It began so swimmingly.
This assertion might apply to each Mike Trout’s profession and his 2024 marketing campaign. It seems like an eon in the past now, however the Angels icon went deep in his first at-bat of the season. He then outpaced all youthful mashers of their prime, like Aaron Choose and Shohei Ohtani, to develop into the primary MLB participant to succeed in 10 residence runs in 2024.
Lower than per week after his tenth homer, Trout abruptly went on the IL. He had skilled soreness in his knee, and a check revealed a meniscus tear. It was a devastating blow, however it wasn’t anticipated to be season-ending. Trout steadily rehabbed from knee surgical procedure, bought again to game-ready type, and started an task at Triple-A Salt Lake Metropolis on July twenty third. It lasted two innings.
Extra soreness emerged and led to an early departure from Trout’s deliberate 4 innings, and although preliminary MRIs have been clear, a more moderen scan revealed a brand new meniscus tear. He’ll bear surgical procedure once more. Trout 2024 season is over after simply 29 video games, all earlier than the month of Might. The star is simply as crushed as the remainder of us.
Few gamers within the historical past of baseball can method the sheer quantity of Trout manufacturing from 2012, when he received American League Rookie of the 12 months, by means of 2019, when he polished off his third profession AL MVP. Throughout that timespan, Trout hit .308/.422/.587 with 245 doubles, 280 homers, 196 stolen bases, and a staggering 72.0 WAR, per Baseball Reference. That’s a better complete in eight seasons than Derek Jeter’s total 20-year profession, and although Trout is usually in comparison with Ken Griffey Jr., even Junior’s eight-year peak from 1991-98 was 57.3 WAR.
Complete books shall be written someday about this god-level run from Trout. As famous, he received three MVPs, however there’s an excellent case that he ought to have received at the least three extra. He might do something on the sphere, robbing homers simply as simply as taking a pitch out of the park himself.
There was nothing that Trout might do about the remainder of the crew round him, although. The core was adequate on the outset of his profession, when the Angels narrowly missed the playoffs in 2012 earlier than recovering from an off-year the following season to win 98 video games and the AL West crown in 2014. Trout’s maiden playoff voyage lasted three video games, because the upstart Royals upset the Halos in a three-game sweep that noticed the MVP go 1-for-12.
The Angels have by no means sniffed the postseason since then, they usually’re at the moment tied with the Tigers for the longest energetic playoff drought. What’s worse is that they haven’t posted a mere profitable season since 2015, even with Shohei Ohtani aboard for many of these years as properly. That streak will doubtless proceed this 12 months, because the Ohtani-less Angels are on their fifth completely different supervisor in seven seasons, at the moment maintain a 47-61 document, and have little hope from the farm system, which FanGraphs charges because the very worst in baseball. Their proprietor is an incompetent, interfering miser who almost rescued the franchise by saying he would promote it after 2022, solely to renege on his choice a couple of months later.
Angels baseball could be considerably extra palatable with Trout round, however that has merely not been over the past 4 years. He was as productive as ever throughout the COVID-shortened 2020, when the Halos someway nonetheless missed the postseason regardless of over half the league making it (together with the sub-.500 Astros and Brewers). Off to a 1.090 OPS begin in 2021, he suffered a mid-Might calf pressure on a seemingly innocuous jog to 3rd base.
It didn’t seem like the sort of harm that will value Trout greater than a pair months, however he by no means returned in 2021. The following 12 months, he performed by means of again ache and the prognosis of a uncommon spinal situation (one that will have an effect on his profession) to seem in 119 video games, albeit whereas lacking over 5 weeks in midsummer.
Trout was wholesome by means of the top of June in 2023 and earned his eleventh profession All-Star look. On July third, nevertheless, a standard swing was rewarded with a hamate bone fracture in his left hand.
Trout made it again for one recreation, on August twenty second. Then on the identical day that GM Perry Perry Minasian introduced that Ohtani was accomplished pitching in 2023 on account of an elbow harm, he revealed that Trout would return on the IL for the reason that hamate nonetheless bothering him. He was ultimately shut down and didn’t return.
Probably the most agonizing a part of all that is that when the dude is on the sphere, he can nonetheless rake! The long run Corridor of Famer’s remaining expertise has shined by means of, as in 111 video games for the reason that begin of 2023, he’s hit .252/.357/.504 with 28 homers and a 135 wRC+. Out of all 299 MLB gamers with at the least 450 plate appearances since then, solely 20 have a better wRC+, and it ranks above perennial All-Stars like Vladimir Guerrero Jr., José Ramírez, and Pete Alonso.
Combining all his time missed this decade tells a bleak story, greatest illustrated by FanGraphs’ Jon Becker with a comp to a different former MVP who can’t shake the harm bug.
For the reason that starting of 2019, a season by which Giancarlo Stanton would go on to play simply 18 video games and Mike Trout appeared in 134:
Stanton: 463 video games performed
Trout: 453 video games performed— Jon Becker (@jonbecker_) August 1, 2024
I occur to nonetheless take pleasure in Stanton fairly a bit when he’s on the sphere, however that is somebody whose personal normal supervisor has mentioned that getting harm “appears to be a part of his recreation.” If his physique is responding higher to accidents than yours, than that could be a dire state of affairs. Hell, much-maligned Reds Period Griffey was more healthy, too.
The place does Trout go from right here? The Angels are nonetheless paying him $37.1 million per 12 months from 2025-30 and he’s solely 32, so he’s not about to retire or something. Each Trout and Minasian (who truthfully may be out of a job himself quickly) are saying all the identical issues about being eager for subsequent season. At minimal, a transfer out of middle discipline to a nook spot appears to be so as, if not an outright transition to pure DH responsibility, à la David Ortiz and Nelson Cruz.
There’s no assure that this gambit will work as a result of Trout’s accidents appear to be so painfully random. Nonetheless, he and the Angels have to attempt one thing completely different as a result of the methods of the previous few years have failed over and over. Working round in middle isn’t the reply. If the Halos can’t put collectively a reliable crew, they should do their greatest to at the least attempt to get their star wholesome. With even a modest second half of his profession, Trout might have been maybe the best participant to ever play this recreation. Now, merely seeing him merely step into the batter’s field on a constant foundation could be a win. We simply need a second half of his profession at this level.
Get properly quickly, Mike, and please keep properly in case you can. We miss you.
