Blogging ain't easy... pass the turkey

Thanksgiving will be here in just a few days and I can’t help, but think about Torii Hunter whenever this holiday rolls around now. That’s because on Thanksgiving morning 2007, my wife Cheryl woke me up early in the morning to tell me that the Angels had signed Hunter to a five-year deal. I was a little groggy and didn’t believe her. I thought to myself that she must of heard wrong and the Dodgers probably signed Hunter. After all, the Angels had four more years of Gary Matthews, Jr. (GMJ) ahead of itself. I even told her as much (something she reminds me about from time to time).

I was beside myself when I finally confirmed the news. I couldn’t believe my favorite player in all of baseball was coming to my favorite team. It was a joyous day and the turkey even tasted extra-good that day, I’m sure.

Well, here we are three years later and I’m hoping Cheryl wakes me up Thursday morning to tell me some more unbelievable news. If that news happens to be about Carl Crawford; all the better.

It’s that time of the year and it always makes me a bit antsy. I wake up every day wondering if this is the day the Angels do something great.

Take today for example. It’s November 22 and this is somewhat of a significant day in Angels history. It’s actually the three year anniversary of the Torii Hunter signing I mentioned above. Talk about something to be thankful for!

It also happens to be the four year anniversary of the GMJ signing. Now that’s a real turkey. Somebody pass me some pie, I need to eat my way out of that memory.

Even though the days are technically shorter, they’re long days never-the-less - as we wait to see what’s going to happen next. It’s still very early in the off season and it may be a long while before anything significant happens. For some perspective, check out Sam Miller’s piece from November 17, 2010 when he outlined the dates that Arte has spent his money. Sam gives us a detailed timeline of all the significant moves and when they happened under Arte’s watch.

By the way, if Arte happens to spend some of his money on Adrian Beltre, I’d be pretty happy about that. I know, I know, I’ve already talked about this a couple times. I only bring it up again because I’d like to point you in the direction of Halos Heaven’s Matt Welch who does an excellent job of separating some of the facts from fiction in his “Adrian Beltre’s Walk Seasons, and Other Illusions.”

Speaking of illusions, I posted something last week about how the A’s seemed to be trying to corner the market on third basemen. Well, turns out their offer to Adrian Beltre was little more than a PR move according to reports on mlbtraderumors.com

Really? That’s the kind of PR the A’s do? I guess it falls in line with Money Ball on some level; I guess they’re making news without spending any real money. Whatever. I just hate the A’s.

Since it’s such a slow news day, err week… err month, I thought I’d spend a little time talking about the blogosphere.

I’d like to give a shout out to some Angel blogs out there. Blogging on a consistent basis is hard work. It takes a lot of time and dedication to try and keep a blog relevant and up to date. Here are some great bloggers who are doing exactly that:

Angels Nation broke in around April of 2010 and seem to be going strong.

AngelsWin has been around a while and is one of the gold standards in blogging. They’re much more than a blog, they’re more like a one-stop-shop for everything Angels. They have organized get-togethers, a message board, orginal content and much more.

L.A. Angels Insider is the handy work of Eric Denton. His site is striving to be much more than a blog as well. You can find great podcast interviews and other “insider” information on his site regularly. Eric has also told me that he’s developing other features on his site that are sure to be of value to Angel fans.

Monkey with a Halo is a blogging warrior. Garrett Wilson posts a lot of stuff on a regular basis. Nothing gets past this guy. He is currently taking a short break from blogging, but his site is always a great place to visit. He’s never lacking for an opinion on all things Angels and that's a good thing.

Halos Heaven is another of the gold standards in blogging. It is also much more than a blog with an absolutely huge following. Be sure to check them out for all the latest discussions, original content, news and much more.

The Angels Blog on the O.C. Register web site is easily one of my favorite places to visit on a regular basis. Sam Miller, Dan Woike, Bill Plunkett, Keith Sharon and the rest of the staff give you a little bit of everything. Fun videos, sabermetrics, news, interviews, photos, you name it – these guys are on it.

The Angels, in order is a very special blog. If you love baseball cards and the Angels than this blog is a little slice of heaven. The author goal is have a signature of every player who has ever been with the Angels. He’s posting his collection one player at a time starting with the first to debut as an Angel in 1961.

Last, but not least is a brand new entry into the blogosphere: This is a very simple game is penned by blithescribe who regularly comments on my posts here. Blithescribe provides some truly unique perspectives on the game of baseball and the Angels (of course). It’s a great blog and I hope this one sticks around.

There are a great many Angel blogs on the internet, the ones I’ve highlighted here seem to be the most consistent. In other words, they don’t disappear for months at a time. They’re also very good and each offers something unique for every Angel fan.

I have a more complete list on the right side of this blog, but again – consistency isn’t a strong point of all of them. Again, blogging ain’t easy. Just saying.

My hope is that we will continue to see Angel bloggers sprouting up all over the place because the more people we have talking about the Angels the better.