Playing like they mean it 

Posted 1:09 PM by Sean
According to Rex Hudler's comments last night, that je ne sais quoi I referred to yesterday is apparently better known as "consistency." Whatever, man. You know, I'm almost positive Rex used to be a better announcer back when he was still getting high.

Anyway, the Angels put quite a few of the pieces together against the Royals last night. Colon continued his second-half surge, bases were run intelligently, and the bats came gloriously alive. For whatever reason, over the last couple of weeks the Angels have gone from a team that won games virtually by accident to one that is genuinely outplaying their opponents. And Jose Guillen promises more: "We're coming, and we're coming really hard. This is our time now."

Possibly the most curious thing about last night's win was the fact that the Angels started both Adam Kennedy and Tim Salmon against the left-handed Darrell May:

2004 v LHP
Kennedy - .213/.315/.298
Salmon - .147/.195/.173

I mean, good God. As noted previously, Kennedy's more or less inevitable at this point, but at least his defense mitigates. Salmon is a DH! And yes, I know he had what was very generously called a hit last night.

The Angels face one of the best lefties around on Saturday, when Johan Santana starts for the Twins in Anaheim. I'm not sure why Salmon is going against his historical trend and hitting lefties so poorly these days, but how sad is it that I'm rooting for Josh Paul or Curtis Pride to DH?