Los Angeles Angels have a slew of recent terrible acquisitions
By Jason Reed
Fans are hoping that the Los Angeles Angels turn things around this winter but if the past is any indication, they will make more mistakes then anything.
The Los Angeles Angels have had the best player in baseball roaming the outfield for most of the decade and have still only made the postseason once in his career and have not won a single postseason game since 2009.
The Angels went the entire 2010s without giving Mike Trout one playoff win. Luckily, they have plenty of time to give him a playoff win as he signed a contract to be a lifetime Angel.
The biggest reason for the Angels’ lack of success is the front office’s reckless abandon in signing large contracts that not only take away draft picks but hurt the team financially in the process.
That, mixed with some not-so-great drafting, has led to a period where the big-name signings turn into duds with the farm system becoming one of the worst in the Majors.
The Angels have some promising prospects in the system but there is still a lot of work to be done and you know that the front office is going to look at free agency yet again to fix any of these problems.
There are some bonafide stars available (Gerrit Cole) and some huge risks (Hyun-Jin Ryu). Angel fans are worried that they will get more of the latter because of this recent track record of signing awful contracts.
2018-2019:
Matt Harvey: One-year, $11 million
Trevor Cahill: One-year, $9 million
Cody Allen: One-year, $8.5 million
Justin Bour: One-year, $2.5 million
Jonathan Lucroy: One-year, $3.35 million
The Los Angeles Angels’ logic last winter was clear: they did not want to commit to any long-term risks and thus exclusively signed one-year deals to look to compete. The problem is that literally every single person they brought in turned out to be a bust.
All of these players have a common trend: they used to be, at one point, pretty good baseball players but were not on the same level as they once were last winter. The Angels were likely hoping that at least half of them would pan out, but they didn’t.
Harvey and Cahill combined to allow 115 earned runs in 162 innings (6.39 ERA). Harvey was injured and canned and Cahill moved to the bullpen, where he was not much better.
Speaking of the bullpen, Cody Allen was awful (6.26 ERA) and was designated for assignment in June.
Justin Bour did not have high expectations and was brought in as a platoon first baseman, yet he somehow still did not live up to expectations. He enjoyed extended time in the minor leagues, finishing the year with 52 games played, a .172 average and a .623 OPS.
He finished with the eighth-worst batting average among players with 150 plate appearances.
Finally, Jonathan Lucroy was the best of the bunch and still only hit .242 with a .681 OPS. He too did not finish the year with the team as he was designated for assignment in early August.
To be fair, the Angels did have one good move of the offseason in trading for Tommy La Stella, who broke out to be an all-star. But in typical Angels fashion, he was injured and played only 80 games.
2017-2018:
Zack Cozart: Three-year, $38 million
Don’t worry: the Los Angeles Angels did not have as many bad signings this offseason but they had one very bad one in Zack Cozart. A year after a breakout all-star season, the Angels decided to pay Cozart just under $13 million per season for three years.
Cozart has been historically bad with the Angels and has not been able to keep himself on the field. In two seasons, Cozart has played 96 games and is hitting .190 with a .557 OPS.
He has the 10th-lowest batting averaging among hitters with 350 plate appearances over the last two seasons and has the fifth-worst OPS. Only two players in the last 50 seasons finished with a worse OPS than his .322 OPS this season with at least 100 plate appearances.
The Angels also traded for Ian Kinsler, which didn’t pan out and he didn’t finish the year on the team, but we have to wait and see if the prospects sent to Detroit turn into anything to assess that.
Of course, we cannot forget Shohei Ohtani, who has lived up to the hype thus far. However, he did have to have Tommy John surgery in his first season, and if he cannot recover then he too will, unfortunately, fail to live up to the hype.
2016-2017:
Luis Valbuena: Two-year, $15 million
Jesse Chavez: One-year, $5.75 million
Ben Revere: One-year, $4 million
Another trio of contracts that are not that hefty in value but certainly did not provide the impact that the Los Angeles Angels were looking for.
Luis Valbuena‘s contract was the worst of the trio, the Angels paid him $7.5 million in each of the two seasons to hit .199 in each season and play a combined 213 games. After the 2018 season, Valbuena was tragically taken from us in a car accident in which he was ambushed by robbers.
Jesse Chavez, like Cody Allen in 2019, did not provide the pitching depth in his one year that the Angels hoped for. In 138 innings Chavez posted a 5.35 ERA, and of course, posted a .2.55 ERA the following year away from Anaheim.
Ben Revere did not seem too bad on the surface as he did finish the year with a .275 batting average. However, he hit for virtually no power, hitting just 13 doubles and one home run and only played in 107 games. He has not played in a Major League game since.
That is all for the recent contracts and we all know that the Angels vastly overpaid for Albert Pujols, Josh Hamilton and Vernon Wells.
Next. Ben Zobrist seems destined to be an Angel. dark
The Los Angeles Angels eye for talent in trades and free agency has not been great in recent memory. If they continue that trend, Angel fans should be disappointed and should start holding the front office accountable instead of defending the signings.