TEMPE, Ariz. — Mike Trout tries to stay off social media, but the ranking nonetheless found its way into his orbit.
Last week, MLB Network compiled a list of baseball’s top 100 players. Trout, a three-time MVP, 11-time All-Star and nine-time Silver Slugger, came in at No. 39, one spot behind 31-year-old Matt Chapman and one ahead of 20-year-old Jackson Chourio.
Trout, who played in just 29 games last year and 82 the season before, understood the reasoning.
“Hey, they’re going off the last couple years, and I haven’t been out there,” Trout said Monday afternoon before the Angels’ first full-squad workout of the spring.
It did not mean he agreed with it.
“I know where I stand,” he continued.
Trout has played in just 266 of a possible 648 games over the last four injury-riddled seasons. During that time, though, he ranks fourth in OPS among players with at least 1,000 plate appearances. He is also the only player worth at least 12 WAR in fewer than 300 games played over that stretch.
When Trout’s on the field, the 33-year-old remains one of baseball’s star talents, even if he’s not the perennial MVP candidate he was throughout the 2010s.
“When he plays, we’re different,” general manager Perry Minasian said. “When his name’s in the lineup, and you walk to the park and you look at the lineup, it just feels different.”
Though the last couple of years have represented a decline from his peak form, Trout still hit 32% better than the league average in 2023 and 40% better in his brief showing last season before he tore the meniscus in his left knee twice, requiring two separate surgeries.
So, while he understands why some might look at his absences and think there are 38 players better than him right now, the injuries haven’t diminished his self-belief or lessened his confidence in what he can accomplish. MLB’s ranking, Trout said, is just another source of motivation.
“I know what I’m capable of,” Trout said. “Last couple years have been tough, some fluke things. I’m trying to put myself in the best position to be out there for the whole season, and there’s obviously things I can improve on, and we’re working on that.”
The Angels are working on it, too.
It has been more than 10 years — 4,186 days, to be exact — since the last time Trout played a position other than center field. Trout was 22 years old on Sept. 2, 2013, when he saw action in left field. It was even longer, back when Trout was 20 years old during the 2012 season, the last time he logged an inning in right field.
Now, that latter spot will be his home for the foreseeable future.
In an effort to preserve Trout’s health and keep Taylor Ward in left field, Minasian and manager Ron Washington told Trout on Sunday that he’ll be bumping over to right. Trout will also mix in some days at designated hitter — perhaps once a week, Washington confirmed — but his time as the club’s full-time center fielder is over.
“I knew it was coming,” Trout said, “just got to get used to it. I just want to be on the field.”
Jo Adell and Mickey Moniak will get most of the reps in center. Adell was a Gold Glove finalist in right field last season, while Moniak played 98 games in center after Trout’s injury. The biggest adjustment for any player moving from center to right, Moniak said, is the angles.
“Center field, you’re kind of straight on, squared up to the hitter and pitcher,” Moniak explained. “Balls coming off the bat, they tend to stay pretty true. When you’re playing right field, everything seems to be running away from you.”
Washington is not concerned about Trout’s ability to recalibrate.
“Mike is an athlete,” Washington said. “He’ll figure it out. The only thing that I think we’re concerned about, and we got with everyone, is the communication. We don’t need nobody running into Mike Trout.”
Trout appears amenable to the switch, much more so than he was three years ago. Before the 2022 season, Joe Maddon broached the idea of Trout potentially moving off of center. Twenty-four hours later, Maddon and the Angels backtracked. The concept was immediately shut down by Trout, who voiced his desire to remain in center while acknowledging that he might be open to moving to a corner spot “down the road.”
That road, after a litany of injuries the last few years, is now here.
“It’s just keeping him on the field,” Minasian said. “There’s no secret. He’s dying to play.”
Trout played in 53 games during the shortened 60-game season in 2020 and in more than 130 games each of the two years prior to that. He has not reached that 130-game mark in a season since.
In 2021, he suffered a season-ending calf strain while running the bases. In 2022, he dealt with a back injury that some briefly worried might be career-altering. In 2023, he suffered a hamate fracture in his wrist on a swing. Last year, he tore his meniscus in April and underwent surgery in May. He returned for a rehab game in July only to learn that he had suffered another tear just above the last one, requiring season-ending surgery. Over the last four years, he has made just 41 starts after the All-Star break.
While none of the injuries he sustained were a direct result of a play in center field, the Angels hope the move will remove some responsibility from his plate, give him a better chance to play a full season and create some memorable moments at a ballpark with a home-run boundary only 8-feet high at the right-field wall.
“I think Mike’s going to be one of the best right fielders in the game,” Washington said.
Trout said he didn’t do anything differently to prepare for the switch this offseason, but he plans on seeking out Torii Hunter, who joined the Angels’ staff as a special assistant last season, at some point this spring for advice. Hunter won nine Gold Gloves as a center fielder before making a similar transition to right at 34.
Trout also reported to camp a bit lighter than he had in recent years.
“I think that was one of my goals coming into spring,” Trout explained, “just feeling more like myself, a little faster.”
That goal falls in line with the one he had before last season, when he set out to steal more bases. He had as many in 29 games last year (six) as he had in his previous four seasons combined and was on pace for his first 30-steal season since 2016 before the injury. Despite the efforts being taken to reduce the wear and tear on his body going forward, Trout doesn’t plan on altering or limiting his aggressiveness.
He still believes he’s the best player on the field, even if his placement on the top-100 list suggests others are questioning it.
“Yeah,” he said, “stuff like that I think fires you up a little bit.”
Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.
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