Mickey's New Neighbor, Mike's New Teammate

In this bowling ball edition of the Baseball Winter Meetings, another big pin fell Wednesday. The Angels, spurned by Gerrit Cole hours earlier, wrote their big check to Anthony Rendon. Coming off four escalatingly great seasons in Washington, the 29 year old 3rd baseball heads to Anaheim for the second biggest annual salary among position players -- $35 million a year for the next seven years.

He'll beef up a lineup that already includes Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani (when he DH's), Kole Calhoun and Tommy LaStella. And there's the power potential, but otherwise diminishing skills of Albert Pujols. But the Angels' biggest issue remains -- who is going to pitch? Ohtani, now a year and change past Tommy John surgery is expected to take the mound once a week. That's 26 or 27 starts. What about the other 135 games? If GM Billy Eppler can fill those holes by trade or luring a Madison Bumgarner, the "other" Southern California club might start to close the gap on the Astros, who are already weakened by the loss of Cole.

Otherwise, Anaheim Stadium will remain a beautiful setting for games without a lot of meaning.


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