Nicky Lopez pitching was just the tip of the iceberg for Angels' strange decisions

Opening day certainly didn't go as planned for the Angels, as new addition Nicky Lopez, a slick fielding backup infielder, found himself making his debut by taking the mound to close out an 8-1 defeat at the hands of 2024's worst team in baseball, the Chicago White Sox.

While position players taking the mound in blowouts has become more common in recent years, using one on opening day led to a lot of mockery. For the Halos who are looking to be more competitive in 2025, following a franchise-worst 63-99 record, it certainly highlights how badly they got off on the wrong foot.

However, as the jokes roll on on X (formerly Twitter), Nicky Lopez's (successful) pitching appearance was just the finishing touch on what was a concerning trend of strange decisions by manager Ron Washington.

Angels manager Ron Washington's lineup construction and bullpen utilization require an explanation

The opening day lineup card submitted by Ron Washington was an interesting hodge-podge of old school baseball conventional wisdom and new school analytics. Given the results, 5 hits in 32 at bats to go along with 2 walks, it was ineffective.

Data has shown that the higher in the order a team employs their best hitters, with an emphasis on the number two spot, the better their production will be. The logic would then dictate that future Hall of Famer Mike Trout should bat second. Instead, Washington opted to bat Nolan Schanuel, a lefty, in the two-hole between leadoff man Taylor Ward and Trout in the third spot.

While it appears Washington was employing the previously debunked strategy of batting a contact-oriented situational hitter in the second spot, while also breaking up the string of right-handed bats in the middle of the order, that logic wasn't employed through the rest of the lineup.

After the top three of Ward, Schanuel, and Trout, the lineup featured slugger Jorge Soler in the cleanup spot, followed by Tim Anderson, Luis Rengifo, Logan O'Hoppe, Jo Adell, and Kevin Newman. For those keeping track at home, spots three through five were occupied by a string of right-handed bats, which doesn't jive with the logic of batting Schanuel second.

Furthermore, the fifth spot being occupied by Tim Anderson, a player who posted a dreadful 27 wRC+ last year, ahead of a switch-hitter like Luis Rengifo, who hit .300 with a 117 wRC+ in 2024, or burgeoning young star Logan O'Hoppe, who provided the only offense in the game, made little sense.

Neither old-school nor new-school wisdom could justify Anderson's placement so high in the order when ostensibly better hitters were relegated to lower spots. The Angels lack left-handed bats, but if Washington was concerned with righty-lefty balance, Rengifo hitting higher in the order could have addressed that, while O'Hoppe hitting higher in the order would have been the way to go to put the best players in position to get the most at-bats.

Lastly, bullpen utilization, prior to Nicky Lopez taking the bump, was very questionable. Despite a few blemishes on starter Yusei Kikuchi's day, when he left after six innings, the Angels were still in the ball game down 3-0.

Washington chose to send out Ryan Johnson, making his major league debut without any minor league experience, to pitch a 1-2-3 seventh. Johnson was then run back out there in the either and promptly melted down, surrendering five runs.

Presumably, Johnson was sent out for a second inning of work in order to save the rest of the bullpen, however, logically, this doesn't make sense. With the game still in reach, that is a lot of pressure to place on an untested rookie, especially when other, better multi-inning options were available.

The Halos are carrying two starters by trade, Reid Detmers and Ian Anderson, in the pen. If they had wanted to save arms on opening day, why not send one of those two out who are stretched out and used to throwing multiple innings at a time?

While other factors like Jorge Soler striking out on a high fastball with the bases loaded and the count full, highlighting the Angels' 0-6 RISP performance, are not on Washington, he still did not put his team in the best position to succeed.

Nicky Lopez may end up being the meme of the opening-day debacle, but it was Washington's inconsistent and strange decisions that led to the downfall. That will be something that must be addressed if the Angels are truly going to be competitive in 2025.

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