Angels’ Trout details a ‘frustrating’ year cut short
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Alden Gonzalez, ESPN Staff Writer
ANAHEIM, Calif. — Mike Trout, typically as composed as anybody in his profession, was visibly emotional while talking about his recent string of injuries Monday, one day after Los Angeles Angels manager Phil Nevin declared that Trout would not return from his recent hand injury in time to play again this season.
Trout, on a trajectory to being one of the greatest players in baseball history as recently as 2020, has played in fewer than half of the Angels’ games over the past three years.
His tally this year will be 82.
“Yeah, it’s frustrating,” Trout said, visibly shaken. “I wanted to get back. It’s tough. It’s been hard.”
Trout, 32, won three American League MVP awards within his first eight full seasons and finished as the runner-up in four other instances. But a torn calf muscle kept him off the field beyond the middle of May in 2021. In 2022, he missed a little more than a month around midseason because of a troublesome back issue. His goal entering 2023 was simply to remain healthy.
“I hired a ton of people to work on my body,” Trout said. “My body felt great. A freak thing happened and I broke my hand.”
Trout suffered a fracture to the hamate bone on the bottom part of his left hand while completing a swing in San Diego on July 3. He pushed to come back seven weeks later, on Aug. 22, with the Angels still on the fringes of contention, but his hand didn’t respond favorably. He played in one game before returning to the injured list and will not be activated again, his season ending with a .263/.367/.490 slash line and 18 home runs.
“When I came back, I was in pain,” Trout said. “My swing wasn’t right. Just wasn’t myself. I was taking it day-to-day, trying for the soreness and just the discomfort to go away. It never did. Now, giving it a few extra days off, it’s going away. I’m starting my swing process. I’ve been swinging. I’m not going to come back, but I wanted to. I just wanted to get my head straight for the offseason, clear my mind. Just have a healthy offseason.”
This offseason will come with more questions than ever for Trout and the Angels. Trout has seven years and nearly $250 million remaining on the mega-extension he signed heading into the 2019 season, and there are questions throughout the industry about whether he and the Angels might actually part ways.
Trout’s age and recent injury history — not to mention the fact that he has the right to block any trade — would make it exceedingly difficult to move his contract. But former teammates have wondered recently if Trout has reached a tipping point and might ask Angels owner Arte Moreno, team president John Carpino and general manager Perry Minasian to work out a trade this offseason. Trout gave no indications that was the case while addressing the media Monday, but he also didn’t necessarily dispel the notion.
He is expected to meet with the front office to talk about the team’s direction in the near future.
“These conversations happen every year, not just this year,” Trout said. “They’re private conversations I have with the front office — John and Perry, all those guys up there. So just keep it as that. The plan, as it always is, is to take a couple weeks off in the offseason, clear my mind, get in shape, get ready to play and go from there.”
Trout provided a similar answer when asked if he wants to see it through with the Angels, saying: “I go through this every year. That’s private conversations I have with Arte and John, and I’m doing the same thing I did last, what, 13 years, just go into the offseason, clear my mind, get ready for spring and, you know, wearing an Angels uniform in spring.”
The Angels began the final week of the regular season with a 70-86 record, having already clinched their eighth consecutive losing season to set a franchise record.
The Angels went on a run early in the second half to vault back into contention, at which point the front office decided not to trade Shohei Ohtani and instead augment an ailing roster by dealing away prospects from a relatively thin farm system. The Angels then went 8-19 during a nightmarish August, a month that saw Ohtani suffer a torn ulnar collateral ligament that prematurely ended his season as a pitcher. Ohtani, whose season as a hitter ended with an oblique injury, will soon enter free agency and is widely expected to sign elsewhere.
“People ask me this all the time, ‘Where’s Shohei going to go?’ Couldn’t tell you. It’s up to him,” Trout said. “You got to ask him. Ultimately it comes down to his decision. He hasn’t said anything to me. He keeps it quiet, just does his own stuff. As another teammate, I think just give him his privacy. It’s his decision. He’s going to do what’s right for him. We’ll see how that goes.”
The Angels are expected to do everything possible to re-sign Ohtani. But they’re burdened by their commitment with Anthony Rendon, who has played in just 148 games over the past three years and is owed another $114 million over the next three. Young players such as catcher Logan O’Hoppe, shortstop Zach Neto, first baseman Nolan Schanuel and outfielder Mickey Moniak have emerged this season, but the Angels would nonetheless have a litany of holes to fill throughout their roster this offseason if they hope to try to contend next year.
Of utmost importance is for Trout to get healthy.
Nobody feels that more than him.
“I just want to be out there,” Trout said. “Injuries suck. All the hard work and stuff and just freak stuff happens. I try to stay positive.”
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Bill Connelly
The 2025 College Football Playoff got underway in Norman, Oklahoma, on Friday night, and we’ve already seen a first. After all four home teams won by demonstrative margins in last year’s first round, Alabama became the first road team to prevail in a playoff game with a stirring comeback against Oklahoma and a 34-24 win.
Here are the main takeaways. We will update this with each completed game.
What just happened?
Oklahoma’s offense only had 20 minutes in it. The Sooners were perfect out of the gate, bursting to a 17-0 lead against an Alabama team that looked completely unprepared for the moment. But the Crimson Tide adjusted and rallied, and OU had only a brief answer. From 17 down, Bama outscored its hosts by a 34-7 margin from there.
We use the word “momentum” far too much in football, but this was an extremely momentum-based game.
1. Over the first 19 minutes, Oklahoma went up 17-0 while outgaining Bama by a stunning 181-12 margin. It could have been worse, too, as the Sooners’ Owen Heinecke came within millimeters of a blocked punt that might have produced a safety or a touchdown.
2. Over the next 21 minutes, Bama outscored the Sooners 27-0, outgaining them, 194-59. Freshman Lotzeir Brooks caught two touchdown passes — the first on a fourth-and-2 to finally get Bama on the board (after he caught a huge third-down pass earlier in the drive), and the second TD came on a 30-yard lob that put the Tide up for good. The Tide defense got pressure on John Mateer, and his footwork and composure vanished. An egregious pick-six thrown directly to Zabien Brown tied the game, and Bama scored the first 10 points of the second half as well.
0:58
Zabien Brown stuns OU with game-tying pick-six before halftime
Zabien Brown takes a big-time interception 50 yards to the house to tie the score before halftime.
OU responded briefly, cutting the margin to three points early in the fourth quarter thanks to a 37-yard Deion Burks touchdown. But the Sooners’ offense couldn’t do enough, and kicker Tate Sandell, the Groza Award winner, missed two late field goals to assure a Bama win.
1:25
Tate Sandell’s back-to-back FG misses help Alabama secure 1st-round win
Tate Sandell misses a pair of late field goals as Alabama holds on to beat Oklahoma 34-24 in the CFP first round.
Impact plays
Oklahoma beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa in November — in the game that eventually certified the Sooners’ CFP bid — thanks to a pick-six and special teams dominance. But the tables turned completely in Norman. Brown’s pick six was huge, and special teams completely abandoned the Sooners, both with Sandell’s misses and with a botched punt in the second quarter.
The botched punt was actually the second of a two-part sequence that turned the game against the Sooners. First, Mateer passed up an easy third-and-3 conversion to throw downfield to a wide open Xavier Robinson, but he short-armed the pass and dropped it. On the very next snap, punter Grayson Miller dropped the ball moving into his punting motion. Bama’s Tim Keenan III recovered the ball at the OU 30, and while OU’s defense held the Tide to a field goal, what could have been a 24-3 OU lead turned instead into a 17-10 advantage. That set the table for Brown’s pick-six and everything that followed.
The blown early lead leaves Oklahoma with quite the ignominious feat: In the history of the College Football Playoff, teams are 28-2 with a 17-point lead: OU is 0-2, and everyone else is 28-0. Ouch.
See you next fall, Sooners
We knew that whenever Oklahoma’s season ended, offense would be the primary reason. The Sooners survived playing with almost no margin for error for most of the year. Their No. 49 ranking in offensive SP+ was the worst of any CFP team, but they got enough defense (third in defensive SP+), special teams (21st in special teams SP+) and quality red zone play to overcome it.
The Sooners’ defense still played well on Friday night — Bama gained only 260 total yards (4.8 per play) — but the special teams miscues put more pressure on the offense to come through, and after a brilliant start, it ran out of steam. Mateer began the game 10-for-15 for 132 yards with a touchdown, 26 rushing yards and a rushing TD, but his last 31 pass attempts gained just 149 yards with five sacks and the pick, and his last nine non-sack rushes gained just 15 yards.
Brent Venables therefore heads into the offseason with some decisions to make. OU’s offense technically improved after the big-money additions of coordinator Ben Arbuckle and Mateer, but Mateer was scattershot before his midseason hand injury and poor after it. Do the Sooners run it back with the same roster core, hoping that better health and a theoretically improved run game can give the defense what it needs to take OU to the next level? Does Venables hit the reset button again? Can he ever get all the arrows pointed in the right direction at the same time?
What’s next
Alabama’s reward for the comeback win is a trip out West: The Tide will meet unbeaten and top-seeded Indiana in the Rose Bowl on January 1. Bama’s defense will obviously face a stiffer test from Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza and the Hoosiers attack, but Bama’s defense has been mostly up for the test this season. Their ability to pull an upset will be determined by Ty Simpson and the Alabama passing game.
Simpson began Friday night’s win just 2-for-6 with a sack, and while he improved from there and didn’t throw any interceptions — his final passing line: 18-for-29 for 232 yards, two touchdowns and four sacks (6.0 yards per attempt) — his footwork still betrayed him quite a bit over the course of the evening, and he misfired on quite a few passes. Oklahoma’s pass rush is fearsome, but Indiana’s defense ranks seventh in sack rate itself, and with almost no blitzing whatsoever. The Hoosiers generate pressure and clog passing lanes, and they held Oregon‘s Dante Moore and Ohio State‘s Julian Sayin to 5.1 yards per dropback with 11 sacks and two touchdowns to three picks. Bama will be an underdog for a reason.
That said, kudos to the Tide for getting off the mat. They were lifeless at the start, missing tackles and blocks and looking as unprepared as they did in their season-opening loss to Florida State. But Brooks’ play-making lit the fuse, and Bama charged back.
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