Major Red Flag Surrounds Mike Trout’s Leadership as Angels GM Set to Lose His Job

Every time the Los Angeles Angels and Texas Rangers meet, something out of the box happens. Rangers pitchers hit Zach Neto and superstar Mike Trout in the same inning on their July 30th meet-up, resulting in a benches-clearing incident. And this time, the chaos was replaced by a humiliating 20-3 loss by the Angels on August 27th, 2025.

Angels starting pitcher Jack Kochanowicz gave up 11 runs in just 3.1 innings, and things got so bad that the Angels had to push position player Oswald Peraza and Niko Kavadas to pitch in the seventh and eighth. And team leader Mike Trout went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts.

Veteran sports commentator Lee “Hacksaw” Hamilton did not hold back after the recent blowout. “They’re out of gas. Angels look like they’re out of leadership. Mike Trout no longer looks to be the same player… Mike Trout’s hitting .233. He’s not hitting home runs either,” Hamilton said in his podcast.

Hamilton’s harsh words about the three-time MVP are painfully accurate. His batting average for the season sits around .230, roughly sixty-five points below his career mark and even below league average. His OPS of .786 is well below his career OPS of .978. Trout’s hitting stands at 3-for-25 with 15 strikeouts in his last 7 games with a .120 batting average. The eye test and the stat sheet both agreed that this is not the Mike Trout we are used to seeing.

Hamilton then questioned the future of both manager Ron Washington and the team’s general manager, Perry Minasian. “Who knows whether or not if this thing totally craters, totally bottoms out… whether Minasian’s job is going to be safe or not,” Hamilton speculated. “This has to be as low a moment as they’ve had under Arte Moreno right now… to see this team just go into a pothole and give up 20 runs.” And Hamilton might have a point, given how this team has struggled in the last few years during Minasian’s tenure as its GM.

This Season’s Disaster Is Not a Fluke

The Angels are currently sitting in last place in the AL West with a 62-72 record. This comes just one year after their 2024 season, when they finished with a 63-99 record — the single worst season in the franchise’s 64-year history. In the last three seasons, the Angels’ best record was 73-89 in 2023 when they finished in 4th place in the division.

And it’s not just the win-loss record where Minasian made blunders — in an attempt to make a final playoff push with Shohei Ohtani in 2023, the team traded away top prospects for rental players like Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo López. And when the team collapsed, he placed those same players on waivers, effectively giving them away for nothing.

Coming back to the Angels’ offence this season, players like outfielder Taylor Ward and Jo Adell have hit 30 home runs, but their batting average is hovering below the league average of .230. Young shortstop Zach Neto is the only consistent player in the list with 23 homers and a .268 average. Other players like catcher Logan O’Hoppe are hitting just .222. So, Mike Trout is just the tip of the iceberg among a whole team of inconsistent players.

Tthe most glaring weakness is that this team struggles to get on base. They rank 4th in MLB in home runs, but they rank a dismal 29th in batting average (.230), 28th in on-base percentage (.303), and are the most strikeout-prone team in the league, ranking 30th according to StatMuse. That shows their offence is clearly built on a “boom or bust” model that is nothing but a wastage of power.

And for a team with an overall 4.81 ERA (28th in baseball) that has lost 9 of its last 12 games, the question remains: which fails first here— leadership, roster design, or fans’ trust in the franchise?