LA Angels: Tony Watson trade is not looking great right now

When the LA Angels traded Tony Watson, it looked like it could be a win for both teams.

So far, it’s been much more of a win for the San Francisco Giants than the Angels.

It’s early but Sam Selman, who is the big-league pitcher the Angels got in return in the deal (the other two pitchers in the deal are prospects), has been disappointing for the Halos since the trade. He has a 5.40 ERA, and has only struck out 5.4 batters per nine while walking 3.6. It’s a different story when it comes to Tony Watson.

Tony Watson has been lights out ever since leaving the LA Angels.

Tony Watson had a 4.64 ERA for the LA Angels this year, but has had a 0.90 ERA in ten games since returning to San Francisco.

Watson has almost cut his 1.182 WHIP in half, and has posted a 0.600 WHIP with the Giants.

He has yet to give up a single home run after giving up 14 in 36 games with the Halos. He also is yet to give up a single walk after giving up 14 in 36 games with the Halos. This is pretty frustrating.

Watson has gotten much better since going to San Francisco, and Selman has been much worse since leaving San Francisco. He had a 4.50 ERA in San Francisco. That’s not great, but obviously much better than that 5.40 with Anaheim. His WHIP was 1.300, and now it’s 1.000.

Perhaps it’s a coaching problem, as the Angels have indeed gone through this year without who was supposed to be their pitching coach. Mickey Callaway was fired for sexual misconduct issues.

No matter what it is, it’s disappointing to see Selman regressing. It may be up to the returns we get out of Jose Marte and Ivan Armstrong, who were the prospects we also acquired in the trade.

We of course won’t know what they can bring to the table until they get here, though. Marte has gotten here for one outing, and actually did look very good. He pitched two innings without giving up any walks or runs, just one hit, and struck out four.

He is on the IL right now, though, so we are still yet to see an adequate sample size to judge how that part of the return is looking. Armstrong is still in Single-A ball, so we probably won’t get the verdict on him for an even much longer time.

Hopefully they’ll be high-level pitchers for this team, that way we can prove that we got the best out of the move and made a productive trade.