Spring Training for the Los Angeles Angels keeps rolling along in Tempe. As is to be expected, there are plenty of tidbits and new wrinkles emerging all the time.
It appears that Mark Trumbo is not experiencing the smoothest of transitions to third base. According to Mark Saxon of ESPN Los Angeles, Trumbo had a bit of a mishap on Friday.
The ball came off the fungo bat of coach Rob Picciolo and hit the lip of the infield grass, according to Jorge Cantu, who was standing nearby. A trainer applied a towel to Trumbo's nose and he was carted off to the Angels spring-training clubhouse, where he lay on the trainer's table with gauze stuffed in his nostrils.
He doesn't anticipate missing any time.
Trumbo cut his workout short, but kudos to him for hanging in there and finding new and interesting ways to field the ball. All joking aside, the Angels currently have no fewer than five natural first basemen at Spring Training camp. Trumbo is the only one taking grounders to the face in an attempt to learn a new position.
On the Bobby Abreu front, Bill Plunkett at the Orange County Register offers some new analysis in a Friday column. Plunkett expects Abreu's grousing comments from earlier in the week -- about wanting either more playing time or a trade -- to blow over, but that the veteran DH's mindset will present an issue for manager Mike Scioscia in the coming months.
Without citing Abreu in particular, the Angels manager did admit that it is always difficult for a player to realize when his skills have diminished.
"I don't think you ever doubt your abilities as a player," Scioscia said. "You always think you can do it - you can do this, you can do that. But players are all different. Some guys, I think, will recognize some things that are becoming a little more difficult to do, maybe before coaches see it.
"But usually players really are the last ones to feel they can't do something, and I think that's the nature of the game. As a player, I was the same way. I couldn't do (anything) at the end of my career but I thought I could make the All-Star team. You just always feel you can do stuff."
Scioscia has proven that he is good at handling many different players in the past, but "grumbling veteran angling for a trade" may be a new scenario for the skipper.
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