The Angels Need To Accept Reality And Rebuild

A month from now pitchers and catchers will report to Spring Training. With major holes in the lineup at second and third base, a questionable at best outfield mix, and a complete lack of organizational depth the odds of the Angels fleshing out a competitive roster for 2026 lie somewhere between slim and none.

However, the organization has amassed a collection of young talented players who could form a competitive team in the foreseeable future. Zach Neto is the centerpiece of that core and is under club control for 4 more seasons. Ideally an extension is reached to keep him in an Angels uniform for longer. The goal should be to keep Neto and a few others and supplement them with as much talent as possible.

Players who could be MLB contributors as Neto is in his prime will be in Tempe this year. Kyren Paris, Denzer Guzman, and Nelson Rada have shown promise but yet to have MLB success. On the mound, Tyler Bremner, George Klassen, and Caden Dana have the best odds of being starters while Ryan Johnson should make his way to the big leagues in one way or another.

The goal should be to add more talent to that group.

The fact of the matter is prospects fail to live up to their ceilings far more often than not. Take a look at recent Angels additions Oswald Peraza and Vaughn Grissom as evidence of that fact. Or Grayson Rodriguez and Alek Manoah. These guys and Nick Madrigal follow a well established pattern of Angels general manager Perry Minasian grabbing previously highly rated players (such as former number one overall pick Mickey Moniak) and hoping they somehow live up to billing in Anaheim. It rarely happens.

If a team wants to field 7 homegrown players that team likely needs 20-30 high level prospects. And the Angels simply don't have that right now. Nor do they have a team that is a couple of free agents short of being a winner. This is an organization that is without a path to contention unless it chooses a direction. And at this point, that direction should be to sell.

Who are the trade chips and what will they bring?

If the goal is to compete 2 to 3 years from now, anybody not under club control for 3+ years is an obvious trade chip. It just so happens that in the Angels case those are also most of the team's most valuable pieces. Yes, each trade would hurt but the chances of future success improves with each move whereas keeping them in 2026 does little to improve the Angels odds of playing in October.

In future pieces I will run a variety of trade scenarios for each player using rankings from baseballtradevalues.com. No resource is perfect, but BTV's player ranking system has evolved over the years and is pretty good now.

Reid Detmers may be a starter or he might be a really solid bullpen piece. He's thrown both a no hitter and recorded a save and is slated to make less than $3 million this season so he's a fit on every roster. A team like Boston could ship the Angels their 2025 first rounder Kyson Witherspoon plus 33rd overall pick Marcus Phillips. Those two would slot as the Angels 2nd and 4th best prospects and as both are college pitchers could be here in a couple of years.

Jo Adell has huge power and plays a decent right field. Pick a team in the NL Central and he pretty much fits there. The Reds could really use some power, so could the Giants where Jo would fetch Dakota Jordan, a higher contact outfielder who can play centerfield but lacks Jo's pop.

Nolan Schanuel is a fine complimentary piece on a good team. His high OBP is his calling card at a position where teams typically look for power. Arizona is a good team with a limited budget and a hole at first base. They also have Ryan Waldschmidt fresh off a .309/.423/.498 showing in AA. They'd need to throw in another player like Blaze Alexander who is blocked in AZ but holds down second base in Anaheim for a while.

With a basic plan like this, the Angels vastly improve the top 10 of their prospect pipeline with players who are 21 or over and partially developed. Picture it as having 3 first round picks and nabbing three of the top college pitchers on the board in Bremner, Witherspoon, and Phillips. That's an immense leap in the talent level of the organization.

If you look at the Angels prospects lists (and we will here OnSI) the system is already pitcher heavy. So adding solid outfield bats in Walschmidt and Jordan is a plus. The team organization also lack positional flexibility and those two have played all three outfield spots as professionals.

If the Angels continue the path of not adding players for 2026, or at least not enough to make a difference, the goal needs to be to compete somewhere around 2028. The only way to do that is to cash in trade chips while they have value and add as many quality prospects as possible.