Angels Could Use a New Master Plan

The world’s largest photocopier can be found at 2000 State College Blvd., otherwise known as Anaheim Stadium, where the Angels don’t play baseball seasons, they Xerox them.

What page are we on today?

The job of California Angel Manager (insert name here) is reportedly in jeopardy after his team, expected to contend for the (insert year here) American League West championship, dropped into last place this week. The Angels are currently (insert unbelievably disappointing won-lost record here) despite a roster that includes (insert names of a half-dozen famous but aging players here). “We thought this was the year,” said (insert name of high-ranking club official here), who had hoped the addition of experienced, veteran players would overcome the loss of (insert names of now-successful former Angels here) during the off-season.

Now, it is Doug Rader’s misfortune to be the man filling the first blank. You wonder what took him so long. Cookie Rojas got there in seven months.

Rader has lasted more than 2 1/2 seasons as manager of the Angels, including a 91-victory season in 1989, which, by Angel standards, makes him Walter Alston. He has weathered worse than this recent wretched five-week run--the first two months of 1990 come to mind--but the degree of the disaster is in the eye of the beholder. And, lo and behold, weren’t Richard Brown and Sports Illustrated and, yes, even Rader predicting a boom year in Anaheim in 1991?

Now that we know the answer to ’91 Or Bust, Rader has been shoved into the ejector seat. And it’s true: Rader hasn’t had a hit in years. Why can’t he make Lance Parrish 25 again or Fernando Valenzuela’s fastball fast again? Why can’t he make his Junior play like the one up in Seattle? Why can’t he schedule 162 road games a year?

Rader is not the Angels’ problem. Changing managers won’t change what’s wrong with this organization.

Changing the way this organization thinks might.

For the benefit of one exceedingly hard-of-hearing franchise, we will repeat, very slowly, what has been our advice to the Angels in 1987 . . . and 1988 . . . and 1989 . . . and 1990.

Do not win one for The Cowboy.

For once, do Gene Autry a favor. Forget about him. Try assembling a team that emphasizes speed on the basepaths, aggressiveness on the mound and selectivity at the plate--not the numbers on Autry’s birth certificate. Develop a plan that envisions a future beyond next month. Stop the rush to win today because Mr. Autry might not be around tomorrow.

Gene’s a strong guy. His heart has been aching for 31 years and it continues to pump.

He might surprise you.

When Rader was tendered a two-year contract extension last September, he said all the right things. Rader said he wanted to build from within, to re-emphasize minor-league development, to upgrade scouting, to begin tapping the rich vein of Latin baseball talent. All around him, Angel management types smiled and nodded . . . and three months later, they traded Marcus Moore, the best pitching prospect in the farm system, to Toronto.

Three months after that, they traded Dante Bichette to Milwaukee for Dave Parker.

Two months after that, they signed Valenzuela.

Two months after that, they signed Mike Marshall.

It’s the oldest youth movement baseball has ever seen.

Brown and his new general manager, Dan O’Brien, insist they are firm believers in the farm system--O’Brien used to run a good one in Seattle--but the Angels need more than lip service. Brown claims he’s working on it, that the reason he signed Gary Gaetti and traded for Luis Sojo was because there wasn’t a qualified third or second baseman in the organization. And until the Angels develop their own, Brown says, the Angels have to patch and plug where they can.

Brown is right about the farm system: There isn’t much there. Last year, according to the Major League Baseball Scouting Bureau, the Angels had 20 big-league prospects in their organization, ranking them 20th out of 26 clubs. One national publication recently ranked the top 100 prospects in baseball and listed just two Angels--pitcher Kyle Abbott and outfielder-first baseman Lee Stevens.

The Angels have never recovered from their draft blowout of 1986, when they owned five of the first 28 selections and used them, in order, on Roberto Hernandez, Stevens, Terry Carr, Mike Fetters and Daryl Green. Stevens and Fetters are the only ones left in the organization--and this was the draft that featured Erik Hanson, Tom Gordon, Todd Zeile and one hellacious cross-trainer named Bo Jackson.

They also don’t know how to develop hitters. Pitchers, the Angels have produced--Kirk McCaskill, Chuck Finley, Jim Abbott, Bryan Harvey. But look at the home-grown hitters the Angels have promoted since Wally Joyner broke in:

Jack Howell (.238 batting average as an Angel).

Devon White (.247).

Mark McLemore (.237).

Bichette (.244).

Stevens (.214).

John Orton (.200).

Rod Carew, Angel roving minor-league hitting instructor? Sounds like a splendid idea.

The Angels also need to begin trading young. If you lack prospects, trade for some.

Bichette was never going to save the Angels--he can’t even start for the Milwaukee Brewers--but he could have brought them a younger body than Parker’s. The Angels had the right idea with Devon White, trading him along with Willie Fraser and Moore to Toronto for a 25-year-old second baseman (Sojo) and a 23-year-old outfielder (Junior Felix). But the Cleveland Indians did it better, and they did it with the same team--Tom Candiotti to the Blue Jays for Mark Whiten and Glenallen Hill, two young outfielders who were last seen in Anaheim taking three of four games from the Angels.

The best moves the Angels made the last month were a pair of non-moves: They didn’t trade Stevens and they didn’t trade Kyle Abbott. Brown and O’Brien caught flak for this, being charged with throwing up the white flag, but in reality, their team did that for them weeks earlier. For the rest of 1991, the only thing that makes sense for the Angels is planning for 1992, 1993 and 1994.

At this point, the Minnesota Twins should serve as the Angels’ model. The Twins won it all in 1987, made some personnel mistakes in 1988 (Bert Blyleven, Tom Brunansky), lost big in 1989 and 1990 but failed to panic, adding enough young talent in the process to rebound faster than anyone could anticipate in 1991.

Through it all, they kept the same manager.