Lessons the Angels can learn from the League Championship Series teams

New York Yankees: your superstar can overcome a career marred by injuries

After the Yankees selected him 32nd overall in the 2013 MLB Draft, Aaron Judge kept getting injured. He injured a muscle in his quadricep during a base running drill, and was held out his entire rookie year. In 2016, he missed time with a knee sprain while with the Yankees' AAA team. For three straight years, from the 2018 to the 2020 season, Aaron Judge missed solid chunks of time with the big league club due to a variety of injuries. He played 112 games in 2018, 102 games in 2019, and 28 of 60 games in 2020. Judge rebounded big time in 2021 and 2022, but could only play 106 games in 2023 after winning his first MVP the year before. Due to his sheer size, nobody believed he (or teammate Giancarlo Stanton) could consistently post over the course of a long MLB season.

Judge is reaching new heights, posting for 158 regular season games in 2024 and every postseason game thus far for his Yankees. You might be reading this and not seeing that strong of a comparison to Mike Trout, as Judge only has 9 professional seasons under his belt and Trout has 14. Well, Trout is only 8 months older than Judge.

Trout is struggling physically, and subsequently mentally, causing many to give up hope that he can show up every day in the lineup moving forward. Keep the faith, Angels fans. A few lost seasons does not necessarily mean you need to give up all hope for your superstar.