All posts by Trout Baseball

Diamond in the Rough – 2018 Season Review

Opinion

The 2018 season began with a great deal of promise for Mike Trout.  Trout had recently gotten married and seen his favorite football team, the Philadelphia Eagles, win the Super Bowl. In addtion, the Angels offseason saw the addition of Justin Upton (through a contract extension), Zack Cozart, Ian Kinsler and the two-way phenom, Shohei Ohtani.   It appeared the Angels would be on track for their first playoff appearance since 2014.

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The season started with a bang as the Angels won 11 of their first 13 games. The offense seemed to be on fire and the pitching staff healthier than it had been in years.  But that optimism didn’t last much past May. Key injuries to Kenyan Middleton, Garret Richards, Shohei Ohtani, and Zack Cozart railroaded the team. In addition Kole Calhoun ran into a major hitting slump which required him to rework his entire swing in the offseason. Justin Upton had a mediocre start to his season that didn’t really strengthen until the latter part of the year.  All of these plus a slew of other injuries robbed the Angels of a winning season.  Meanwhile Mike Trout continued to do Mike Trout things. Continue reading Diamond in the Rough – 2018 Season Review →

Two Seven Turns 27

Photos, Video

Mike Trout celebrated his twenty seventh birthday in a special way. Instead of setting up a private booth at a club or buying a new car he took time out of his schedule to visit kids at a local children’s hospital with a couple of his teammates. Here are some great videos and photos of Trout showing what kind of role model an athlete can be.

Marketing a Superstar or Marketing a Sport

News, Opinion

On the Monday before the All Star Game Bill Shaikin started a lot of trouble by publishing a piece in the LA Times about the struggles in getting Mike Trout the kind of attention he deserves. Aside from playing most of his games on the West Coast and a lack of playoff appearances Shaikin also stated that Trout turns down high profile opportunities to promote himself and the sport.  Torii Hunter is quoted in the piece as saying:

“If Mike really wanted to, if he got a marketing team and everything, he would be the face of baseball,” . . . “He doesn’t. He wants to be with his wife and keep it simple.

“It’s his choice. It’s not anybody else’s choice.”

At the end of the article Shaikin asks:

Should the league do a better job of promoting him?

“I don’t know,” Trout said. “I’m not telling anybody to do that.”

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred went on The Dan Patrick Show  (go to the 33 minute mark) the next day and when asked about promoting players cited Shaikin’s piece and agreed with it.  Manfred felt it was the responsibility of the league to promote its players but they could only promote them as much as they were willing to be promoted.

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Later in the day Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register asked Manfred more about promoting Trout.

Continue reading Marketing a Superstar or Marketing a Sport →

2018 All-Star Recap

News, Video

Mike Trout once again put on a show in the All Star Game.  This was Trout’s seventh straight appearance and the sixth time he was voted in as a starter.  Inexplicably, despite being the best player in the game, he only received the fourth most votes.

The FOX broadcast did a great job of highlighting Trout by creating a hilarious weather report and then micing him up in the second inning.

Continue reading 2018 All-Star Recap →

A-Rod and Trout Discuss Hitting

News, Video

ESPN posted a great interview with Alex Rodriguez talking baseball with Mike Trout. They discuss shifting and how to bring more personality to the game. They end with a long discussion on Trout’s pregame routine and how he works on his hitting. This is one of the best interviews you will see with Mike Trout a really nice job by A-Rod.