Washington Nationals: 3 to watch as Nats head West
By Drew Douglas
Mike Trout
Mike Trout, a kid from a small town in New Jersey, is the face of baseball. This is obvious because despite playing on a noncompetitive team on the West Coast, he receives as much national coverage as anyone.
After bursting onto the scene in 2011, Trout has had a phenomenal career. He is a six-time All-Star, two-time AL MVP, five-time Silver Slugger Award winner, and has hit a whopping .308 throughout his career.
Trout is having yet another spectacular season, batting .337 with 16 homers in 50 games. Despite missing a significant period of time, his 16 homers rank 27th in the American League and he is tied with guys such as Daniel Murphy, Jose Bautista, and Jose Abreu.
On top of his light-tower power, Trout is also capable of hitting for average, as shown by his .337 batting average, and has above-average speed, which he uses to steal a decent amount of bases. In 2012, he joined the 30-30 club (30 homers and 30 stolen bases), which is outstanding for someone of his size. This year, he is 11-for-12 while stealing, and has a career 84% stolen base percentage.
Since being activated from the disabled list, Trout has played well. In three games, he is 4-for-12 with a stolen base. This is right after returning from a fairly significant injury, and he should only improve as he continues to get back into the swing of things. Although it’s never fun to face Trout, the Nats are playing him at the perfect time.
In three career games against Bryce Harper, I mean the Nationals, Trout has hit .357 and scored three runs. While this is a solid stat, it’s a small sample size. There will be a more significant reading of how well Trout performs against the Nats after he plays them four times this season.
Trout is an incredible talent, who is unfortunately on a non-contending team. He is also in the American League and the Angels don’t appear to be serious World Series contenders, so Nats fans will only get to see Trout for four games this year. It should be a lot of fun to watch arguably the best two players in the league on the same field for a few games.