The Angels should trade Jo Adell now before it's too late

At one point, Los Angeles Angels outfielder Jo Adell was seen as a future superstar they can have in the outfield next to Mike Trout.

In 2019 he was ranked as the 14th-best prospect in all of baseball by MLB.com. The 10th overall pick in the 2017 draft seemingly had all the tools needed to be a star. He had a ton of power and was a freak athlete.

Adell got his first taste of the majors in 2020. Things couldn't have gone much worse for him as a big leaguer so far.

The time to trade Jo Adell is now. It's best for the Angels and is also best for Adell.

With the Angels making a trade to acquire Hunter Renfroe from the Brewers, the only path to consistent playing time for Jo Adell is through injury. The outfield is set with Taylor Ward in left, Mike Trout in center, and Renfroe in right. That will be the alignment every day unless there is an injury or a day off.

I wouldn't even have Adell as the fourth outfielder. I'd give him a shot to compete with Mickey Moniak during the Spring, but Moniak has shown more in his limited time than Adell has, which is sad since Moniak hasn't shown much either.

Adell has slashed .215/.259/.356 with 15 home runs and 60 RBI in 161 games in three seasons. Adell has essentially played the equivalent of one full season of big-league baseball and has that stat line. The 15 homers are decent, but the rest is not good. He has a 70 OPS+ in his career.

The big issue for Adell has been the strikeouts. He has a 34.8% career K-rate which is far too high. It was at 37.5% this past season, so it hasn't improved at all. To make matters worse, he's walked at a 4.7% clip. That number was at 3.9% in 2022 so again, worse.

Adell has shown his tools as he's hit for some decent power at the big-league level. He also ranked in the 98th percentile in sprint speed according to baseball savant. The problem with that is he hasn't really used the speed for much of anything. He's stolen six bases in his career in ten opportunities. He has four triples in his career. In addition to his underwhelming hitting, he's been a poor defender, ranking in the 17th percentile in outs above average. I will say he did look much better defensively in the second half of the season.

With all of his struggles taken into account, there is still a team that will be willing to take a chance on Adell and think they can help make him closer to the player he was projected to be. He's still only 23 years old and has those great tools. This could be the last chance the Angels have to get any sort of value from him.

The alternative in this situation is having Adell sit in AAA and hope he shows signs of improvement. I'd much rather give him the fresh start he needs and give the Angels a potential asset. It wouldn't be much, but even a reliever would be plenty for me.