The Angels are one of the few obvious deadline sellers at the moment, but even they might not be fully open for business. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale suggests that the club prefers to hold onto outfielder Taylor Ward and starters Tyler Anderson and Griffin Canning, due to the fact all three are signed/controlled into next season. If the Angels are reluctant to move anyone signed or controlled beyond the current campaign, that would then extend to Luis Rengifo as well. Anderson is signed through 2025 and earning $13MM each season. Ward is controlled through 2026 via arbitration. Canning and Rengifo are arb-eligible through the 2025 season.
It’s always possible, especially this time of year, that there’s some level of posturing in that stance. The Halos are 15 games under .500, 10.5 games out of the division lead and 12 games out of a Wild Card spot as of Monday morning. Their -78 run differential is the fifth-worst in MLB. Mike Trout has been on the injured list since late April. Patrick Sandoval and Robert Stephenson have both been lost to UCL surgeries. To say things have not gone well in 2024 would be putting things mildly.
That said, Angels owner Arte Moreno has long appeared averse to embarking on any kind of rebuilding effort. The Angels have regularly been active in free agency and on the trade market over the past decade, even as their playoff drought has grown to the largest in the sport. (They last qualified for postseason play in 2014.) That trend has spanned multiple general managers — Jerry Dipoto, Billy Eppler, Perry Minasian — and thus seems largely attributable to ownership. Even as they were faced with losing Shohei Ohtani in free agency this offseason, Minasian decisively stated that the Angels would not rebuild.
When considering that context, it’s easier to see a scenario in which the Angels would rebuff interest in names like Ward — even if there’s a strong logical case that they should be capitalizing on trade value nearly anywhere it exists on the roster. As it stands, Nightengale writes that the Angels have been “bombarded” with interest in closer Carlos Estevez and are also likely to trade setup man Luis Garcia. Other rental players of note on the Halos include Matt Moore, Brandon Drury, Kevin Pillar, Hunter Strickland and Miguel Sano.
The 31-year-old Estevez is in the second season of a two-year, $13.5MM contract signed in the 2022-23 offseason. The longtime Rockies hurler has taken his game to a new level in Anaheim — particularly in 2024. He boasts a tidy 2.89 ERA with a strong 26.9% strikeout rate and a career-best 3.8% walk rate. Estevez averages just shy of 97 mph on his heater, has picked up 16 saves this year (and 31 last year), and was named the AL Reliever of the Month in June after tossing 10 shutout innings and recording a 32.3% strikeout rate without issuing a walk.
Garcia, 37, is on a one-year, $4.25MM contract. He’s pitched 36 innings and yielded a 4.25 ERA while recording nine holds. The veteran righty has fanned a sharp 23.7% of his opponents against a similarly strong 7.9% walk rate. He’s kept the ball on the ground at a hearty 49.5% clip. His sinker is down from the career-best 98.7 mph average he showed with the Padres in 2022 but still has plenty of life, sitting at 96.4 mph, per Statcast.
Strickland, 35, has had an up-and-down career with inconsistent year-to-year results but is in the midst of a strong season. He’s pitched 40 innings out of the bullpen and logged a 3.60 ERA, 20.6% strikeout rate, 6.3% walk rate, 35.3% ground-ball rate and 0.90 HR/9. Over his past 9 2/3 innings, he’s gone unscored upon and allowed only one hit and three walks while punching out 10 batters.
The 35-year-old Pillar was released by the White Sox in April and has been a godsend in Anaheim. Since heading to Orange County, the journeyman outfielder has turned in a huge .305/.360/.516 slash with six home runs and five steals in just 139 plate appearances. Pillar recently acknowledged that this will likely be his final season, so it stands to reason that he’d welcome the opportunity to join one more playoff race and one more chance to chase down a World Series ring.
None of the other rental options on the Angels’ roster are performing particularly well. Moore, Adam Cimber and Jose Cisnero all signed one-year deals in the offseason. Moore has seen his strikeout rate plummet as he’s struggled to keep his ERA under 5.00. Both Cimber and Cisnero have ERAs north of 7.00 and are presently on the injured list. Drury, hitting .172/.24/.227 in the second season of a two-year $17MM deal, is more a release candidate than a trade candidate. Sano, back in the majors after not playing in 2023, is hitting .205/.295/.313 with a 37.9% strikeout rate in 95 plate appearances.
It’s bleak…there’s the article.
moribund organization. please trade trout.
Can’t argue Trout deserves a chance to win, but obvious why he’ll be in Anaheim for few more years.
Fan base would go ballistic if fan favorite was moved and really the reason? Trout is owed 6/240m, has been oft injured the last 3-4 seasons and production those years way down. It would require heavily subsidizing his salary monitary/prospect wise to move him = He’ll remain.
Why would anybody want Trout and his 60+ missed games every year
They are not going to trade Trout. Well, this owner and GM are not going to trade Trout.
Next year the Angels will have a new owner and GM, they’ll talk with Trout and who knows?
HALO11
No no no no
Get off that “trade Trout” bus
I don’t know what the new owner and GM will do.
Moreno has so gutted player development, it’s not going to be a quick fix.
If Minasian applied good band-aides, they may have competed during some of his reign, he didn’t.
But now, they are not close. Too many questions have been answered in the negative.
If Trout wants a quick fix, who knows?
The “new owner” would be insane to
#1 Trade the most recognized players in Angel history
#2 Absorb the bulk of the contract that it would require to trade/ unload Trout.
Why would anyone alienate the fans in the stands like that? It doesn’t make sense or cents.
I don’t want Trout to go. But I will imagine he will have a conversation with the new owner and GM, and unlike so many others on this board, I’m not a mind reader. I don’t know how these players think. I don’t know their wants and desires.
But other people seem to know these players better than their own family.
“Trade Trout”…As a huge Trout fan, I’ll say that that ship has clearly sailed. His contract is so far underwater he’s virtually untradeable. Not to mention Trout having a no trade clause. I hate being a doom & gloomer, but this franchise is in for some dark days, until Arte Moreno decides to move on.
MLB fan
Since when do you hate to be the doom and gloomer? I have yet to see anything upbeat from you. haaaaaa
“Anything upbeat for you”…Apparently I’ve made quite an impression on you, whereas for you, I have no idea who you are. Just like Reggie Jackson says, “they don’t boo nobodies”, so feel free to keep following me around and stalking me, you weirdo.
I would not say it is doom and gloom but reality.
Sad fact is once Artie is gone it will be years before the team rebounds. Artie has ruin baseball for Angels fans for at least a generation.
It was a joke.
Lighten up Francis.
You and I both know that 75% of the diatribes on here are negative in nature.
I have no idea who you are mlb fan. That’s probably a good thing.
@hud and not my son. He’s not going to get traded because he doesn’t want too and has a ntc.
How?
Wrong. And Trout has no trade clause. He signed a lifetime contract. Not going anywhere. Know what your talking about
And here come all the “TRADE TROUT” comments!
Why ???
Talk about been there done that!
Talk about beating a dead horse!
Talk about ” fill in the cliche'”
Enough already. I already know that the Angels are trading him to the Oakland Athletics fro Reggie Jackson, Vida Blue, and Catfish Hunter. As a trade kicker Charlie Finley is throwing in a case of his special orange baseballs.
If it makes any fans feel betters, the Angels are known for being indirect and borderline dishonest about their intentions in the press since Arte bought the team.
So just assume no one will know what theyre doing till literal things happen.
I’m really confused as to what the Angels front office/ownership sees in this team that would make them believe they would be competitive enough next year not to maximize the trade value of their players this year?
Angels farm system is awful, their roster is awful, their payroll situation is awful as well. If they would actually commit to a full rebuild maybe they could break this cycle. Instead every year they throw good money on top of bad and bad money on top of worse.
The front office is not the issue. It’s the owner.
Bingo.
The owner hired a completely unqualified bunch of executives.
The owner and those executives replaced a good front office and scouting team with lower quality choices and a skimped budget.
The owner mettles with the front office and publicly stated he won’t rebuild.
So the GM is hamstrung in many ways. Yet the executives at the top never get fired.
Taking a page out of Dick Monfort’s school of management: Surround yourself with yes men. Profit.
Arte has his billboard people in baseball decision making roles.
No other team spends less on scouting and development than Arte
No other baseball owner meddles in on field personnel more than Arte.
Arte was the driving force in signing Hamilton, Albert and Rendon contracts.
Arte is the problem with this franchise
Please sell the GD team Arte!!!!!!!!
Thought myself Rendon would be a decent sign. He had a productive past w/no injury history, plus not wanting to sit, rather than play, like some have seemed in the past (Carl Crawford comes to mind). neither was he given huge amounts, simply because of 1 months post season performance, like Pablo Sandoval, who also quickly gained nearly 50lbs and was out of shape for years after signing his huge deal.
Rendon had age and a solid history behind him. looking inside of a person is the hardest thing. Not everyone who has played the game has/had the drive and determination of ex Angels hurler John Lackey.
The front office is a big part of the issue.
Amazing you don’t see that.
As always, Halo11Shill chimes in to deflect blame from Moreno.
Moreno is 100% responsible for turning this whole organization into a dumpster fire. He has hired some good GM’s and then hamstrung them with his meddling in order to prioritize marketing over building a winning team. He’ll spend millions on players with marketing value, paying them for past performance. Then he’ll put hard caps on spending for anything else. He’s grown much richer and the big market team hasn’t won a playoff game in 15 years.
Amazing you don’t see that.
I do not deflect blame. Man you are clueless.
Minasian is part of the problem. Only the true lay cluless doesn’t understand that. N
They’re rebuilding right now. Arte won’t admit it though. But I also don’t need him to tell me anyway because I know what a rebuild looks like. When a team goes into a season with so many players without a full season of experience, it’s a rebuild. Angels haven’t done a rebuild in 30 years, so I can see where it’s hard for some fans to spot it. But this is exactly like the early 90’s. Bringing up young players, acquiring others, while also continuing to bring in some veterans to fill spots so their young players have a chance to grow instead of just being thrown in the fire all the time. And doing so on the off chance that some break out early, and they get a lucky season out of it. After going through the growing pains of 1992-1994, it almost happened in 1995. This franchise has never done a full rebuild. And they never will. They shouldn’t either. Angels ownership has always had the money to rebuild and then supplement with enough to compete when ready. I think more teams should do that for the sake of their fans instead of tanking. It could be a lot worse. It could be the Pirates, never spending a dime even when they actually have a core. Angels did exactly what every other high market team does when their farm system begins to run dry: sign star players. Angels have just had a very unfortunate outcome of frequent injuries to many of the star players they’ve signed to big contracts. That shouldn’t happen. If it’s 2021, Trout, Ohtani, Rendon, and Upton should be a juggernaut that would get any team at least a WC even with their pitching issues. Something else is wrong there. It’s not scouting or player development. Something in the conditioning at the major league level is a miss. Yankees have a top heavy roster, and it’s showing right now. Dodgers are more reliant on their payroll again with almost all veterans in their lineup. They still have good young starting pitching depth to keep them afloat. But if they lost Ohtani and Freeman in addition to Betts and Muncy, they’re likely a .500 team. Angels should stay the course and get what they can. It just leaves a more sour taste because of the last 8 years. But we have to bite the bullet and deal with it until their core is ready.
All MLBTR articles have typos
And 5 readers care.
So does your username.
“Articles have typos”…MLB Traderumors has a typo or two, but so does ESPN.com if you’ll notice. As long as it’s clear what the writer is saying, there’s really no problem or issue.
Angels are the AL version of the Rockies.
Without getting into specifics, I have heard that Arte has found a buyer and iwill sell the team. There are a couple of issues that need to be worked out first, which I can’t go into. My source has never been wrong. Don’t believe me, I don’t care.
Since I know this will happen, The only thing I care about is Minasian being replaced. He’s a horrible GM.
The new owner has to hire people to rebuild the system. Arte has killed the infrastructure of this organization.
I can’t wait till they are still in last place for the next five years and no once cares for this team. Too bad as the fans are amazing in Anaheim.
Thata a lie. We will never be last place again that is and always will be Oakland. Get it right. No one cares for this team? Wrong we care and so does everyone else
I care for the Angels. Have been a fan before they became a mlb franchise.
Followed them when they were a PCL team, playing at Wrigley on Avalon Bl.
They were a fun team to watch, until Moreno made the purchased .
You do not need to win the WS every year, but as an owner, you should make every attempt to be competitive.
His buying of a past big name, is a smokescreen .
You build from within .
See Baltimore .
Dont listen to Val. She is what we real Angels fans who dont daydream that this team is slightly any good, is considered a lost cause. I hope we finish last until fArte sells the team. Theres no hope when hes still the owner.
Mike ‘Slowest Healing Calf Strain In The History Of Sports And I’m Going To Squeeze As Much Time Out Of The IL Every Chance I Get Despite The Fact That I’m Paid More than $100,000 For Every Single Day Of The Year’ Trout is not an All-Star this year.
Good.
This year‘s injury is a torn meniscus
Right. After already setting a record for slowest return time for a calf strain, now he will be out for at least 3 months for an injury with a standard recovery time of 4-8 weeks (8 weeks being very high end). Of course he also had the option to be a DH for the rest of the season, but he chose not to play. ‘Shocker’.
Albatross contract. Couldn’t even give him away for nothing meaningful in exchange without Arte covering at least around $10+ million a year.
Sounds like jealousy to me.
This deadline is gonna be so underwhelming. Angels gonna Angel
It’s funny that they are doing pretty much the same without Ohtani as with him.
Not a lot of value to trade. Even Taylor Ward is average this year and Tyler Anderson’s FIP is terrible. I would stay away from the Angels as a trade partner.
Angels fans are still buying tickets and merch. Arte seems to be the kind of owner who finds value in that over winning pennants. Can’t disagree with the business logic and frankly, it has its appeal. Without multi-year contracts, players are free to explore other options, and to be honest, it’s competitive. Considering the alternative of signing players to multi-year contracts only to watch them deteriorate, is better left to owners chasing pipe dreams, Arte seems like a genius. The Angels rely on new talent as well as players who have seen better days. Granted, since Otani’s departure, I don’t pay much attention to them anymore, but I do still watch games occasionally.
Trade away.
Trade as many as you can.
Nightengale said it, so that means all 3 will be traded before the deadline. Does that guy EVER get a rumor right? Why does anyone quote him when he is always wrong?
Yep. I was gonna be upset about these rumors that the team wont be selling at the deadline until I read the info came from Nightingale. How does this man still have a job? Every time I turn around, I find someone else who finds his takes to be a joke.. The Halo Bros at Locked on Angels dig at him whenever his name pops up, and its been a long standing complaint with many readers here.
A bad GM could never make a team bad for decades at a time because he’d never last that long. Only a bad owner can accomplish this.
Bad owner hires bad GMs. Even without meddling GM makes terrible choices.
“Bad GMs..even without meddling GM makes terrible”…The Angels have LONG needed pitching. Previous Angels GM Jerry Dipoto was canned and yet he’s built a sensational(and cost effective)pitching staff in Seattle. Dipoto has arguably gotten more good pitchers(for Seattle)in the last 5 years than Anaheim has acquired in the last 20 years. Perry Minasian was a key part of Atlanta’s very successful team building and yet struggles in Anaheim. This is 95% on Arte Moreno, not the several GMs who made the mistake of accepting his job offers.
Under Dipoto the Mariners have won more games while spending substantially less money than the Angels.
They built a top 5-10 farm system at one point.
They have made the playoffs while the Angels have not.
It is scoreboard across every single column.
And with one of, if not the, worst farm systems in baseball they are in the woods for at least 5yrs.
They should sell the useful pieces and get back some prospects, but Arte is unpredictable…
What do they want for Logan O’Hoppe? The Phillies could use him.
Foolish not to be willing to trade Anderson–he will not ever be better (this is literally his second really good year), and the Angels are not contending next year. Shortsightedness…thus the bleakness offered here.
As an Angels fan this makes this pisses me the f@&$ off. They have no direction of any kind. They have been in this “let’s try and see what happens” every single year and it hasn’t worked. FFS Arte, sell the team. We don’t deserve another decade of this trash product you choose to put out there. Take your billions and move on. Take your bff Carpino with you too. I hope they do a complete sell off but with the current owner. Who knows what mood he’ll be in come trade deadline.
Its Nightengale. Take what he says with a pile of salt.
another season, another inexplicable approach by the Angels. Can someone give Arte a brain scan to see if something is wrong? I get not wanting to move Trout, and even understand why he wanted to keep ohtani money wise. But Ward is nothing special and always starts hot and fades, Griffin and Canning are fine starters, but nothing worth keeping if given a good offer.
This approach hasn’t worked yet… let’s see how it plays out.
You can’t become a championship contender if you don’t rebuild, you are either supposed to win or lose
If in the middle ground (like the angels) most of the time you sell because it would be easier to get prospects then to get good major league talent
The angels will never win it all if they stay like this
Write this team off for the rest of the decade, maybe longer
Buyers but not buyers, sellers but not sellers. They’ll do everything besides the right thing. What a joke of a team.
One of the many issues with this franchise is their lack of any real scouting department. Basically zero advanced scouts. Just a couple of scouts for the draft (Their South American scouts are decent). They lack any minor league scouts to know who to target in any trade then have the worst minor league development staff to help their young players along. Worst MLB franchise from top to bottom.
Nothing in this article is surprising; actually it’s what I was expecting from them. Following this team religiously for decades, they’re actually quite predictable and do understand the ‘logic’ behind their madness. I got tired of telling everyone the last two seasons that they wouldn’t trade Ohtani.
The Angels should sell high on Anderson and Ward while they have value. I could see Estevez, Moore and Strickland all going. Drury might go, but he hasn’t done much of anything all season. Sano, Cimber and Cisneros aren’t likely going anywhere unless they are DFA’d
@rsox agree, but it stops after moore. Strickland and Drury will probably go on waivers after the deadline. Cimber might be out for the year. Cisnero dfa’d, and Sano will probably stay the rest of the season. I would even try to move canning or thaiss for whatever is possible.
Why does anyone believe what Bob Nightingale has to say?
Angels deadline outlook?
Dead in the water.
At 37-52, Big Art is in rebuilding mode but just doesn’t know it. He famously and ridiculously misplayed Ohtani and could have traded him for a king’s randsom. Trout’s value is not nearly as high as what it is in Art’s head, but there is still value there. He should trade Trout and get some young guys for the future.
Trout has little to no value with his contract and continuous injury woes. The only way another team would trade for Trout is if the Angels agree to pay a good chunk of his contract. Makes a lot more sense for the Angels to keep Trout.
Arte Moreno will NEVER be a good owner and make legit moves to win. That said keeping Anderson at his current salary has it’s benefits. Ward should be traded, and so should Adel. Lastly, if and only if they spend in the offseason for more starters and bullpen pieces can this team turn it around. Neto and O’Hoppe aren’t enough. Trout should be the primary DH and DFA Rendon.
Hopefully this is a smoke screen but with Arte it probably isn’t.
Just to illustrate how bad the Angels are as an organiztion:
MLB: 37-52 4th place only because Oakland is Oakland
AAA: 32-42 Last place in the first half
3-9 Last place in the second half
AA: 33-35 in the first half. Our high water mark.
9-3 in the second half so far
Hi A: 26-39 first half, last place
2-13 second half and well in last place
A: 25-40 first half, good for last place
6-9 second half, also last place
You couldn’t destroy a franchise from top to bottom more thoroughly if you tried.
Bear in mind Arte bought the defending World Series champions with a highly rated farm system and a development team that would add Weaver, Kendrick, Aybar, Corbin, Napoli, and a kid named Mike Trout among others.
Clevinger, skaggs, richards, and adenhart. bane also drafted posey trying to convert him to Catcher he didn’t sign. After that we had bradish, ward, marsh. I’m stalling out of names.
Yeah, this franchise has headed straight downhill since Arte’s team hired an intern as GM in 2007. It took a while to see the impact as there was a lot of talent in the organization at that time.
Arte was able to ride the previous front office and farm system for about a decade. But once his crew’s impact was felt it has been nothing but suckage at every level.
Skagg’s wrongfull death lawsuit is pushed to next May due to overwhelming case works.
I hate being an Angels fan.
If none of your “controllable players” are worth extending, they’re not that good.
Ward will be 32 at the end of arbitration. We still won’t be good.
Rengifo will be a free agent before we could possibly be gold.
Tyler Anderson is signed through next year.
Carlos Esteves is a free agent after this year.
These are players with trade value but there’s no reason for the Angels to extend any of them. We’re going to suck for years. Hopefully fewer years if we trade these guys.
@halosheaven. Agree you might as well get something in return since it’s going to be a competitive buyers market need to get something in the minors. so we dont have to see willie Calhoun hitting cleanup next year.
The Angels have to trade these guys, but does anyone trust Minasian to get value? I don’t.
@halos11fan he wasn’t bad with the o’hoppe trade. I’m trusting he’s better without the arte handcuffs on him probably will when the gm of the year when he leaves.
And that was his best trade and so far it’s a wash.
And I don’t think Arte handcuffs him. Moreno goes for the big item tickets and destroys the infrastructure of the system.
And O’Hoppe just hit a HR.
And this is why it’s not worth watching this team. Ownership is horrible and can’t seem to understand they are nowhere close to the playoffs. This team won’t get any better until ownership changes.