in September,” Washington said, “then you have a chance to think about a playoff.”
And if it turns out we are talking about Angels playoff baseball in September, I’d think we’d also be talking about where they’d be without that bountiful stretch in May – even if no one with any sense was thinking a wit about the playoffs then.
No, seeing the Angels get shut down by the Yankees on Monday, that fantastic notion felt far, far away indeed.