Mike Trout needs his own thread

awesome that he's at the top of that distance leaderboard. probably helped a little by playing in such a cavernous park, but still

can't seem to get a hit lately

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9715559/mike-trout-quest-mvp-great-performance-major-league

Article really lays out how ridiculous he is. Definitely the greatest position player I've seen in my lifetime and I'm not sure really anyone's even close.

jeez, i'm his biggest stan but like, a-rod, bonds, griffey - those guys are at least close

Not at 20-21 they weren't. I guess that should be a caveat though.

arod's age 20 season is comparable i think

age 20 season, adjusted batting runs

1. Mel Ott 5.3 1929
2. Mike Trout 5.2 2012
3. Al Kaline 5.1 1955
4. Alex Rodriguez 5.0 1996
5. Ted Williams 5.0 1939
6. Ty Cobb 5.0 1907
7. Mickey Mantle 4.7 1952
8. Frank Robinson 3.6 1956
9. Rogers Hornsby 3.3 1916
10. Dick Hoblitzell 2.9 1909

yeah A-Rod at 20/21 was definitely close

that said we dont know what Trout's peak is. if this isn't it the history books are going to be demolished.

sorry that's batting WINS. Age 21:

1. Mike Trout 6.6 2013
2. Eddie Mathews 5.8 1953
3. Jimmie Foxx 5.6 1929
4. Ted Williams 5.1 1940
5. Ty Cobb 5.1 1908
6. Albert Pujols 4.9 2001
7. Cesar Cedeno 4.7 1972
8. Rogers Hornsby 4.7 1917
9. Denny Lyons 4.7 1887
10. Ken Griffey 4.3 1991

A-Rod 20 was amazing but still behind Trout. A-Rod 21 was not even in same league.

You can see why Leo Durocher was excited about Cedeno in '72.

Cedeno's arrival was right when I started watching baseball, so I still remember all the (legitimate) hype around him. I saw an Astros-Reds spring training game in '72--came away with one of Lee May's bats.

I know you're talking about position players, but the most awesome 20-year-old in my lifetime was Gooden.

Mike Trout has a higher career WAR (20.8) than Jermaine Dye (20.3), Joe Carter (19.3), Ryan Howard (18.9), & Dave Kingman (17.2).

“It can be a combination of dirt stains, grass stains, bloodstains — he'll blow out a knee or a butt cheek. He's in the top two or three for most-soiled every night. He's old-school.”
—Angels assistant equipment manager Shane Demmitt, on the daily state of Trout’s uniform.

“The Sistine Chapel.”
—Rays manager Joe Maddon, when asked to define Trout’s ceiling.

I wonder if Subway sammiches have made his neck that big.

"Blowing out a butt cheek" is a distressing mental image.

i've been to the sistene chapel the ceiling isn't THAT high

ugh sistine

Voted $400 million, didn't give it any thought. If there aren't any bumps in the road before 2018, I have to believe it'll be in that range.

http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/43039/what-if-willie-mays-were-a-free-agent

13 trade offers for Mike Trout

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=22425

the Angels should take the sky scrapper.

that first trade is bonkers. there's no way the angels trade the best player in baseball for an unproven PITCHER and a no-offense 3B who just broke his leg

like machado is good but he's a league average hitter at best and who knows what his defensive range is going to be like now

he's a shortstop playing third

and he was worth 6.2 WAR

at 21

almost entirely because of defense, and he just had a devastating lower body injury

i mean i love machado believe me, but obviously the angels laugh and hang up the phone in a second when they get that call

these trade ideas are meant to be insane - you guys realize that, right?!

yeah i realized that as i went further down haha

kk u realize before he came up defense wasn't even considered his strong suit? league average hitting at age 21 is special

not as special as say mike trout but there's also his defense and kevin gausman, who is a prospect like any other

tbf i do not know who kevin gausman is, but he's a PITCHING PROSPECT ffs

lol i love the abstract over-exaggeration of tinstaapp being stretched into "there is literally no worth in a starting pitcher who isn't playing major league ball yet", been happening a lot lately

I think the point is its MIKE TROUT ffs. There is no trade scenario that doesn't get a GM laughed at.

pittsburgh could do it, just send mccutchen, cole, alvarez, sidney crosby, evgeni malkin, mario lemieux, and the steelers franchise to LA

sidney crosby is basically the real life charlie from mighty ducks, this deal is destined to happen

Throw in an autographed Clemente jersey, and maybe.

Has Gausman passed Dylan Bundy?

no

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2014/02/07/obama-compares-the-farm-bill-to-mike-trout

Extension? that pays him $38 M for 2019?

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2014/2/23/5439770/mike-trout-angels-contract-extension-rumors

the way baseball salaries are inflating, that wouldn't be that insane

no – but you would expect some kind of discount (or - jesus - *is* that a discount?!)

well maybe not if the deal is backloaded that much. I am a Trout believer, but ya never know.

fangraphs has him worth $45m and $52m over the past few years... so he's still guaranteed to be vastly underpaid even in the first 3 or 4 years of that extension

even assuming his play comes down he'll prob be getting fair value even at $38m

that said i bet there's no way the parameters of that rumored deal are actually true

i'm sure it will be like most every deal with slight increases of a few million a year over the life of the contract

the angels aren't really getting a discount but then again trout is an unprecedented player

i guess they're giving themselves some security against him putting up another 10 WAR season and rightfully demanding like $250 million

it's just money tbf, the angels have plenty of it iirc

the angels aren't really getting a discount but then again trout is an unprecedented player

well, there's still A-Rod...

yeah but what part of makes trout unprecedented is not just his skill level but his place in baseball history, in this case meaning a time in which players frequently sell arbitration and FA years many years in advance

there's just no real example to go off with trout. it's uncharted waters (lol). we basically have freddie freeman, clayton kershaw aaand maybe ryan braun as examples but that's really trying to jam a square peg into a round hole