The Angels announced that they have selected the contract of outfielder Juan Lagares. In a corresponding move, right-hander Mike Mayers has been designated for assignment.
After spending his entire big league career with the Mets, Lagaras joined a new organization for the first time last year, signing a minor league deal with the Angels. He ended up getting into 112 games for the Halos last year, hitting .236/.266/.372 for a 71 wRC+. Generally regarded as a glove-first player, that production was just a bit below his career batting line of .252/.293/.363, 80 wRC+. The 33-year-old signed another minors deal with the Angels just over two weeks ago and has played seven games for Triple-A Salt Lake Bees, hitting .308/.379/.462 in that time.
The club has a strong regular outfield mix of Mike Trout, Brandon Marsh and Taylor Ward. However, Ward has been sidelined recently after colliding with the outfield wall while making a catch. Over his first 30 games, he was hitting out of his mind to the tune of .370/.481/.713 for an absurd 245 wRC+. But he hasn’t played since May 20 because of soreness in his neck/shoulder area that resulted from that collision. Tyler Wade has been getting some starts in right field recently to cover for Ward, though he’s far more experienced on the infield in his career and hasn’t hit much this season. The Angels will hope that Lagares can provide better coverage until Ward can return to regular action. Manager Joe Maddon tells reporters, including Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com, that Ward still can’t play the outfield but isn’t going on the IL because he could still come into a game as a pinch hitter.
As for Mayers, 30, he was drafted by the Cardinals and ended up seeing big league action with them in four seasons, from 2016 to 2019. However, he never got much of an extended look, logging more than 20 innings in only one of those campaigns. After being claimed by the Angels, he had an excellent showing in the shortened 2020 season, throwing 30 innings with a 2.10 ERA, 35.5% strikeout rate, 7.4% walk rate and 32.8% ground ball rate. Last year, he wasn’t able to sustain that over a full season but still had a good year, throwing 75 innings with a 3.84 ERA, 28.6% ERA, 8.3% walk rate and 37% grounder rate. Unfortunately, things have gotten worse this year, with Mayers sitting on an ERA of 5.40 through his first 16 2/3 innings and his strikeout rate collapsing to 18.7%.
Despite those poor results on the season so far, opposing teams could be interested in his services based on his success in prior seasons. He also came into this year with four years and twenty days of service time, meaning a team that adds him to their roster could retain him for next season via arbitration. Mayers and the Angels avoided arbitration for 2022 by agreeing to a $2.15MM salary.
Mayers is one good dude, but a decent fielder from the past Lagares seems ok Why do they need him?
There was some extremely scary news regarding Taylor Ward that should be part of this article.
Neither Wade or Lagares is going to hit much. Lagares plays a good outfield, though, and that’s what we need. So this is an improvement.
For sure, he’ll do as a 4th OF, and a few games out there, till Ward gets back. Sounds like Ward should be back very soon.
I don’t trust this medical staff’s timelines. Seen minor injuries turn out to be otherwise too many times.
Loved Mike Mayers in Wayne’s World!
IKR.I was gunna be like “David Spade getta shot next?”
Wait til you see Austin Powers
Juan Lagares signed a minor league contract with the Padres in 2020, but with no minor league action in 2020, he wasn’t chosen for the player pool (taxi squad) and asked to be released. He went to the Angels the following year.
https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/07/padres-juan-lagares-kyle-barraclough-free-agency.html
Michael Mayers was DFA’d after he picked up an old William Shatner mask and painted it white. That made several Angels players nervous on the major league club.
Why didn’t they just bring up Jo Adell and let him play everyday until Ward is able to come back?
Adell isn’t ready. He needs time to develop.
He doesn’t field well at all, and he strikes out a lot. AA and AAA is where he should figure that out.
A full season at AAA is probably best for development vs multiple brief call ups.
What 5 said, plus maybe Adell in August or after, for a long term injury in the OF. Knock on wood.
The Angels need a 4th outfielder. Adell needs to just relax and play
Adell shouldn’t be considered for a call up at all this season regardless of his performance in Salt Lake. He has yet to spend a full season at any level of pro baseball. It’s doing him a disservice to not allow him to develop in the minors, not to mention pay his dues.
Best wishes to Juan! I was always a big fan of his when he played for the Mets.
Can you believe Mayers went into last year as THE late inning RP? I still can’t.
And others may disagree, but I’d much rather have Upton than Juan Lagares. Cutting Upton didn’t make sense.
With Ward on the IL. Adell and Marsh should have been playing everyday. When Ward came off the I.L. the loser should have gone to AAA and Upton should have been our 4th outfielder.
Terrible on all 3 takes 11. I guess Maddon is the smartest guy in the room, if you and your 30 clones were in it. 😉
My opinion of Maddon is very similar to previous two GMs.
I’ll leave it at that.
Mayers did get better last year for certain stretches. His play was inconsistent, but know that the bullpen was challenge outside of Iglesias. This year was a different story and easier to dismiss Mayers especially since he was in lower leverage situations. He stayed this long because Bradley, Quijada, and Warren were IL and he can do multiple innings. Bradley is back Quijada soon and Warren early June, so yeah
Inconsistent is not acceptable for a set up man
Mayers should go to the Phils, for Girardi to misuse
Halo – I still don’t know what Upton you were watching over the last three seasons. Nothing he did warranted a spot on our roster, both offense and defense. Where am I going wrong?
I was watching an Upton who still hits the ball very hard and was unable to play because of health. You think he’s lazy, which is the same things fans said about Garret Anderson
Hitting the ball hard means nothing when it results in an out. It’s like citing a pitcher’s spin rate when he gives up dingers. It doesn’t matter when the results are bad. Upton stunk as an Angel when he was healthy, which was rare and yet another problem with him. I don’t see it.
I didn’t think GA was lazy.
GA career batting stats: BA .293 OBP .324 SLG .461 OPS .785
JU career batting stats: BA .262 OBP .343 SLG .471 OPS .814
Hitting the ball hard means nothing? Oh my god.
Do you think Duffy is lazy or just stupid?
High spin rates, tons of SO’s and lots of dingers… sounds like Heaney.
It also sounds like Gausman before the Giants taught him how to pitch. But you can learn how to pitch, I don’t know if batters who don’t hit the ball hard can sustain success,
Anyway, I can’t really talk baseball with someone who doesn’t care if someone hits the ball hard or sums up players by calling them lazy.
I agree higher exit velo’ are better than lower one’s. I would also add that command of the strike zone and contact rate, among other things, are important. Regarding sustained success, I would point to Gwynn, Carew, Boggs and Rose as examples of guys who I suspect had low exit velo’s that did ok.
halo – Don’t take what I said out of context. I said hitting the ball hard means nothing when it results in an out. Please tell me why it matters when a guy hits a ball hard into a double play or hits a ball hard into a fly ball out?
I never mentioned Duffy.
Halo – Don’t know if this was for me but the only player I’ve called lazy is Upton, as have many others on here. Not sure where that’s coming from of if you’re just trying to deflect the conversation away from how bad Upton was for us. I never mentioned Anderson or Duffy.
Maddon is not a GM. Go back to sleep.
Mayers was ok, his numbers this year are high, but he pitched well in the games we needed holds, or close games. The leaders of the ship just desided, there’s better options currently, and with better health coming in the pen. Good luck to Mayers going forward.
I think it is a good sign that our pen is deeper than ever. We have the ability to move on and call up a better option. I hope he will go to AAA and get things right. He was pretty dang good a few seasons ago. And Juan is a better 4th outfielder than most. He can play all positions and fields well and hit some. Kinda like Squid. I like the recent moves
It is a good sign, but also shows how bad our bullpen was last year.
This year’s pretty solid pen, it means nothing for last year. Last year’s team wasn’t doing squat, even with this years bull pen.
What means more is a healthy Trout and Rendon, coupled with a stand out start in Ward. That’s the HUGE difference.
We’ll use that pen this this year.last year, didn’t matter.
Missed the SP’s. They’ve been huge, with Trout, Rendon, and Wards start…… That’s the difference.
The bullpen has been a big disappointment this year for me. We signed all these guys and our best options out of the pen are Herget, Barria, and Ortega? Right now we rank 25th out of 30 teams in terms of bullpen WAR. We need for some of these guys live up to the money we gave them.
Rengio is on fire at the plate. He’s batting .310 with an .801 OPS. He’s made some great plays on defense too in the midst of his few mishaps.
Because hitting the ball hard means nothing..
Again, Halo, you completely misrepresented what I said. You are being dishonest, which is revealing your lack of integrity. This is what I said:
prov356 2 days ago
“Hitting the ball hard means nothing when it results in an out.”
That is a completely different statement than what you continue to suggest I said. Seems to be par for a conversation with you. God bless you Halo.
“You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” Exodus 20:16
Gary Sheffield hit the ball extremely hard. He should be in the hall btw.Hoping so.
This should go down as the worst trade of the year