The best Angels Silver Slugger winner every decade since award's inception

The Los Angeles Angels as a franchise only predates the existence of the Louisville Silver Slugger Award by about 20 years, but the team has still had some pretty incredible players take home silver over the years. 

FanSided will be announcing the winners of the Louisville Silver Slugger in November just like last year which gives us the perfect opportunity to reflect on the best Angels player to win the award in every decade since 1980, the first year the award started.

Best Angels player to win Silver Slugger in each decade since 1980s

1980s: Reggie Jackson

Not many people associate Reggie Jackson with the Angels. He’s much more well known for his time with the Oakland A’s and New York Yankees. His most memorable moment as an Angel for many may be his appearance in the first The Naked Gun film where he is programmed to assassinate the Queen of England.

It’s tough to top that, but Jackson did some other good things in an Angels uniform. He took home a Silver Slugger in 1982, his first season with the team. He hit .275/.375/.532 with 39 home runs and 101 runs batted in at the age of 36.

He declined after that season but it was still an impressive year and Jackson was certainly the most decorated Angels player to win a Silver Slugger in the 1980s.

1990s: Lance Parrish

With all due respect to Tim Salmon, who won the Silver Slugger in 1995 with the Angels, catcher Lance Parrish was the best player to win one for the team in the 1990s.

The catcher spent half of his career with the Detroit Tigers where he had a great run but joined the Angels later on. He won the Silver Slugger in 1990 and hit .268/.338/.451 with 24 home runs and 70 runs batted in. He put up great offensive numbers for a catcher and was an eight-time All-Star so he had a very accomplished career.

2000s: Vladimir Guerrero 

Even though he began his career with the Montreal Expos, Vladimir Guerrero had a great run with the Angels in the mid-2000s. He won a Silver Slugger every year from 2004 to 2007 and hit a collective .327/.392/.566 with 131 home runs and 475 runs batted in across those four years.

He’s in the Hall of Fame as an Angel and provided a lot of thump in those years so he has to be the best Silver Slugger winner of that decade.

2010s: Mike Trout

This one is obviously not even worthy of debate. Mike Trout may very well go down as the best baseball player of the 2010s so without question he is the best Angels Silver Slugger winner from that era.

He won the award seven times in the 2010s and is tied for the third-most Silver Sluggers of all time. Trout will obviously be in the Hall of Fame someday and will go down as the greatest Angel of all time.

2020s: Shohei Ohtani

If Trout was the best player of the 2010s, then Shohei Ohtani has to be the best player of the 2020s. He will be remembered mainly for his time with the Los Angeles Dodgers, but he broke into the league with the Angels and displayed his greatness for everyone to see.

He won the Silver Slugger in 2021 and 2023. It will always sting that he left the Angels for the Dodgers but the fact that he’s associated with the franchise at all is still pretty special.

The Angels probably won’t have a Silver Slugger winner this year, but maybe with a new front office and new owner they will get on the right track and start getting some Silver Slugger winners again in the future.

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