Angels Star Outfielder Won’t Do Home Run Derby, But He Still Leads All-Star Voting
· Yahoo Sports
Los Angeles Angels outfielder Mike Trout is one of the bright spots in a bad season, and the pivotal moment of his season is here. Trout has a chance to play in the All-Star game in Philadelphia in less than two weeks, but he’s rehabilitating from a hamstring straing.
There’s good news and bad news related to this. The good news is that Trout is doing well in his rehab, and he’s leading all American League outfielders in the All Star voting. He’s very driven to get back, as he’s said multiple times in related ways.
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“It would be huge,” Trout said in a story written by Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com. “Before the season, it was one of those things on my mind. It’d be cool to play in front of the hometown crowd. And being close to my hometown, it'd be special. As soon as I got the injury in Arizona, I was aiming to be back in time for it, for sure.”
The bad news is that Trout is leaning against participating in the Home Run Derby, even though he’d be a welcome addition. It would be a big ask body-wise at this point, and Trout really doesn’t want to go there at this point.
“I'm leaning toward not doing it,” Trout said. “Obviously, it’d be cool to do it, but I probably won't do it. I was thinking about it, but then I hurt my leg. So that's what kind of threw it off there.”
But Trout is already doing some light jogging, and it’s hard to imagine him not at least making a token appearance in the game at this point. He’s been one of the biggest stories in baseball this season, and Trout grew up just 40 miles away in Millville, NJ.
“It's encouraging,” Suzuki said. “It's surprising a little bit too, right? How quick that it's been that he's already doing some light jogging, some movement stuff and some footwork stuff too. So it’s nice.”
The good thing about seeing Trout in this one is that it almost doesn’t matter how he performs. His slash line when he went out with the injury was .234/.394/.472 with 17 homers, 12 doubles, 54 runs, seven stolen bases and 36 RBIs in 74 games this season.
He was also an iron man, as he missed just one game through the Angels first 74 games before sustaining the injury. It’s almost impossible not to root for him, and it looks like he’s going to make it.