Mike Trout needs his own thread

http://metsmerizedonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/sports-illustrated-253x300.png

he is now at 9.4 rwar for the season. his closest competitor is robinson cano, who has played 21 more games, at 6.2. fwar is a bit more circumspect, but still gives him significant lead.

he leads the majors in stolen bases, runs scored and ops+

randal grichuk, whom the angels took one pick ahead of trout, is having a nice season in high-a ball.

this fucking guy.

he's probably not gonna top A-Rods ridiculous age 20 season but yeah this is getting stupid

He's only not going to top it cuz he missed a month (although to be fair to A-Rod he only played 146 games it looks like.)

Totally proves the draft is a complete crapshoot.

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/09/10/mike-trout-is-first-player-to-reach-10-war-since-barry-bonds

TROUT

...and a triple to go with his homer after two AB. Geez, if he hits for the cycle, you'll have to disown him.

:p

prefer 2 more HRs

he really is pretty good
i mean, he is definitely probably one of the nice surprises this season, roy material

he's in the running for rookie of the year for sure

Ruth of the Year

does he have a nickname yet? we need to get on this. his last name is Trout for crissake, this should be low hanging fruit

Rainbow and Dizzy are taken

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutthroat_trout

too bad he couldn't have played in the same outfield as tim salmon.

or rogers smallmouth-bass

30th dinger

first 30/30 rookie

Top of the 6th, he's 4-4 with a double, triple, and 3 RBI--off Felix. Unbelievable.

MIKE TROUT	

Month	      AL WAR Rank
May	      1
June	      1
July	      1
August	      1
September     2

he's really fallen off

The Los Angeles Angels renewed the contract of AL Rookie of the Year Mike Trout for $510,000. The salary is $20,000 above the major league minimum.

seems a bit like leaving a $1 tip on a $100 check. there must be ways of saving money that don't involve insulting your best player

every player goes through this and they already gave him 1+ mil just to sign. he'll buy a few yachts once he hits arb.

but don't mind me i have trouble treating baseball contracts with the appropriate relativity

If B-R numbers are right, it doesn't look like recent Rookies of the Year have gotten massive bumps in their next season.

I don't know that throwing him an extra $500k this season buys any more loyalty when the time comes for his $200mn contract in a few seasons.

scratch that - http://mlb.sbnation.com/2013/3/4/4062060/mike-trout-salary-los-angeles-angels

increases were quite a bit larger, just not in raw $$$

i'm sure he'll do v. well in arbitration and that he'll go wherever the money is when he's a free agent. if the angels had a policy of paying ppl the absolute minimum they had to, then fine. the extra $20k is weird tho.

it's obviously in trout's best interests to play hard and everything. it just seems like a bit more might be warranted in an effort to keep your best player happy and feeling valued.

http://www.billjamesonline.com/mike_trout_runs__games/

The record that Mike Trout could threaten is the post-WWII tally for runs scored: 152, collected by Jeff Bagwell in 2000. And Trout could be the first player to score more runs than games played since Rickey Henderson accomplished the feat in 1985.

My first bold prediction for 2013? That he does one or the other. Mike Trout with either score 152+ runs in 2013, or he’ll score more runs than games played.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=20105

jeez, look at the way he rounds first in that second clip. amazing.

Bonifacio gif linked in the comments is actually an even crazier looking play.

will return to LF when Bourjos is activated

http://www.baseballnation.com/2013/5/31/4383614/mike-trout-center-field-left-field-mike-scioscia

i posted that in the angels thread the other day :(

it is strange how the advanced metrics have him as a minus fielder so far this year after being a stellar LF last year

B-R has him -9 runs in the field so far!

i meant to say OF in the previous post btw, he played left and center iirc

it is strange how the advanced metrics have him as a minus fielder so far this year after being a stellar LF last year

― k3vin k., Sunday, June 2, 2013 11:11 AM (6 days ago)

An attempt to break this down:

http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/36800/why-are-trouts-defensive-numbers-so-bad

Conclusion: don't expect it to last.

thanks, i was just about to ask if anything's been written about that!

75mph changeup = line-drive HR to left

four hits today

Noticed that he's almost exactly where he was last year in terms of basic slash stats:

2012 -- .326/.399/.564
2013 -- .320/.399/.560

His HR and SB are down a little, 2B and 3B way up.

why is there no youtube compilation of mike trout triples?

4-4 with 2 walks last night, up to .331/.412/.568 and leads fWAR by 0.4 wins

18 walks in his last 10 games

David Cameron @DCameronFG
Through age-21 season, by wRC+, Mike Trout is the best hitter of all time, edging out Foxx and Williams.

David Cameron @DCameronFG
That's just hitting. No baserunning, no fielding, just hitting. Trout has been better than Ted Williams at hitting.

seeing him play next week

I saw him before his rookie year! Batting ninth!

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/ANA/ANA201107090.shtml

...

Two-run homer first time up tonight. If it weren't for that (still weird) -1.4 defensive number, he'd probably be on his way to about a 12.0 WAR for the year.

Angels have to be trying to lock him up for like decade.

Two-run homer first time up tonight. If it weren't for that (still weird) -1.4 defensive number, he'd probably be on his way to about a 12.0 WAR for the year.

― clemenza, Wednesday, August 7, 2013 10:35 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fangraphs is much kinder, but even they have him as a neutral defender rather than a huge minus.

anyway OPS above 1.000 now - .333/.424/.580

just turned 22 yesterday btw

but beefheart wouldn't be beefheart if there weren't a bunch of people on the side going "i don't know what people are hearing in this", so i'm just playing the role

um

i am sorry

btw you all should check out this poll over here, it's great

Top 120 Songs Under 120 Seconds (ILM Poll #95)

I thought it was maybe a “trout” mask replica thing

Trout, Mike - replica jersey

he's so hot right now that he literally opened a wormhole in this thread

trout mask replica was my keeper league team name for a while, but nobody got it. i changed it to mike 'ehrman' trout.

this is my punishment for never getting around to voting

:-(

2019 injury roll/discussion

seems like it’s minor, thankfully

WAR is live on our site and (no surprise) Mike Trout leads the majors

His 1.8 WAR in 12 games would pro-rate to 24.3 WAR in the course of a full 162-game season pic.twitter.com/b2DrrKI6l4

— Baseball Reference (@baseball_ref) April 10, 2019

Trout Neck Replica

Mike Trout Walk Rate by season since 2014:
2019 - 26.5%
2018 - 20.1%
2017 - 18.5%
2016 - 17.0%
2015 - 13.5%
2014 - 11.8%

Teams are getting smarter apparently.

— Daren Willman (@darenw) April 11, 2019

at this rate his 2030 season will feature four at-bats

As with Bonds, though, is there not a threshold where you're now walking the player too often?

well he's slugging .938 so far, so it doesn't quite make sense to walk him . . . but it's pretty close

if there's RISP i imagine a .938 looks very walkable!

This is the setup Mike Trout gets on a 3-0 count in a tie game pic.twitter.com/xj91tTRCj1

— David Adler (@_dadler) April 25, 2019

Is Trout's drastically reduced strikeout rate--31 games, 16 K (against 31 BB)--an early-season fluke or a conscious change in his approach?

...or a conscious change in opposing pitchers' approach? He's on track to log 33 IBB's this season (previous high 25).

Is Trout's drastically reduced strikeout rate--31 games, 16 K (against 31 BB)--an early-season fluke or a conscious change in his approach?

― clemenza, Tuesday, May 7, 2019 8:23 AM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

honestly haven’t watched much of him this year but he struck out like twice in his first dozen or so games, so I’d bet he’s regressing back to near his normal mean

https://cdn-blogs.fangraphs.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Trout-2019-Contact.png

from https://blogs.fangraphs.com/pitchers-plan-and-mike-trout-laughs/

attack trout on the outside outside outside corner, it’s the only way

it’s cool that he makes contact with 100% of the pitches thrown at his face

great article btw, don’t think I recognize the writer

Ben Lindbergh:

Because he’s stopped swinging at the toughest pitches to hit but still attacks the fat ones—Baseball Savant says he’s swung at 80 percent of deliveries down the middle, his highest rate in the five-season Statcast era—Trout has also kept increasing his contact rates to new seasonal highs, even as the league’s contact rate has continued to decline.

https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2019/6/21/18700398/mike-trout-los-angeles-angels-playoffs-war-mediocrity-500-record

this fucking guy.

― mookieproof, Sunday, September 2, 2012 4:09 PM (six years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Having a huge game.

While wearing Tyler Skaggs’ #45, Mike Trout hits a 454 foot home run pic.twitter.com/nsjJicTKLu

— Baseball Quotes (@BaseballQuotes1) July 13, 2019

I somehow managed not to notice anything else about the game while posting about Trout.

that was quite the performance.

Temporarily joining Ruth, Bonds, Greenberg, Foxx, Williams, Gehrig, Hornsby in the 1.000 OPS club.

I noticed that too the other day. I don't think it'll be that temporary, though, if you look at his career progression (new career highs four years running)--I could see him still being there three years from now.

Another way, I guess, of saying he'll breeze right past the notion of peaking at 27. Of course, I guessed wrong with Pujols when he headed over to the Angels.

Pujols was already having tons of problems with his foot before he left the Cardinals, even, and was much less of a complete, well-rounded player than Trout is. I wouldn't make any bets on Trout putting up 1.000 OPS in a few years, but he seems like he has a much better chance of it than anyone

also he has the advantage of a juiced ball

An oddity, looking at his career box: his seasonal high in total bases is 339, which I'm willing to bet would be the lowest mark if you looked at the 50 greatest hitters ever as measured by OPS+ or whatever you want. This is in no way a knock--it can easily be explained by all the walks he takes and the time he's lost to injuries. Just a quirk of the numbers.

(Oh--and if you eliminate people like Dave Orr, because I've never heard of him.)

Didn't have to look far for another walking-machine with fewer: Votto.

is it too late to make a bet with you, though? ;)

keep in mind i only bet with space bux

I have already plowed through over $40 billion in my off-the-cuff I'd-be-willing-to-bet posts.

Apart first half of Bonds’ career, Trout is the only one who is a legit great a defensive player in that list. Makes u think.

Forgot Hornsby yikes!

i suspect ruth's pitching was more valuable than hornsby's defense

Hitting and pitching didn’t happen much at the same time that being said (iirc)

Within 0.1 of Bellinger on Baseball Reference's WAR leader board. I know the season doesn't really start for some until he takes over the #1 spot, so Opening Day is imminent.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/MLB/2019-batting-leaders.shtml

happy 28th

1173 G, 1301 H, 278 HR, 198 SB, .306/.419/.582, 176 OPS+, 71.7 bWAR, 72.9 fWAR

Penciled him in for 12 more HR this year and tried the Favourite Toy calculator: 14% chance at 763 HR. Which is probably a little light, seeing as his HR rate may continue to climb for another two or three seasons.

Mike Trout is now tied with Derek Jeter in career WAR via both FanGraphs and Baseball Reference. pic.twitter.com/OC6vat7vQY

— Lindsey Adler (@lindseyadler) August 18, 2019