Angels legend puts Arte Moreno on blast over crumbling relationship

It is fair to say that Los Angeles Angels owner Arte Moreno has burned a lot of bridges. Fans have completely turned against him for a number reasons, including many years of mediocrity at best, a number of questionable moves pushed by him, letting Shohei Ohtani leave having not played in a playoff game, not investing in pitching/player development ... the list goes on and on.

Apparently, the list of hurt feelings doesn't stop with fans, as even former Angels greats have been on the outs under Moreno.

Rod Carew is, without question, one of the greatest players to ever wear an Angels uniform. For seven years of his Hall of Fame career, he made six All-Star teams, hit .314/.393/.392, and added 17.4 rWAR to his career 81.2 WAR total while with the Angels. Hell, he is one of the few numbers that the Angels have actually retired as Carew's No. 29 became off limits in 1986. A legend among legends and one would think that the Angels would be more than interested to have him around to be a mentor and resource for their players.

However, a piece by the LA Times indicated that there is a massive rift between Carew and the team and that Arte Moreno is largely to blame for it.

Rod Carew has had enough of Arte Moreno and Angels president John Carpino

This is a long built situation and Mike Giovanna does a great job in his piece going through the details. However, the gist is that Carew previously enjoyed a great relationship with the Angels, but he also remained close with his other former club, the Twins. Once manager Mike Scioscia came along and found out that Carew had given advice to Twins players, he kept Carew from helping in camp.

That was the beginning of a number of slights, including team president John Carpino again refusing to let Carew come into camp before the 2023 season because of his Twins associations (the Twins were fine with him helping out Angels players, for what it's worth), almost no Angels personnel came to visit him while he was dealing with severe health issues, and Moreno backing Scioscia during that whole saga.

Carew clearly has had enough. Fans ask him why he isn't around the Angels anymore and he even openly celebrated the news that Moreno could sell the team before he famously pulled the Angels back off the market. The final straw was that the Angels didn't even invite Carew to the Angels' home opener this year and he wants fans to know that while he loves them and wants to help, his relationship with the powers that be is going to take a lot of work on the Angels' side to fix.

The Angels are currently saying the right things. Carpino went on record to say that Carew is always welcome at the park and that Moreno has nothing but love and respect for Carew. It is also worth mentioning that Carew's wife thinks that if Moreno were to reach out to Carew to try and mend fences, it would be a good start to fixing this whole situation.

As for Carew's thoughts as to what it would take to repair the relationship, his quote was far more damning: “If they sold the team.”

More LA Angels News from Halo Hangout