Mike Trout is still inevitable no matter how crowded the AL MVP competition looks
Mike Trout gave fans 473 reminders this week that he's still the best baseball player in the American League
Something a bit odd happened to the Los Angeles Angels when Shohei Ohtani defected across town to the Dodgers this offseason.
No, the ball club in Anaheim didn’t go out and recreate him in the aggregate or really retool at all to remain competitive in the American League West. This is the status quo of the Angels, after all, which is why it’s weird so many people seem to be discounting the remaining star player on their roster in one Michael Nelson Trout.
Now at 32 years old and likely nearing the end of his prime, Trout is still one of baseball’s biggest attractions in a game full of up-and-coming stars — and it’s almost unsettling how much he’s being discounted in 2024.
I can’t believe I’m going to say this about Mike Trout, but it has to be asked: Is it at all possible he is somehow underrated now?
Trout didn’t need Ohtani in the lineup to win two of his three MVP awards and he might not need him to win another. It’s why when ESPN dropped it’s ranking of the 100 best baseball players coming into the 2024 season, plenty were shocked to see Trout fall all the way down to No. 19.
“I know there’s always recency bias,” Atlanta Braves first baseman Matt Olson told ESPN’s Buster Olney, “but I’m a little more swayed by the guys who have been there and done it for a while … Mike Trout at 19. That’s ridiculous.”
Similarly, oddsmakers were far more worried about guys like Bobby Witt Jr., Kyle Tucker and Adley Rutschman winning MVP than Trout when betting opened. Never mind the fact a catcher hasn’t won AL MVP since Joe Mauer in 2009.
Here’s how the opening odds looked at BetMGM:
| Aaron Judge | +550 |
| Juan Soto | +600 |
| Yordan Alvarez | +900 |
| Corey Seager | +1000 |
| Julio Rodriguez | +1400 |
| Gunnar Henderson | +1800 |
| Kyle Tucker | +1800 |
| Bobby Witt Jr. | +2000 |
| Mike Trout | +2200 |
| Vladimir Guerrero Jr. | +2200 |
Look, I’m just as excited for this new generation of ballplayers as anyone, but that’s incredible value on Trout at +2200 — the ninth-best odds on the board.
Of course, you know what happened next.
Trout hit a towering home run off baseball’s darling Orioles on MLB’s Opening Day. Then he hit two more in Miami that likely still haven’t landed.
Mike Trout hit two MASSIVE homers last night, including this 473-ft. blast!
(MLBStats x @GoogleCloud) pic.twitter.com/dZ1YWsKsJS
— MLB Stats (@MLBStats) April 2, 2024
Does this really look like someone you want to doubt? Trout is slashing .278/.316/.778 with an OPS of 1.094 in five games to begin the year.
It’s not a ton to go off of, but it’s all you need to remember that when Trout is locked in, there’s nothing in baseball like him.
FanGraphs now projects he’ll finish the season batting .258/.358/.517 with 35 home runs and a 4.3 WAR and even those numbers feel low.
We know about Trout’s injury history — he’s played just 237 games out of 486 over the last three years — but if he’s healthy and destroying baseballs again, there’s no reason to discount his MVP chances.
After all, someone has to teach these young guys how it’s done.