The Los Angeles Angels have a lot of holes to fill and players to fix in 2026, but catcher Logan O’Hoppe has to be at or near the top of the list to have a bounce-back season, according to Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com
O’Hoppe had an awful year last year, and it’s hard to understand what originally sent him off the rails. Offensively, the catcher was having one highlight game after another, including a stretch of four consecutive games in which he homered, a 470-foot shot in May, and a multi-homer game against the Houston Astros in which he hit a pair of home runs and drove in five runs.
By the end of June, O’Hoppe had 17 home runs, which was a franchise record at that point in the season. That was when the offensive highlight really came to a close, though, and O’Hoppe’s defensive issues started.
Inconsistency was the key indicator. Maybe it was because O’Hoppe emphasized hitting, but he started experiencing problems with blocking balls, framing pitches and throwing out runners. When his offense began to falter--he ended up hitting just .213 with 19 homers--his defensive issues became front and center.
What happened in August and September was no mystery at all, however. When manager Ron Washington had to step down due to health issues, O’Hoppe began feuding with interim manager Ray Montgomery, who eventually became openly critical of the catcher’s ability to manage the pitching staff.
Montgomery is long gone, however, and that’s part of the potential for the bounce-back year. The Angels hired Kurt Suzuki, who played for 15 years as a big league catcher, several of them for the Angels. One of Suzuki’s hires was Max Stassi as catching coach, and Stassi will be a crucial part of rehabilitating O’Hoppe’s defense.
Stassi certainly has the credentials to do it. He never hit much during is 400-game MLB career, but he had an excellent reputation for framing and defense, and Stassi will also be an integral part of whatever choices get made to mange the new ABS challenge system, aka the so-called “robot umps.”
As productive as O’Hoppe was offensively for the first three months, expect most of the emphasis to be on defense. The Angels are still in the process of revamping their pitching staff, and new pitching coach Mike Maddux will be part off the process when it comes to keeping O’Hoppe on track. Getting that done will be an important part of whatever success the Angels have as they try to climb out of the AL West basement.