Los Angeles Angels: This rotation is good enough to make the playoffs
By Jason Reed
The Los Angeles Angels’ biggest problem heading into the 2020 season appears to be the starting rotation, which is decent enough to win in the regular season.
The Los Angeles Angels‘ biggest need heading into the offseason was starting pitching and the front office swung and missed on every big-name starting pitcher on the market. The team was able to audible perfectly and sign Anthony Rendon, but that still did not help the starting rotation.
The front office has made some additions to the starting rotation, but they certainly were not the names that fans were hoping to be the biggest additions of the winter. Julio Teheran signed a one-year contract with the team and the Baltimore Orioles traded Dylan Bundy to the Angels.
There is still time for the Angels to make more additions to the starting rotation, but I personally would not expect the front office to improve the rotation, based on a mixture of who is still available and how much the team is already spending.
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While fans are excited about the powerful lineup that the Angels are going to field night in and night out, there are still concerns around the starting rotation. It could definitely get better but the starting rotation is actually good enough to make it to the playoffs.
First of all, the Angels actually have a five-man rotation full of decent big-league pitchers. Shohei Ohtani, Teheran, Andrew Heaney, Griffin Canning and Bundy make up the starting rotation. The problem is health. The Angels are notoriously a hurt team and that rotation is two injuries away from falling apart.
The great thing about the team this year is that they do not need an elite rotation to win games. This is a lineup that is going to score runs and as long as the pitching staff can keep games to 4-5 runs each then the Angels can absolutely win 90 games this season.
The team also has a savvy manager that can manage pitchers and a bullpen that has some solid arms. As long as Maddon runs the operation smoothly, which he should, then this is a pitching staff that should play the “game-manager quarterback” role and let the offense win games.
The problem is the playoffs. We have seen it the last two seasons with the Oakland Athletics, who managed their way to October with a good offense but could not make it out of the wild-card round. When the pitching gets better in October and the lineups get scarier this will be an issue for the Halos.
Next. Angels' best move to make would be Matthew Boyd. dark
But right now, the Los Angeles Angels’ main objective is to make the playoffs first. Once they get there anything can happen and just getting there in year one with Rendon is something to build.