Angels To Hire General Manager For 2027 Season

Angels interim general manager John Mozeliak informs Jeff Fletcher of the SoCal News Group that the club will be hiring a full-time general manager for the 2027 season, and that Mozeliak himself will not be that general manager. No one has been interviewed yet as the process is still in its early stages. Mozeliak will step aside when the new front office leader is hired, per Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com. “That is still to be determined, but I imagine I will help,” Mozeliak said when asked if he would be involved in the search, per Sam Blum of The Athletic.

In June, general manager Perry Minasian was fired, with Mozeliak taking over the front office as interim GM. September brought the stunning news that longtime owner Arte Moreno would be selling the club to Stan Kroenke, owner of several other sports franchises, including the Los Angeles Rams of the NFL. That sale is expected to be finalized early in 2027.

The news of the sale came as the franchise was in transition in many ways. As mentioned, Mozeliak was running the front office on an interim basis. Kurt Suzuki managed the club in 2026 but on a one-year deal. At the deadline, the Angels made some future-focused moves but stopped short of a full rebuild. José Soriano and Jo Adell were flipped elsewhere but trade candidates Reid Detmers and Zach Neto stayed.

For the past few weeks, it’s been unclear what the new ownership has in mind for the future. Would Suzuki stay in the dugout? Would Mozeliak stick around to run the front office? Would the club continue selling players from the major league roster?

Some answers have been trickling in today. The club announced a few hours ago that they declined an option in Suzuki’s contract and would start looking for a new manager and coaching staff. Suzuki was offered a special assistant role in the organization. He later told Fletcher that he is unsure if he will accept because he has received some interest for jobs in other organizations.

Now there’s some clarity on the front office plan as well. The club will look for a new leader to steer them into the future. It’s unclear how long the search will last but presumably not too long. Mozeliak says the new hire will decide about the club’s next manager. It’s also fair to assume the new general manager will also have strong input about the club’s plans for a return to contention.

The Angels have been mired in mediocrity for quite some time. They haven’t made the playoffs since 2014 and haven’t had a winning season since 2015. Those losing seasons came despite the club having Mike Trout the entire time, with other star players like Shohei Ohtani, Albert Pujols and Anthony Rendon also spending time with the Angels.

Despite those rough years, the Halos have resisted rebuilding. There was some logic to that when Trout and Ohtani where sharing the roster, as it’s hard to justify a teardown when you have arguably the two best players in the world. But Ohtani has been gone for three years now and the results have continued to get worse. The Angels lost at least 90 games in those three most recent seasons, including 100 in 2026.

As mentioned, there were some signs of the club perhaps opening the door to a rebuild this summer. Soriano was traded to the Blue Jays even though he’s under club control through 2028. Adell was sent to the Guardians despite being controllable through 2027. Those two trades allowed the Angels to net four prospects. They got Arjun Nimmala, Eddie Micheletti and Angel Rivero in the Soriano deal and Jacob Cozart in the Adell swap.

Detmers and Neto were in somewhat similar positions to those two. Detmers is slated for free agency after 2028 and Neto after 2029. Those two are still on the Angels’ roster. If the new front office leader doesn’t see a path to near-term contention for the Angels, then it would make sense for them to end up on the trade block.

Trout has also been in plenty of trade chatter over the years, though most of it has been wishcasting from fans of other clubs as opposed to substantiated rumors. Trout’s contract has a full no-trade clause and he has consistently said he wants to stay in Anaheim. Perhaps he would reconsider if the club were kicking off a multi-year rebuild project but as recently as September he said he hadn’t changed his stance.

Though today has provided a bit more clarity on the future of the franchise, there are still many questions to be answered as the winds of change blow through Anaheim.