ANAHEIM, Calif. — When Angels centerfielder Mike Trout’s career ends, he will be remembered as one of the players in Major League Baseball history. With a career line of .300/.412/.581, 364 home runs, and over 900 RBI, Trout is already a legend, and he still has time to pass some important hitting milestones and collect more hardware like the three American League MVP awards he received in 2014, 2016, and 2019.
And for the first time since 2014, his Los Angeles Angels have a good shot at making the playoffs. They’re in third place in the AL West, only four and a half games behind first-place Texas, and seven games above .500 at 39-32. Last season at this time, after 71 games played, the Angels were 33-38.
And the most incredible thing about this performance by the Angels is that Trout isn’t exactly the one helping the team. He’s mired in a bit of a slump and, at the time of this article, is only hitting .248—we mentioned the career .300 batting average earlier, so yes, this is an important number to examine right now.
On the latest episode of Locked On Angels, brothers and co-hosts Jon and Mike Frisch discuss Trout’s surprising slump thanks to a viewer voicemail in which the caller expresses his anger over Trout’s recent performance.
BE SURE to listen and subscribe to Locked On Angels wherever you find your podcasts!
Mike Frisch jokingly called himself the resident Mike Trout apologist of the show before saying about the caller, “He’s right. There’s something that we’re seeing in Trout this year that is very un-Trout-like. He’s having the worst slump of his career. He’s never been below .900 OPS (it’s currently .814).” He added, “Last week against the Astros, Cubs, and Mariners, his slash line was .114/.256/.200 which works to a .456 OPS.” Trout had 43 plate appearances combined against those three teams, and he had a home run, five runs batted in, seven walks, and 14 strikeouts.
If you look at his last five games, three against Texas and two against Seattle, Trout was 2-17 with no extra-base hits. He walked six times and struck out five times.
Since a win on May 29 against the White Sox in which he went 2-4 and his batting average was up to .283, Trout’s played in 15 games, and he’s gone hitless in nine of those games. He only has two home runs and no other extra-base hits (doubles/triples).
Perhaps the most astonishing stat to examine Trout’s slump is his average against fastballs. Tom Verducci of Sports Illustrated did a deep dive; the numbers are worrisome.
Trout’s average against fastballs in April was .273. Pitchers were also throwing them to him 58.5% of the time. Now, in June, pitchers are blowing Trout away with fastballs. Not only are they throwing them more, 78.2% of the time, but his average against them is only .115.
The good thing for the Angels is Ohtani picking up the slack while Trout struggles through the worst slump of his career. They’re 18-15 since Trout’s slump started, and they took three of four from the division-leading Texas Rangers in Arlington, with Trout only getting one hit in three games and sitting out during Tuesday night’s 7-3 Angels win.
With that performance against Texas, they’re only a game behind the Houston Astros for second place without Mike Trout doing much of anything. Could you imagine how good the Angels could be if Trout snaps out of this and Ohtani keeps being Ohtani?
The Kansas City Royals are the Angels' next opponents and the league’s second-worst team, so this weekend could be the perfect time for Trout to snap out of that slump.
BE SURE to listen and subscribe to Locked On Angels wherever you find your podcasts!