Once again, the Angels are enduring a disappointing season.
After this weekend’s three games in Houston, they will be exactly halfway through the regular season, and they’ll be under .500.
The extra wild-card playoff spot this year has given them slightly more hope than they would have otherwise. They also have both Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani performing at a high level, a confluence they’ve never enjoyed this far into a season.
Overall, though, the team definitely needs some help, which is why our request for questions yielded a large chunk of queries about trades, so let’s start there.
Q: When do you think the Angels will start making some trades? There are some pretty clear weak spots on the roster and it feels like not much is being done about it. — @michelekiyoko
A: Don’t hold your breath for the Angels to make any deals that will dramatically improve their prospects for 2022. I’m sure General Manager Perry Minasian would love to be able to bring in some difference-making talent before the Aug. 2 deadline, but there are a few reasons why it’s going to be tough to do any better than incremental upgrades.
While the expanded playoff field gives the Angels a little more hope, it does the same for other fringy teams that would otherwise be sellers. So the players on those teams who might be trade candidates now might stay put, or else their teams will want an exorbitant price to move them.
Among the teams that will definitely be sellers, there just aren’t that many impactful players to be had, which means the cost for those players will be high.
Oakland A’s right-hander Frankie Montas and Cincinnati Reds right-hander Luis Castillo are the top starting pitchers, and then there’s a huge drop-off. Pretty much all of the contenders will be looking for starting pitching, so do you think the Angels are going to be able to outbid, say, the Dodgers for one of those arms? Remember, the Angels still have one of the thinnest farm systems in baseball.
Most of the relievers who ought to be available are also rentals: Colorado Rockies right-handers Daniel Bard and Alex Colome, Chicago Cubs righty Mychal Givens, Arizona Diamondbacks righty Ian Kennedy, Washington Nationals righty Carl Edwards Jr. and Detroit Tigers righty Michael Fulmer. Again, the teams that are much more securely in the race than the Angels are going to be bidding more fiercely for those pitchers.
Cubs righty Chris Martin, Miami Marlins righty Anthony Bass and Tigers lefty Andrew Chafin all are under control for one more year, so they could be more appealing to the Angels. Of course, they’d also cost more. (Fun fact: Martin and Bass were both teammates of Ohtani in Japan.)
As for position players, the Angels really need an infielder and the best one is Reds third baseman Brandon Drury. Other players like Nationals second baseman Cesar Hernandez, Seattle Mariners utility man Adam Frazier and Kansas City Royals second baseman Whit Merrifield also might be available, but none of them are having particularly good years. Of that group, only Merrifield is under control beyond this season.
Q: Jeff, think the Angels will be sellers? If so, ‘who’ do they have that anyone would want? — @ninedeeniner
A: Here’s the other side of the coin. If it’s too difficult for the Angels to buy, do they sell? That’s tricky too. The Angels have shown in the past they’ll only trade players who are impending free agents, because they don’t want to trade anyone who could help them when they’re trying to win again in the following season.
Just about the only guy who fits that description and has some value is Noah Syndergaard. (Archie Bradley could have also, but his trip over the railing on Sunday will have him out till past the deadline.) Although Syndergaard has certainly pitched well enough that he could help a team, his issue is that he barely pitched in the previous two years, and he’s been pitching this year on extra rest all season. How confident would a contender be that he could fit into their five-man rotation and pitch deep into October? And they’d have no control over him beyond that.
Then there is the question of Trout and Ohtani. This topic deserves a much more in-depth treatment than this, but the short answer is that I can’t see the Angels trading either one of them. And even if they did, it definitely wouldn’t be in the middle of the season, because it would take too much time for the Angels to analyze the return.
Ostensibly, the reason to trade either one of them would be to avoid having too much money tied up in a few players. Yes, it’s difficult to build a winning team that way, but it’s also difficult to build a winning team with a bunch of prospects you don’t really know from another team, or by spending the money you aren’t paying Trout and Ohtani on other free agents. They’ve spent plenty of money so far, and that hasn’t worked.
The Angels’ main problem is not lack of spending. It’s poor development of their young players. That’s a whole other topic.
Q: What portion of heaven and earth need to be moved for (Michael) Stefanic to get his call up? — @aaronburkart
A: Stefanic was out with a quadriceps injury when Anthony Rendon got hurt, or he probably would have gotten his chance then. Stefanic just returned to the Triple-A lineup on Tuesday. The Angels have another vacancy with Matt Duffy on the injured list, so if Stefanic performs well at Triple-A, I assume he’ll get a shot soon.
Q: What do you think their plan is with (Jo) Adell? Hope he looks good in Triple-A and trade, develop and call up at some point or ?? — @mikeyAngelfan
A: I don’t think the Angels need to have any “plan” other than waiting and seeing what happens with him. If Adell makes the improvements he needs to make, then the Angels can play him in the major leagues or trade him for something valuable. If he doesn’t, they can’t do either. At the moment, Adell is still having issues offensively and defensively, although the Angels insist he’s working hard at fixing them and he has the right attitude.
It’s possible they’d trade him before the deadline, but they’d likely be moving him at a low point in his value, which isn’t ideal.
Also, Adell is 23 and he still has options, so there’s no urgency to know this minute what he’s going to become.
Q: What is the solution to the fifth and sixth (spots in the) rotation for the remainder of this year? — @angelsnumber9
A: Good question. The Angels have shuffled through Reid Detmers (4.66 ERA), José Suarez (4.36), Chase Silseth (5.23), Kenny Rosenberg (4.22) and Jhonathan Diaz (2.93), with varying degrees of success.
Although they’d love for one or two of those pitchers to be consistently good enough to separate themselves, they can also just keep using all of them, allowing them to pile up innings and experience that would help the team make decisions going forward.
The only potential issue is that the new collective bargaining agreement has an annual limit of five times a player can be optioned. The count started on May 2, this year. Since then Rosenberg has been optioned three times, and Suarez and Diaz have been optioned twice apiece. Silseth and Detmers have each been optioned once.
Q: You think if the Angels are out of contention at the end of the year they’ll activate Rendon so he won’t serve his suspension next year? — @LarryFranklin04
A: Nice try, but Major League Baseball wouldn’t allow a team to activate a player from the injured list without some medical documentation certifying that he was able to play.