There are a lot of things that come rolling in with the new year, and in baseball predictions are definitely one of them. Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com contributed to a larger piece that offered one big prediction for every team, and his call for the Angels was that Mike Trout would make a comeback.
It’s not a bad prediction, but it does come with some caveats. Time and injuries have taken a toll on Trout’s battered body, and last year it was a bone bruise in his left knee that relegated the former superstar outfielder to full-time duty as a DH.
Trout didn’t adapt well initially. He hit just .232, but Trout did manage to stay somewhat healthy, and the silver lining in his season was that he hit 26 homers in 130 games, according to Bollinger.
That’s nowhere near the kind of production Trout has given the Halos in the past as a three-time AL MVP and 11-time All-Star, but once Trout got past his 400th career home run, he got hot. Trout has been insisting he had a mechanical issue in his swing that was holding him back, and he thinks he has it fixed.
That’s just the offensive part of it. Unfortunately, GM Perry Minasian has been talking about Trout playing in the outfield again, specifically in center field. This doesn’t sound like a good idea, but the Angels also have a new rookie manager, Kurt Suzuki, who’s working on a one-year deal, and Suzuki needs to hit some incentives to keep his job, according to reports.
Suzuki is a former catcher who played in the big leagues for 15 seasons, including several with the Angels, so he should know better than to allow Trout to return to the field at all. Given the way the Angels operated, we have no idea if letting Trout play in the field is his idea or a management ultimatum now that Trout has expressed his interest.
It’s hard to see how Trout returning to the field would help this team much, but there’s pressure of another kind as well. Owner Arte Moreno just had to settle the massive contract of former third baseman Anthony Rendon, and he’s also paying out a judgment as part of a settlement after the disastrous civil suit trial of late pitcher Tyler Skaggs.
The Angels haven’t shown any willingness to pay for good players so far, so we have no idea what kinds of financial issues may be in play here. Hopefully they don’t affect Trout, though, and he can make this prediction come through as a DH.