Angels Trade Chase Silseth, Logan O’Hoppe To Rangers

The Arizona product has made 47 appearances, working to a 2.72 earned run average over 39 2/3 innings. Silseth has fanned 27.6% of opponents behind an excellent 14.1% swinging strike rate, missing bats with both a 96 mph fastball and a plus splitter. He has always had below-average command and has walked nearly 13% of batters faced this year, struggling with left-handed hitters in particular. The Halos have used him mostly in middle relief, though he was tied for second on the team with nine holds.

Silseth should play a similar role in Texas. He’s under team control for four-plus seasons and is playing on a pre-arbitration salary. That’s crucial for a club reportedly operating without much payroll space but looking to extend their 1.5-game lead in the AL West. (MLBTR listed Silseth among a handful of controllable relievers who could be surprise trade candidates based on that affordability and his strikeout stuff.) He’s out of minor league options and needs to stick on the MLB roster.

O’Hoppe won’t jump directly onto the big league club. Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News reports that Texas will option him to Triple-A Round Rock. They’ll stay with an Elias Díaz and Austin Wynns pairing behind the plate for the time being. Texas has been without Jansen since early June due to a forearm strain. Today’s IL transfer is a procedural move but the veteran backstop said last week that he might need to undergo season-ending surgery. The Rangers also placed Kyle Higashioka on the injured list last week with a flexor strain; his recovery timeline isn’t clear.

Texas didn’t have any additional depth catchers on the 40-man roster. They’ll take a flier on O’Hoppe, a former top prospect who looked like the Halos’ long-term catcher when he hit at a league average level between 2023-24. His production on both sides of the ball has tanked over the past year and a half. O’Hoppe had a .629 OPS last season and has had an even tougher ’26 campaign. He’s hitting .209/.271/.295 with four home runs across 256 trips to the plate.

O’Hoppe missed time with a concussion last year and suffered a left wrist fracture on a foul tip this April. He only missed three weeks but has seen his batted ball metrics plummet. O’Hoppe is averaging 86.9 mph off the bat this season, four ticks below where he’d been each season from 2023-25. He’s hitting .212/.241/.314 in 46 games since the injury.

While he’s clearly healthy enough to be on the field, it wouldn’t be a surprise if the wrist has had a lingering impact on his power. He needs to hit the ball with authority, as he has always been an aggressive hitter who strikes out a fair amount.

O’Hoppe also hasn’t progressed as the Angels hoped defensively. He rates as a below-average pitch framer and has really struggled as a blocker. O’Hoppe is tied for the seventh-most passed balls over the last two seasons and has been behind the plate for 75 wild pitches — 20 more than any other catcher. The quality of the Angels’ pitching staff certainly plays a part in that, but Statcast grades O’Hoppe as the least effective blocking catcher in the league this season. He’s middle of the pack in average pop time and essentially league average at throwing out baserunners.

The Halos were clearly ready to move on. They’re reportedly looking to add a young catcher on the trade front, a signal of O’Hoppe’s falling standing in the organization. They offload the approximate $846K remaining on his $2.625MM arbitration salary. O’Hoppe will be eligible for arbitration at least two more times. That’d climb to three years after this if he spends a full month in Triple-A on optional assignment, as he needs to spend another 39 days on an MLB roster or injured list to cross the four-year service threshold before season’s end.

It’s the first trade for Angels interim general manager John Mozeliak, who could oversee significant changes if the Halos move any or all of Reid Detmers, José Soriano and Zach Neto. They’re reportedly more open than they’ve been in years past to discuss controllable pieces. This doesn’t signal too much about their trajectory on more impactful trade pieces but could be the start of a busy week for the front office.

The aptly-named Arredondo is a 19-year-old who is playing mostly third base in Low-A. He’s batting .243/.371/.392 with eight home runs across 357 plate appearances. The righty hitter has taken walks at a strong 14.3% clip against a lower than average 18.2% strikeout rate. It’s a decent but unexceptional statistical profile, and Arrendondo hasn’t made much of an impression on public prospect evaluators.

None of MLB Pipeline, Baseball America nor FanGraphs ranked Arredondo among the top 30 prospects in a weak Texas farm system. Mozeliak tells Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com he thinks Arredondo is underrated publicly and should immediately slot into the top 10 in the Halos’ system. It behooves him to say as much — he’s not going to blast a player whom they just acquired — but it’s also very likely true that the Angels like Arredondo more than consensus. They otherwise simply wouldn’t have made this trade, as this doesn’t come with huge financial savings or pressing contractual maters.

That’s not to say the Halos are necessarily correct in their evaluation, of course. That’ll be determined over time, and Arredondo is a low minors lottery ticket at least three years away from the big leagues. Mozeliak’s comments are a good reminder that teams can rank prospects (their own and those in opposing systems) quite a bit differently, especially those in the lower levels who have less of a statistical track record off which to base decisions.

Jeff Passan of ESPN first reported the Rangers were acquiring Silseth and O’Hoppe. Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News was first on Arredondo. Respective images courtesy of Kirby Lee/William Liang, Imagn Images.