While the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim started off their season with an 11-3 rout at the hands of a very young and talented Baltimore Orioles team, there was a lone bright spot for the Halos.
Their three-time American League MVP and 11-time All-Star Mike Trout hit a 402-foot solo blast in the first inning off of newly acquired ace Corbin Burnes, the lone mistake he made all game.
It was a reminder that when healthy Trout is still one of the best hitters in the game, and somebody who likes to hit homers on Opening Day. That was the fourth Opening Day homer of his illustrious career, a new Angels team record passing Tim Salmon and Joe Rudi who each hit three.
The question with Trout in recent years hasn’t been as much about diminishing talent as much as it has been about health. Over the last three seasons he’s played in just 237 out of a possible 486 games dealing with a variety of different injuries, from calf to back to his hand and wrist that has kept him out for large chunks of the season.
To be fair, some of those missed games could’ve been due to the Angels not being in any serious contention in the American League playoff picture, and didn’t want Trout to push it and make those injuries any worse.
Since he’s maintained his commitment to the Halos after watching fellow superstar Shohei Ohtani sign with the Los Angeles Dodgers, could this be the year the 32-year-old Trout is able to stay healthy, play the majority of the season, and give this younger Angels squad a chance to be more competitive?
After a difficult Opening Day loss, some would already write the Angels off and say Trout is wasting his remaining prime years in Anaheim for a lackluster organization that has an inept owner.
However, this season shouldn’t necessarily be about whether the Angels can make a dash for the playoffs. It should be about Trout proving he’s still one of the greats in this game.
It should be about how in a league that is filled with young, dynamic, burgeoning stars, Trout is still an elite baseball player that can hit with the best of them and be a franchise cornerstone.
If the Angels win in the process, that’s an obvious bonus, but what a comeback season for Trout actually means is rebuilding his brand, his value, and his status as one of the elite of the MLB.
The consequences of that would be to apply more pressure on the Angels front office and ownership to surround him with better caliber of talent or simply to maximize this window of opportunity or if it still falls on deaf ears, then a trade demand where both sides would benefit from.
Even with seven years and $248 million left on his contract, a bounce back season for Trout would mean teams might be more willing to make a deal with the Angels to land Trout and in return, Anaheim would get a more enticing haul of young prospects to build with.
So while the ‘goals’ are to stay healthy and help get the Angels back on a winning track, Trout’s comeback tour should be more about re-establishing himself as the best in the game and showing other teams what he’s still capable of doing if they still want him.
