MVN - Most Valuable Network

All you need to know about the Angels and manager Mike Scioscia

Tim Brown just wrote an article for Yahoo sports that tells you all you need to know about Angels manager Mike Scioscia and why he has earned the respect of both his players and his former players. Here is the link.

Near the end of the Tim Brown article, he writes about something that Scioscia’s former coach installed in him - the ability to focus on the next play and forget about the last mistake.

And that focus was clearly on display in the Angels’ 3-2 win over the Washington Nationals on Monday night. This is something that is not easily found in the boxscore but is important to know about how the Angels play.

Garret Anderson drove in the winning run with a base hit in the eighth inning for the Angels in Monday’s game but if you had seen Anderson’s three previous at bats you would have been no doubt surprised that he turned out to be the hero.

Anderson struck out in his first two at bats and then hit into a routine double play in his third at bat in the sixth inning. However with a chance to put the Angels ahead - and no thought or worries about the previous three at bats - Anderson knocked in the go-ahead run on Monday night.

Now this is not to say that Garret Anderson would not have had the game-winning hit if someone else were his manager. And he could just have easily lined out or struck out in that key eighth inning.

And this post is to not give all of the credit for the Angels’ success the past few years to Mike Scioscia. The Angels have succeeded in part to a talented farm system, an excellent coaching staff and, yes, the backing of a billionaire owner.

At the same time, other teams have been given as much financial backing (i.e. the Mariners and Mets) and last week both of those organizations saw their managers fired.

So while some teams flail and flounder with the weight of an enormous payroll, the Angels continue to sail along in first place. Mike Scioscia has as much to do with that as some of the players - including Vladimir Guerrero.

Take a look at that Tim Brown article again. All you need to know is there.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 23rd, 2008 at 11:06 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.