A Brief History of the Halosphere 

Posted 12:28 PM by Sean
I originally compiled this on a whim as part of a longer entry, but it looks like it's something I might want to occasionally revisit, so I'm giving it it's own entry and updating it as warranted. Perm link here.

Most recent update: buried Purgatory Online, resurrected Bjoern's Baseball Blog.

Pre-history: Before the dawn of the Angels blogs, there was (and, I think, still is) an online journal of an Angels fan dating back into the 90's. I only saw it once and didn't save the hyperlink, so if anyone has it, let me know and I'll update. While not a blog, precisely, as it contained no links and didn't read as if it were written for the public, it was pretty well updated, mostly with game recaps.

May, 2002 - October, 2002: Purgatory Online, the beta version. Originally conceived as a general purpose blog that would talk a lot, but not exclusively, about baseball, I published a mixed-bag of stuff that I eventually wiped out when I decided to focus on the Angels.

October 10, 2002: First "real" Purgatory Online entry is posted.

January 27, 2003: "Halodan" begins publishing Halos Hardball. In what is probably a bad karmic decision, his first entry is about football.

April 12, 2003: Karma catches up. Halos Hardball ceases to be.

July 10, 2003: The late, lamented The Monkey's Paw publishes its first entry.

September 8, 2003: The late, lamented The Monkey's Paw publishes its last entry.

October 16, 2003: Halofan begins publishing at the Anaheim Angels Blog.

February 3, 2004: Rob's 6-4-2, doing double duty as an Angels/Dodgers blog, debuts.

February 15, 2004: Richard jumps into the mix with The Pearly Gates, a blend of five parts Angels blogging to one part right-leaning politics.

March 15, 2004: Chronicles of the Lads becomes the third Angels blog to start up in the space of 40 days. Chronicles will eventually find a niche as "the one who does actual statistical research."

March 25, 2004, 2:47 a.m.: ESPN correspondent Matt Allen moves from the Expos beat to the Angels beat, and converts his Expos blog to an Angels blog called Inside the Halo. ItH's focus is on analysis for fantasy baseball purposes.

March 25, 2004, 9:43 p.m.: Yet another new Angels blog, League of Angels, arrives on the scene. Technically, I suppose this was the first collaborative Angels blog, but the ratio of Jeff to Joe has been something like 9:1, so decide for yourself. Until Halofan's decampment, League of Angels was the sole Angels blog to be affiliated with a bloglomerate, in their case the Most Valuable Network.

June 7, 2004: Watching Jeff DaVanon becomes the first Angels blog to single out a particular player for worship. Inexplicably, that player is Jeff DaVanon, a servicable but unspectacular reserve outfielder.

September 11, 2004: Dawn of The Acerbic Alchemist.

October 6, 2004: As the ill-fated 2004 postseason begins, so too does the Haloblog.

December 29, 2004: The Halo Herald is born.

March 1, 2005: Stephen Smith, whose invaluable Future Angels site has been keeping track of Angels prospects for years, adds a blog.

March 17, 2005: The Acerbic Alchemist joins The Pearly Gates.

March 22, 2005: Halofan enfrocked, ensconces self in SportsBlogs.

March 26, 2005: The Halosphere gets its first international member, Bjoern's Baseball Blog.

April 24, 2005: L.A. Seitz of Chicago takes another stab. After abortive attempts at Angels blogging in January, April, and June, 2003 and February and July 2004, this one appears to stick.

August 5, 2005: Inside the Halo grinds to a halt.

August 19, 2005: Bjoern's Baseball Blog buys the farm.

November 26, 2005: Bjoern's Baseball Blog thrusts its mottled arm from its still-fresh grave and drags its lively corpse back into the sunlight. "Braaaaains," it croaks, re-entering the Halosphere. "Braaaaaains..."

December 27, 2005: Purgatory Online blows out the candles, turns out the lamps, and lights its pyre with its trading stamps.

Look homeward, Angels 

Posted 9:54 AM by Sean
Apparently, the Angels have been scouting around for relievers, most recently taking a look at Detroit's Gary Knotts. As in, 5.45 lifetime ERA, .795 lifetime OPSA (.900 versus righties!) Gary Knotts. Now, a look's just a look, and lookin's free. But it seems to me that if Chris Bootcheck (10 scoreless innings this spring) is showing signs of living up to the hype he used to get a couple of years ago, a smart feller might want him in the bullpen to see what develops.

In the same article, by the way, we note that Kelvim Escobar and Carlos Zambrano, the starters for today's Angels-Cubs game, are described as "a matchup of burly Venezuelans." I am, of course, delighted to see that the Register has found a way to transport a writer away from covering bare-knuckle boxing in the 1890's and put him on the Angels beat.

Antennas pointed in the right direction 

Posted 9:15 AM by Sean
I think this is new: video clips on the Angels front page that load and play automatically. At the moment, the video is of Bill Stoneman discussing the Angels' off-season moves; he's fairly candid about the fact that their first choice was to pursue a starting pitcher (names aren't mentioned, but we all know he's mostly talking about Matt Clement), and that they decided to upgrade at shortstop only after they found out that the best they were going to do at SP was Paul Byrd. Of course, Byrd seems to be providing some cause for optimism this spring, whereas Clement has struggled a bit with the Red Sox.

In other video-related news, Arte - marketing genius that he is - has apparently figured out a way to have the pictures and descriptions of Angels games beamed through the air to receiver boxes in Southern Californians' living rooms on 158 of the 162 occasions the team is scheduled to play. The downside of this is that I'll have to listen to Rex Hudler that much more. Hey, Rex - the heat's off, man. Start toking again! Seriously. You used to be better.

His surgeon is one Montgomery Scott, apparently 

Posted 9:12 AM by Sean
Adam Kennedy "on course to return to the Angels in late April?" Wow. Looks like Figgins is going to have to have a pretty hot start if he wants to play every day...

Angels 9, Padres 1 

Posted 4:34 PM by Sean
Directly contradicting my previous post, the Angels packed the lineup with reserves today but nevertheless waxed San Diego. Most encouraging: Paul Byrd threw six scoreless innings. He apparently had his sinker working, as well, as the infield turned three double plays and had a chance at a fourth.

If we could just get the motors going in the regular lineup...

Solidification 

Posted 10:29 AM by Sean
The serious bidness of spring training has commenced for the Angels. In addition to all five starters getting more or less in shape and taking their regular starts, it now appears that Scioscia has decided on Jeff DaVanon as his DH and 2-spot hitter, and that the regulars will be getting most of the at-bats from here on in. Well, good. In the former case, I might argue that Kotchman should be the regular DH, but I suspect that he'll be getting plenty of at-bats anyway, and the important thing is that the team be allowed to find its routine.

The secret to a good life is knowin' when you're through 

Posted 10:23 AM by Sean
The Times keeps tabs on Tim Salmon, who seems to be shooting for a return in August or September.

If he's confident enough to play in 2006, he'd probably be willing to sign a contract for something near the major league minimum of $316,000, preferably with the Angels.

If the only offers he gets are from East Coast or Midwest teams that would force him to uproot his family, Salmon will strongly consider retirement.

There's no quote from Salmon to back up this "major league minimum" business, but it might be an interesting option to have. I strongly suspect, however, that it will be difficult to find room on the roster for a DH-only guy, since Erstad will still be under contract in 2006 and there's just no way Kotchman won't be playing every day by then (barring injury or trade).

Roulette 

Posted 10:16 AM by Sean
Alan Schwartz reviews the Red Sox-Angels-Cardinals shortstop-go-round. The verdict, predictably, seems to be that the Bostons improved considerably, the Angels improved a little, and the Cardinals got David Eckstein. To his credit, Schwartz looks deeply enough to see that the defensive upgrade the Angels get is particularly important, since they'll have either McPherson or Quinlan at third. I'm not sure I buy that Cabrera accounted for "60 extra outs" over Eckstein last year (particularly when adjusted for playing behind Derek Lowe on several occasions), but he's certainly going to take at least a little pressure off the hot corner.

Got the time tick-tick-tickin' in my head 

Posted 3:52 PM by Sean
I'm not exactly sure what the reason is behind my (more than usually) elongated blogging funk, but I know this blog ain't dead yet. Truth be told, I've always thought that my proper focus should be on what happens on the field, rather than what happens off the field, so talking about games I can't watch sort of bores me. That should all change come opening day.

Speaking of which, due to various circumstances, I'm thinking of not subscribing to the "Extra Innings" package this year, but rather to the streaming broadcasts through MLB.com. I'll be clear on this - it's not my first choice. The only advantage to mlb.com that I can see is that I should be able to access the games even when I'm not at home. However, the games I miss during the year because I'm away from home are generally games I'd miss even if I had Web access to them, so I suspect that realistically I'd only catch five or so more games. And the downside seems pretty big - blurry video, dropped connections, watching at my computer desk rather than on the couch, etc. But on the other other hand, I suppose it is about half the cost...anyway, if anyone still reads this blog, and has any experience with MLB.com's video, drop me a line at purgatoryonline@yahoo.com, willya?

All that said, let me make note of a couple of changes in the lives of some of my fellow Angels bloggers. Josh has folded the tent on Acerbic Alchemist and shacked up (metaphorically, as far as I know) with Richard at The Pearly Gates. I believe this makes TPG the first collaborative Angels blog.

Halofan, meanwhile, has ported himself to the SportsBlogs conglomerate, a maneuver that's garnered him a snazzy new site and, apparently, the ReverendPersona plugin. I'm nonplussed about this one. To be honest, I'm not really on board with the whole sports blog conglomeration idea; generally when I'm approached by one my first reaction is to say "but what will you do when I decide to take two weeks off?" Beyond mere slothfulness on my part, though, I think that what I value most about this blog - and most of the ones I read - is the sense that it's an individual effort. Sure, the formatting is crap, and the content grows at the speed of Dutch Elm Disease - but that's what I like about it. It's mine. I don't have to promote anybody; I can call Athletics Nation a sack of mewling crybabies if I want to and nobody cares (or, indeed, knows).

Don't get me wrong - I think Halo Heaven is going to be a must-read. It's just weird to see the guy who was pretty much the exemplar of that iconoclastic spirit join in any enterprise that involves working with fans of the Oakland Green Weenies.

In honor of these changes, I commit to posterity my brief history of Angels blogdom:

Pre-history: Before the dawn of the Angels blogs, there was (and, I think, still is) an online journal of an Angels fan dating back into the 90's. I only saw it once and didn't save the hyperlink, so if anyone has it, let me know and I'll update. While not a blog, precisely, as it contained no links and didn't read as if it were written for the public, it was pretty well updated, mostly with game recaps.

May, 2002 - October, 2002: Purgatory Online, the beta version. Originally conceived as a general purpose blog that would talk a lot, but not exclusively, about baseball, I published a mixed-bag of stuff that I eventually wiped out when I decided to focus on the Angels.

October 10, 2002: First "real" Purgatory Online entry is posted.

July 10, 2003: The late, lamented The Monkey's Paw publishes its first entry.

September 8, 2003: The late, lamented The Monkey's Paw publishes its last entry.

October 16, 2003: Halofan begins publishing at the Anaheim Angels Blog.

February 3, 2004: Rob's 6-4-2, doing double duty as an Angels/Dodgers blog, debuts.

February 15, 2004: Richard jumps into the mix with The Pearly Gates, a blend of five parts Angels blogging to one part right-leaning politics.

March 15, 2004: Chronicles of the Lads becomes the third Angels blog to start up in the space of 40 days. Chronicles will eventually find a niche as "the one who does actual statistical research."

March 25, 2004: Yet another new Angels blog, League of Angels, arrives on the scene. Technically, I suppose this was the first collaborative Angels blog, but the ratio of Jeff to Joe has been something like 9:1, so decide for yourself. Until Halofan's decampment, League of Angels was the sole Angels blog to be affiliated with a bloglomerate, in their case the Most Valuable Network.

June 7, 2004: Watching Jeff DaVanon becomes the first Angels blog to single out a particular player for worship. Inexplicably, that player is Jeff DaVanon, a servicable but unspectacular reserve outfielder.

September 11, 2004: Dawn of The Acerbic Alchemist.

December 29, 2004: The Halo Herald is born.

March 1, 2005: Stephen Smith, whose invaluable Future Angels site has been keeping track of Angels prospects for years, adds a blog.

March 17, 2005: The Acerbic Alchemist joins The Pearly Gates.

March 22, 2005: Halofan enfrocked, ensconces self in SportsBlogs.

And that's it, as far as I know. If I'm missing something, email me.

What strikes me most about this, really, is the fact that there have been a total of eleven Angels bloggers (counting League of Angels as one), and ten are still going at it. That's a pretty remarkable rate, I think - though it would be interesting to see how things worked out in a parallel universe where the Halos were stinky in 2004. Back when I started, I remember there being about 40 Mariners blogs...now, not so much.

Anyway, if - for some Godforsaken reason - you haven't been reading the other nine, start. They all work harder than me.