Will The COVID-19 Shortened MLB Season Be The Most Unpredictable Ever? Part 2.
In Part 1 of this piece, we discussed the potential for the COVID-19 shortened 2020 MLB season to be an unpredictable explosion of chaos throughout the league standings. Teams that went into the preseason considered huge favorites could be doomed by an early slump, and teams that were considered to have no shot could be buoyed into contention by an early hot streak. In part 2, we will examine some teams with dark horse playoff aspirations who could ride those early hot streaks into the postseason.
Objective criteria for predicting what the surprise teams will be is arbitrary and difficult by nature. However, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim do stand out as a surprise candidate. The Angels have been a team of dubious distinction over the past decade. That distinction is the fact that, despite having the game’s best player, Mike Trout, patrolling center field since 2012, the Angels have only made one postseason (and won zero postseason games) since having him on the roster. However, last year Trout showed his faith in the franchise to turn things around, signing an extension for 12 years worth a record 426.5 million dollars.
Owner Arte Moreno and General Manager Billy Eppler made aggressive moves over both this offseason and others in the recent past to build a competitive team around Trout. In 2018, the Angels signed Shohei Ohtani, the biggest star to come out of Japan in over a decade, and even more uniquely, a two-way player who could perform at an all-star level both on the mound and with the bat. Ohtani had to undergo Tommy John surgery at the end of the 2018 offseason, and 2020 will be the first season where he will be able to both pitch and hit again. If he is healthy, that will give the Angels the top of the rotation starting pitcher they have lacked for most of the past decade.
The other big splash the Angels made over the past offseason was to get another big bat to protect Trout in the Angels batting order. That would be Anthony Rendon, the star third baseman who last fall helped lead the Washington Nationals to their first ever World Series title, after a regular season where he was an All-Star, All MLB First Team, and won his second Silver Slugger award as the best offensive third baseman at his position. Rendon hit free agency right after the World Series, and the Angels swooped in, signing him to a seven year, $245 million dollar deal.
Rendon and Trout together in the lineup is arguably the most potent twosome in the game of baseball (with the top competition being the rival Los Angeles Dodgers’ combo of Mookie Betts and Cody Bellinger). Rendon is also an elite defender at third base, and between him and shortstop Andrelton Simmons (considered the game’s best defender), the Angels could boast one of the best infield defenses in baseball.
The key question that will loom over the Angels’ season is that of potential injuries. There is the open question of how effective Ohtani will be on the mound recovering from Tommy John surgery, although there are many successful recovery cases in the modern game. Trout missed much of the month of September 2019 due to surgery to remove a neuroma in his right foot. Andrelton Simmons missed large chunks of the 2019 season with ankle problems. Fellow infielder Tommy La Stella, who had a breakout first half of 2019 and made his first All Star game, missed the entire second haf with injury.
Then, of course, there was the tragedy that struck the team in the middle of the season. In July 2019 pitcher Tyler Skaggs passed away from an opiate overdose, devastating his teammates. Making matters worse, it was revealed that he had been supplying his opiate addiction with drugs that had been provided to him by an employee of the Angels organization. His death hung over the team like a cloud, and their season on the field never recovered after that.
For the Angels to make a surprise playoff run, the health of the team will need to hold up. A shortened season, with less of the grind associated with the 162 game schedule, could be just the ticket for the Angels to get into playoff contention. Another potential advantage of the shortened season could be less pressure on the Angels’ bullpen, which started out the season strongly but than ground down after a heavy workload due to the inability of the Angels’ starting pitchers to go deep into games- no Angels pitcher threw more than 100 innings in a season.
Ohtani being back on the mound could not only bolster the starting rotation, but he can take pressure off of the bullpen as well. The same can be true of Dylan Bundy, a starter acquired by trade in the offseason. Although Bundy has not developed into the ace starter that the Baltimore Orioles hoped for when they drafted him at fourth overall in 2011, he can reliably eat innings, pitching at least 160 in each of the past three seasons. The Angels also acquired Julio Teheran, who has thrown at least 170 innings in every season since 2013.
The story of the Angels over the past decade has been one of the most disappointing in recent sports history. No Mike Trout during October baseball is a loss for not only their fans, but for every baseball fan regardless of their allegiance. Even with all of their new additions, it will be an uphill battle for them to get Trout and company back to the postseason. But they have bolstered many of their weakest points, and the shortened season may work in their favor to eliminate some of the other weak points of their team. Watching how their season unfolds will be one of the most compelling storylines of the 2020 MLB season, whenever it does end up beginning.
