With an epic series in the Bronx, Mike Trout sends a powerful reminder of his greatness

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Dustin Satloff/Getty Images Share articleFor those who might have forgotten Mike Trout’s place in baseball history, allow Los Angeles Angels hitting coach Brady Anderson to refresh your memory. “When you look up the all-time OPS leaders, you’re quickly reminded,” said Anderson, a former outfielder who played 15 years in the majors. “As you go down the top 20 you get to Mantle, then DiMaggio, then Trout. His name is right in the middle of the game’s all-time legends, and rightfully so.” Anderson had it right. Trout entered Thursday 13th in AL/NL history in OPS, behind Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio, and slightly ahead of Stan Musial (minimum 1,000 plate appearances). Babe Ruth, Ted Williams and Lou Gehrig ranked 1-2-3. Some guy named Aaron Judge was sixth. Before this season – heck, before this week – that list might simply have been a reminder of Trout’s glorious past, when he finished first or second for MVP in each of his first five seasons and seven of his first eight. But when Judge on Monday referred to Trout as the “greatest of all time,” he wasn’t simply paying homage to a player who dominated the 2010s. He was talking about a player who, all these years later, is dominating again. In his 16th season. In 2026. Trout turns 35 in August. From 2021 to ‘25, injuries kept him off the field for more games than he played. Yet, you wouldn’t have known it this week, when he became the first player to homer five times in a single series against the New York Yankees since George Bell in June 1990. In Thursday’s series finale at Yankee Stadium, an 11-4 Angels victory, Trout hit a 446-foot homer, his seventh of the season, and drew three walks. His OPS is up to 1.010, in the range of his best seasons. Asked if this is the best he has felt in years, Trout said, “It’s pretty close. I felt good at the end of last year. But (I’m) just seeing the ball and staying with a routine and having a good game plan up there.” Granted, the Angels’ season is only 20 games old. The sample is not large enough for anyone to say with confidence, “Trout is back.” The enduring caveat – “if he stays healthy”– always applies. Still, pretty much everyone across the sport roots for Trout, especially those who work closest with him. Angels bench coach John Gibbons, a former player and manager who is in his first year with the team but fifth decade in pro ball, said Trout is “probably the most humble superstar I’ve ever been around.” Anderson, also new to the Angels, calls Trout, “one of the coolest down-to-earth humans you’ll ever meet.” Trout’s past refusal to request a trade from the Angels, a franchise that has paid him hundreds of millions but made every attempt to bumble away his loyalty, raised eyebrows among fans and even people inside the game. His willingness to stay with a team that last reached the postseason in 2014 should not be mistaken for a lack of competitiveness. All this time, Trout burned to be the player he once was, burned to be great. “To an unusual degree he loves to hit – truly loves it,” Anderson said. “If left to his own devices and if he didn’t have other responsibilities in life, I think he may hit for four hours per day without stopping. “He gets in these grooves in the cage in which every ball he hits is loud and on the same part of the bat, often more than 10 in a row. It’s not normal even at the highest level.” Such is Trout’s work ethic – and his pride. When MLB Network dropped him to No. 39 on its list of top 100 players entering the 2025 season, Trout said, “stuff like that fires you up a bit.” He slid even further entering this season, to No. 82 – and that was coming off a year in which he played 130 games, hit 26 homers and had an OPS-plus that was 23 percent above league average, albeit the lowest of his career. What is different thus far? For starters, Trout is healthy – so healthy, he has made 17 of his 19 starts in center field after starting last season in right and then moving to DH. In the batter’s box, he has made an adjustment, taking a step back with his back foot before getting into his swing. He first made that change in the latter part of last season, abandoned at the start of this one, then reincorporated after an early slump. “It ensures he loads his back side,” Anderson said. “He goes back to it when he gets the feeling he’s falling forward without loading.” Perhaps the best indication of Trout’s resurgence, from a statistical perspective, is that his Baseball Savant page again is loaded with red. He is in the top 1 percent of the league in barrel rate, expected slugging percentage and expected weighted on-base average. He has cut his strikeout rate from 32 percent last season to 20.2 percent. His contact and in-zone contact rates are the best of his career. Again, it’s early. Again, Trout needs to stay healthy. But the past four days, he outhomered even a red-hot Judge, who hit four in the series. “He looks like the guy I remember,” said Gibbons, whose second stint managing the Toronto Blue Jays was from 2013 to ‘18, in the middle of Trout’s peak. “I had heard he was declining because his body was banged up but I don’t see it.” Kurt Suzuki, in his first season managing the Angels, was Trout’s teammate in 2021 and ‘22, the final two years of the former catcher’s playing career. Trout played in just 36 games in the first of those seasons. He appeared in 119 in the second, and hit 40 home runs. The player Suzuki describes now is refreshed, revived, reborn. “Mike’s in a good place right now mentally. He’s enjoying himself everyday at the yard,” Suzuki said. “I don’t want to speak for him on how he felt when I played with him, but just right now, seeing his joy for the game has been awesome.” Anderson, a former teammate and good friend of Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr., is well-versed in baseball lore. Speaking of Trout before the series finale, he lamented, “some may forget where he truly ranks in the game’s history.” Could be, given our short attention spans. But for four days at Yankee Stadium, Trout sent quite the powerful reminder. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Ken Rosenthal is a senior baseball writer for The Athletic who has spent nearly 40 years covering the major leagues. In addition, Ken is an Emmy-award winning broadcaster for Fox Sports’ MLB telecasts. His peers voted him National Sportswriter of the Year in 2022 and 2024. Follow Ken on Twitter @Ken_Rosenthal