The Angels’ bid to snap an eight-year playoff drought — and convince Shohei Ohtani to stay with the club in free agency — just took a massive blow.
Superstar center fielder Mike Trout was placed on the injured list Tuesday after he was diagnosed with a fracture of the hamate bone in his left hand, but he anticipates to return this season.
“I’ve had other guys reach out who’ve had this surgery before, or had this injury before,” Trout said. “I don’t know if it’s going to need surgery or not. We’ll know in the next couple of days, I guess. Some guys came back in four weeks, some guys take a little longer just to see how their body heals.”
The three-time MVP could be out for at least a month, according to multiple reports.
“I kind of knew it wasn’t good. It’s another freak thing,” Trout said. “It’s nothing crazy serious, so obviously I’m going to miss a little bit of time, but it’s not season-ending.”
Trout, 31, left Monday night’s game against the Padres in San Diego in the eighth inning after getting hurt taking a swing.
He said after the game that his wrist “doesn’t feel great.”
“I can’t describe the pain I felt,” Trout said. “I never felt it before, ever, before this. I never had wrist problems or anything. Just freak things.”
Trout is hitting .263 with an .862 OPS, 18 home runs and 44 RBIs this season.
Trout, a three-time AL MVP, was selected to his 11th All-Star team on Sunday and 10th straight as a starter.
He said he had been feeling well before the injury and that it’s going to be tough to miss the All-Star Game.
“I was really looking forward to it,” he said. “It’s frustrating.”
Astros left fielder Kyle Tucker was named Trout’s replacement on the All-Star roster.
The injury is crushing for the Angels, who entered Tuesday 45-42 and sat three games behind the final wild-card spot in the American League.
Angels manager Phil Nevin said the team was going to get one more medical opinion on Trout’s wrist, “but usually these things need to be fixed. To be quite honest, when I went out there, I kind of had an idea. I’ve had players before that have done this, the feelings he had.
Nevin said Mickey Moniak and Jo Adell will fill in for Trout in center field.
Adell was recalled from Triple-A Salt Lake, along with right-hander Gerardo Reyes.
The Angels last made the playoffs in 2014, when they were swept by the Royals in the ALDS, the only playoff appearance of Trout’s career.
They last won a playoff series in 2009, sweeping the Red Sox in the ALDS before falling to the Yankees in the ALCS in six games.
Trout has expressed how important returning to the postseason is with respect to convincing Ohtani to say as the two-way star approaches free agency this winter.
Ohtani is having an otherworldly season, hitting .303 with a 1.054 OPS, 31 home runs, 68 RBIs, 61 runs and 11 stolen bases.
On the mound, he has 127 strikeouts in 95 ⅓ innings with a 3.02 ERA across 16 starts.
— with AP
