The Angels are going to place outfielder Mike Trout on the injured list with a hamstring injury, report Sam Blum and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Infielder Christian Moore will be recalled to take his place on the roster.
At this point, there are no details on the cause or the severity of Trout’s injury. He played in last night’s game and there wasn’t any indication that anything was amiss. Presumably, something popped up after the game or earlier today.
Regardless of the details, it’s a rough development for him and the team. The 34-year-old Trout continues to put up good numbers when on the field. He has been back in center field after mostly being a right fielder and designated hitter last year. He has 17 home runs. He is drawing walks at a massive 19.7% clip, one of the best such marks of his career. His 24.8% strikeout rate is above average but a nice improvement over last year, when that figure spiked to 32%. His .234/.394/.472 line leads to a 139 wRC+, indicating he has been 39% better than the league average hitter.
That will now be put on pause, which has become a common theme of Trout’s career as he has pushed into his 30s. Due to various injuries, he hasn’t played more than 130 games in a season since 2019. He has only twice topped 82 games in that span. He had stayed healthy this year until this point, appearing in 74 of the club’s 75 games. Unfortunately, he’s now going to be on the IL once more.
For the team, it’s a brutal blow, even if it’s a fairly minor injury. The Angels are 30-45 right now. The Rockies are the only team in the majors with a worse record. The Halos can’t really afford setbacks of any kind. Losing their best player for any amount of time only worsens their already-bleak prospects.
Without Trout, the Angels will probably have a regular outfield alignment of Jo Adell, Wade Meckler and Jose Siri. Moore has only played second base in his big league career but the Halos have started playing him in left field in the minors in recent weeks. Infielder Donovan Walton also has some outfield experience. It was reported a month ago that the club was doing some outfield work with Vaughn Grissom and Oswald Peraza but neither infielder has been sent to the grass in official game action yet.
Photo courtesy of Matt Kartozian, Imagn Images
