Coming out of the All-Star break, even as it’s obvious the Dodgers and Angels are going in different directions, there’s plenty of angst to go around for both fan bases.
The Dodgers were leaking oil as the break mercifully arrived, the consequence of all those injured list moves, all those bullpen innings, all of those designated-for-assignment guys who turned into placeholders for baseball’s most expensive team.
The Angels? No one dared utter the R-word in their organization as the season began, but anyone with eyesight and critical thinking skills knew a rebuild was happening. Ron Washington had been hired as manager specifically for his skills as a teacher, and the mixture of baseball wisdom and tough love should hasten the process for the young Angels.
One team’s fan base (and, to be fair, entire organization) has sky high expectations, for whom anything short of the Commissioner’s Trophy is a failure. The other’s followers have few expectations to speak of, since the Angels have not only not reached the postseason in a decade but haven’t been close to a wild card berth since 2017 and currently are 12½ games out of a playoff spot again. They’ve spent as much time venting about the owner as grousing about the product on the field, and I’m expecting more of those missives to hit my inbox soon.
There’s another way to describe the two organizations: Buyer and seller. And when you think about it, why shouldn’t they get together and make a deal?
It would be a change. The last deal of any sort between the Dodgers and Angels was a minor league transaction in July of 2019, when the Angels purchased Triple-A pitcher Adam McCreery and catcher Josh Thole. The last big league deal? Howie Kendrick to the Dodgers for Andrew Heaney at the 2014 Winter Meetings, one of Andrew Friedman’s first acts as a Dodger executive.
The Dodgers need pitching reinforcements, and waiting for guys to come off the injured list is not necessarily a dependable strategy. The Angels need prospects to replenish a barren farm system.
So how about this: Tyler Anderson, an All-Star in 2022 as a Dodger and this year as an Angel, returning to The Ravine and bringing Angels closer Carlos Estévez with him, and two or three Dodgers Class A-level prospects going the other way.
This could work. Anderson has regained his footing, and adding Estévez to a bullpen that already features Evan Phillips, Blake Treinen and Daniel Hudson would make a really good ’pen close to untouchable.
In return, the Angels would get financial relief, since the Dodgers are one of the few teams that would probably be willing to assume all or most of next season’s $13 million, the final year of the contract Anderson signed with the Angels before last season. They also would get to dip into the Dodgers’ bountiful farm system, although what ails their own minor league system might be less about prospects than about the people who are tasked with player development. (Or the philosophy of those who oversee them.)
Any deal, of course, would be contingent on Arte Moreno not stepping in. Remember the last time the Dodgers and Angels had a potential trade? Andrew Friedman was trying to clear salary room to complete the Mookie Betts trade in the early months of 2020, and he thought he had a deal with then-Angels GM Billy Eppler that would send Ross Stripling, Joc Pederson and then-prospect Andy Pages to Anaheim for Luis Rengifo.
But Arte killed the deal, ostensibly because of the week-long delay in completing the Betts deal. Joc ultimately helped Betts and the Dodgers win a World Series that fall before starting his own incredible journey; he’s now in Arizona, his fourth team in four seasons. Rengifo is still an Angel – the Dodgers might even have interest in him still – and Pages is now a big leaguer and a key part of the Dodgers’ future.
It’s a bit of a head-scratcher why the Dodgers and Angels haven’t done more deals over the years. They are opponents four games a season but aren’t really rivals, except maybe for advertising dollars. The Dodgers have their clientele, the Angels have theirs, and if members of the latter haven’t jumped ship by now, they’re not going to. There’s always the chance of blowback from a deal that doesn’t work, but it’s not quite the same as dealing with a divisional rival and having a bad deal shoved in your face 12 times a season.
A team that doled out $461.5 million worth of contracts to get the two best starters it could find in the offseason, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tyler Glasnow, again seeks pitching as the July 30 trade deadline approaches, and as crazy as it sounds doesn’t this look familiar? This is the type of situation that forced the Dodgers to take a flyer on Lance Lynn at last year’s trading deadline, and I apologize if that brings up grisly memories of balls flying over fences.
Clayton Kershaw is said to be one rehab start away from returning to the rotation. As much as you’d love to see him come back and be the old Kersh following last winter’s shoulder surgery, there’s no way of knowing what to expect. Walker Buehler went back to the injured list after several starts that were hardly vintage Buehler. Bobby Miller is in Triple-A trying to rediscover what got him to L.A. in the first place, and the last few weeks have featured a cavalcade of rookies and emergency acquisitions.
The big targets are a pair of American League All-Stars, Garrett Crochet of the Chicago White Sox and Tarik Skubal of the Detroit Tigers. The suitors are lining up for both, and the price will be steep.
The absences of Betts and Max Muncy from the everyday lineup only emphasize the issues the Dodgers have had getting offense from the bottom of the batting order, and another hitter – Luis Robert? Jaz Chisholm? – to bolster that bottom five wouldn’t hurt. But, again, what’s the cost? And does going shopping for an extra bat make more sense than giving Miguel Vargas a legitimate shot at an everyday job?
Through the All-Star break the Dodgers had used 46 players, 29 of them pitchers, through their first 97 games. The pitching segment of the injured list alone features Kershaw, Buehler, Yamamoto and Glasnow from the rotation (though Glasnow is expected back momentarily), and relievers Joe Kelly, Brusdar Graterol, Michael Grove and Ryan Brasier.
The old adage that you can never have too much pitching? They’re living it.
Betting on health is always risky. Ask the Angels. Hopefully we will see full-strength Mike Trout again soon, and maybe even an effective and engaged Anthony Rendon on a consistent basis. But the kids are the future, and the more of them Perry Minasian can amass, the better.
Maybe this is an indictment of the farm system, though. Having a drafted player reach the big leagues in less than a year is almost unheard of. The Angels have three of them: Reliever Ben Joyce (drafted in July 2022, called up May 29, 2023); shortstop Zach Neto (first-rounder in 2022, called up April 15, 2023), and first baseman Nolan Schanuel (first-rounder last July 9, called up Aug. 18).
So this is a transitional year, an educational year, for those players and their slightly older teammates. And if you are an Angel fan, it probably requires some mental effort to savor a rebuilding project, to accept the bumps in the road and look for the small triumphs that encompass growth.
But what choice do you have?
jalexander@scng.com
