The Angels have clinched, already. They also have the best record in the majors (by just a hair). So are they really the best team in the league? Mark
Teixeira put them over the top?
When Teixeira joined the Angels, they were 66-40 (.623) with the third-best run differential (+43) in the American League.
Today? They're 88-57 (.607) with the sixth-best run differential (+62) in the American League.
This is impossible, right? After all, the Angels perfectly addressed a glaring need by trading for Teixeira, who's been fantastic since then, hitting .362/.444/.610 in 38 games. But what's so easy to forget is that Teixeira is just one player. Just one of 25 (or one of 20 if you want to ignore the guys who don't play important roles).
When a team adds a player like Teixeira, the general assumption is that the team
has to play better, because he'll play better than whoever he's replaced and everyone else will play exactly as they've been playing. But of course the real world doesn't work that way. Some guys will play about the same, some will play better, some will play worse. In this particular case, it's pretty clear that the guys playing worse have outnumbered the guys playing better. Or perhaps that the guys playing worse have been worse than the guys playing better have been better.
Anyway, you get the drift. Adding Teixeira was obviously a positive change, but one positive change doesn't guarantee anything at all. The Angels have won the West with him, and they would have won the West without him. They wouldn't be as well set up for the postseason without him, though. So for that reason alone he was worth getting.
The Angels are pretty good. In the playoffs, they'll be just as good as anybody else except the Red Sox. But even with Teixeira in the lineup for the last seven weeks, the Angels are 10th in the league in slugging percentage and 11th in on-base percentage. Even with Teixeira in the lineup, they've got one great hitter (him) and one very good one (
Vladimir
Guerrero).
The Angels may well finish with the best record in the league. It won't mean they're the best team.
Rob Neyer
