TROUT, ANGELS START FAST
Three-time MVP not only player pushing club into contention
After an unexpected weekend off following the postponement of two games against the Minnesota Twins, the Angels returned to action Monday with a 6-4 loss to the Texas Rangers.
The team entered the night with an 8-5 record, its second-best 13-game start to a season since 2012.
Here are five observations from the opening twoplus weeks.
Trout’s scorching start
By his standards, Mike Trout’s 2020 season was a slight disappointment.
His start to 2021 has been anything but.
Entering Monday, Trout is batting .386. He’s reached base more than half the time. He’s slugging .750 with four home runs and 10 RBIs. And he’s trailing only Ronald Acuña Jr. in Fangraphs’ version of wins-above-replacement.
He hasn’t been perfect, striking out in close to a third of his plate appearances and whiffing on swings at a similar rate. But when he’s connecting, he is crushing the ball. According to Baseball Savant, he has a 64.3 hard-hit percentage on batted balls with an exit velocity of 95 mph or more.
Trout has also been more aggressive than usual, swinging at the first pitch of an at-bat 24.6 percent of the time (his career average is 15.9 percent). His defense, an area he focused on improving during this offseason, has also looked better.
The last time he started a season this well was in 2019, when he had five home runs, 12 RBIs and a 1.475 OPS after 13 games. That year, he went on to win his third MVP award. If the past few weeks have been any indication, he looks primed to contend for a fourth — a feat never before accomplished in the American League.
Three-headed monster
Trout isn’t the only Angels hitter near the top of
MLB leaderboards.
Designated hitter Shohei Ohtani (.333 average, 1.076 OPS, four homers, 12 RBIs) and first baseman Jared Walsh (.341 average, 1.133 OPS, four homers, 13 RBIs) have also been among the most productive batters in baseball.
In Fangraphs’ all-encompassing wRC+ metric, Trout ranks second; Walsh, seventh; and Ohtani, ninth. The Angels are the only team with three players in the top 10. Only one other club has even two hitters in the top 20.
Walsh is continuing his hot finish to 2020. Since the start of September, he ranks fifth among all MLB positions players in WAR. And after recent injuries to several Angels outfielders, he’s made several impressive plays defensively in right field.
Improved pitching
Although 13 games are a small sample size, there have been positive early trends from the Angels’ pitching staff.
Their team ERA is slightly
better than last year, 4.73 compared with 5.09 in 2020. And their FIP (a pitching measurement that removes the role of defense and batted ball luck) has improved markedly, currently ranking seventh best in MLB at 3.46 after finishing 17th last year with a 4.49 mark.
The Angels are getting more strikeouts and ground balls, especially among their starting rotation, which ranks second in MLB with a 30.5 percent strikeout rate.
Their relievers are performing better in close games, highlighted by a 1.93 ERA in “high leverage situations,” according to Fangraphs (last year, they had an abhorrent 10.30 ERA in that category).
And they’re doing a better job pounding the strike zone, getting either a called strike or swing-and-miss on 30.6 percent of their pitches, the third-best rate in MLB.
Dylan Bundy has been the team’s most consistent starter with a 3.32 ERA in three outings. Andrew Heaney, Alex Cobb and Griffin Canning have largely been solid, lasting at least five innings in six straight combined starts. And Ohtani is set to return to the mound today after a twoweek pitching layoff because of a blister.
In the bullpen, new closer Raisel Iglesias has a 6.75 ERA but has converted two of three save opportunities. Mike Mayers, the lone returning reliever from last year’s team, has permitted just one run in his first eight innings, pitching in crucial spots. And no other pitcher with multiple appearances has an ERA over 4.50.
Clutch hitting
The Angels’ early hitting stats aren’t too different from last year.
Although their team batting average is up — they are hitting .265 this year after posting a .248 mark in 2020 — other metrics including on-base percentage, slugging percentage, strikeout rate, walk rate and weighted on-base average have all remained close to the same.
The one noticeable difference in the season’s early weeks has been their performance in key moments.
With runners in scoring position, the Angels have a .910 OPS, third best in MLB. Last season, they had a .774 mark.
In the seventh inning or later, the Angels are batting .303 with an .859 OPS, ranking top-five in MLB in each category. Last season: .212 and .666, respectively.
After going 2-26 when trailing after seven innings last year, the Angels already have three such wins this season.
Quality opponents
Of the Angels’ eight wins, seven came against teams that made the playoffs last season — a fact that made manager Joe Maddon smile.
“You always want to play the best, beat the best,” Maddon said. “I love it.”
Maddon also noted the early standings in the AL West, where all five teams finished the weekend within three games of one another. The Angels, who were in second place and a half-game behind the Seattle Mariners, began a stretch of 13 straight division games Monday.