Details emerge concerning Patrick Sandoval's odd non-tender from the Angels roster

The Angels will be without their 2024 Opening Day starter in 2025 and beyond. Former fan-favorite, Patrick Sandoval, was somewhat shockingly non-tendered by the Angels right before the deadline in November. Baseball is a business at the end of the day, but fans hate to see a happy-go-lucky player like Sandoval done dirty by the organization he made 100 starts for.

Sandoval described how shocked he was when he found out about his non-tender to MassLive's Chris Cotillo:

"“I wasn’t expecting it at all. I got a call like two minutes before the tender deadline. My agent had let me know that they decided not to tender me. I didn’t really know how to feel. I understood, me coming back from injury, they might not want to pay me that money to just sit and rehab for a year. And they have the right to do that...I’m thinking I still have two more years until I get that opportunity to choose which team I want to play for.""

Patrick Sandoval

In a vacuum, keeping José Suarez over Sandoval made little sense to fans even with Sandoval set to miss most of 2025 with an elbow injury. Only the thing is...it appears that the lefty will be back on the mound potentially months before it was anticipated. Instead of a full Tommy John surgery that would have brought Sandoval back at September at the earliest, the pitcher had a less severe internal brace surgery. While there is a chance he experiences a setback with his elbow, Sandoval is gearing up for a healthy back-half of the 2025 season.

While the Angels would have kept Sandoval on the books for about $6 million the next two seasons, the Boston Red Sox brought him in on a two-year deal that guarantees him $18.25 million. The Red Sox and the Philadelphia Phillies (plus other teams that were not named) were all over Sandoval in free agency, and the Angels could have retained Sandoval on a more team-friendly deal than those forward-thinking organizations offered.

It made sense that the Angels would not have kept Sandoval for ~$11-15 million with no guarantee that he was going to pitch next season after TJ. However, in the context of Sandoval not undergoing TJ, thus returning earlier in the second half than expected...why did the Angels not bring him back to fortify the rotation during the second half of the season and compete for a job in 2026?

The Angels presumably have Yusei Kikuchi, José Soriano, Tyler Anderson, Kyle Hendricks, Reid Detmers, and Jack Kochanowicz battling it out for 5 spots in the rotation. Let's say Sandoval returns in July, a year after his internal brace surgery (he is currently in a throwing program). At that time, one or more of those pitchers could be injured and he could take their spot. If there were no injuries (an unlikely proposition) they could have optioned Detmers or Kochanowicz down to AAA. They could have traded Tyler Anderson and his expiring contract if he was pitching well, or simply release him. They could have moved Kyle Hendricks to the bullpen. Keeping Sandoval was clearly the wise move.

Getting rid of Sandoval, who was semi-blindsided by the decision, reflects poorly on the Angels. It makes them look cheap, short-sighted, and heartless. What else is new, though? Angels fans are used to puzzling decisions the team has made over-and-over for a decade now.

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