The Los Angeles Angels are, whether they like it or not, a team in a transition period.
They just lost the best player in baseball, Shohei Ohtani, to free agency.
If they didn’t make the playoffs once in six years with Ohtani on board, it’s really hard to think they will do it without him.
Not everything is lost for LA, though.
They have a few young and promising players, and they still have Mike Trout.
Injuries have affected the three-time MVP, but even in his worst version in recent memory, he hit .263/.367/.490 with a .858 OPS in 82 games last year, homering 18 times.
There are many reasons to think that, if he is fully healthy, Trout can return to the 1.000-OPS hitter he usually is.
On Wednesday, he finally broke through and hit his first home run of the spring, as shown by Bleacher Report via Twitter:
Mike Trout's first homer of spring training is a grand slam 💥
(via @angels)pic.twitter.com/JcQp8ldqpu
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) March 6, 2024
It was a grand slam against the Oakland Athletics.
The ball left his bat in a hurry, and showed us an important lesson: don’t sleep on Trout.
His team is not good and postseason baseball is highly unlikely, but Trout could have a huge bounce-back season in 2024.
All he needs is health, and he will do the rest.
His spring training line is now .190/.250/.381, but he is just getting started.
This is a career .301/.412/.582 hitter with a .994 OPS.
He is also 32 years old, theoretically still in his prime.
He is very much capable of hitting 40 or more homers for the fourth time in his career.
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