The Los Angeles Angels haven't had much to celebrate this season, but center fielder Mike Trout has played in most games and is an All-Star for the 11th time.
The Los Angeles Angels are having a season like many people believed it would: bottom of the standings with little to be excited about.
The Angels got off to a decent start, winning 11 of their first 21 games by producing high offensive output and getting quality pitching from its top three starters, but that momentum fizzled quickly.
Los Angeles’ offense is incredibly streaky and power-forward – if the Angels aren’t hitting the ball out of the park, they tend to struggle scoring runs. That quality pitching has been hit or miss as well (no pun intended), and the Halos lost one of the top three in right-hander Jack Kochanowicz, who underwent season-ending Tommy John surgery.
Right-hander José Soriano looked like an early Cy Young candidate through his first six starts but has struggled over the last couple of months. His overall numbers still look good, but he has been hit hard and given up lots of runs since May.
Left-hander Reid Detmers has become a strikeout specialist but has his fair share of struggles, too. He will either give you seven scoreless innings with eight or more strikeouts, or he will give up five runs and punch out less than five batters.
Both Soriano and Detmers have emerged as trade candidates with a lot of upside, but it’s a sign of a bad season for a team that was looking to take a step in the right direction.
One positive from this season has been the career resurgence of center fielder Mike Trout, who has been voted into his 11th All-Star Game. Trout has been on the injured list with a hamstring injury but is expected to be back before the end of the first half.
Trout looks like the old version of himself that baseball fans all over the world fell in love with. He has 17 home runs, 29 extra-base hits and 36 RBI while slashing .234/.394/.472 (.866 OPS) and going 7-for-7 in stolen base opportunities.
ESPN’s Bradford Doolittle used the AXE rating system, which accounts for bWAR, fWAR, win probability added and championship probability added, to break down each team’s midseason Most Valuable Player and All-Star-caliber performances.
Trout was the clear choice for MVP, leading the charge with a 122 AXE rating, and was the only player to reach the 120 mark to be considered an All-Star-caliber player.
“Even though Trout has spent much of the leadup to the All-Star break on the IL, it has been a resurgent season for him,” Doolittle wrote Wednesday. “He needs to stay relatively healthy for that to remain true, but he has managed to close the gap between his walks and strikeouts to a level we haven't seen in years.”
Doolittle mentioned that we may never see Trout put up the batting average that he used to, but he still does damage when he makes contact. Detmers (117 AXE), shortstop Zach Neto (115) and Soriano (114) missed the cutoff.
“It would be an exaggeration to say that Trout has been a one-man show. But his lone presence here is kind of symbolic for this era of Angels baseball,” wrote Doolittle.
Everyone is hopeful Trout regains the form he took before he got hurt and stays on the field for the second half.
