LA Angels: 3 MVP candidates competing with Shohei Ohtani

The American League hasn’t been the same without our own LA Angels outfielder Mike Trout.

Doesn’t that speak to how ‘valuable’ of a player Mike Trout is? The LA Angel has won an MVP Award in a year where he’s battled injuries (2019), so as long as he’s in the conversation for best player in the MLB, he’s in the running for the MVP. And Trout is certainly still in the conversation for best player on the planet.

He’s tied with Guerrero for third in the AL with a .333 batting average, he’s leading the league with a .466 on-base percentage, and he’s second in slugging percentage at .624. He has a 1.090 OPS (2nd in the AL), and nobody in the league has a higher BB% than Trout’s unbelievable 18.5% BB%. To be able to walk that often while slugging that high is incredible.

Something else that’s incredible is that despite missing the time that Trout’s missed since his injury, he’s still third in fWAR among position players. His fWAR is 2.4. His lowest fWAR in a year he won the MVP was his 8.3 fWAR in 2014.

It’ll be tough to get back to that considering he’s going to be out another five to seven weeks.

Betting against Trout is usually not a good idea, however, so Angels fans very well may end up having the top two AL MVP candidates on their own team.

Trout was still in the top three in MVP odds as of May 20th. There’s no counting him out. He’s going to be making noise as soon as he returns to the centerfield grass.