Last offseason, the Angels reportedly offered Korean infielder Hyeseong Kim more money than the Los Angeles Dodgers. The original report from South Korea was subsequently disputed, but the larger point stood.
Even if he ends up making more money with the Dodgers than he would have in Anaheim, Kim chose to sign with a team that ended up optioning him to the minor leagues to begin the season, rather than the Angels — whose roster still features a gaping hole at second base.
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It isn’t always about the money. Or the playing time. Free agents often choose a team based on their reputation for catalyzing a player’s success. And few teams have a worse reputation than the Angels.
That, at least, was the conclusion of an anonymous player survey published Wednesday by The Athletic, which garnered more than 100 votes from players between February and May of this year.
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Only five teams — the Pittsburgh Pirates (24), Miami Marlins (25), Colorado Rockies (25), Chicago White Sox (31), and Oakland/Sacramento Athletics (39) — collected more “bad” votes than the Angels (19).
“They just don’t know what they’re doing top to bottom,” one player said of the Angels. “That’s what I’ve heard.”
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Players are more apt to rely on word of mouth than the standings, but there too the Angels don’t stack up well compared to their peers.
No team has gone longer between postseason appearances than the Angels, who haven’t clinched a playoff berth since 2014. Their last winning record was in 2015. That was four managers and three general managers ago.
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The churn among coaches and executives is likely part of the reason the Angels’ direction as a franchise is hard to discern among players.
“We had four or five different managers and four or five different pitching coaches with the Angels,” former Angels pitcher Griffin Canning, now with the New York Mets, told The Athletic‘s Sam Blum last week. “Sometimes a new guy comes in and maybe doesn’t necessarily know you as well. Or just different organizational philosophies when people come in and out.”
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Canning, for his part, is 6-2 with a 3.22 ERA in 13 starts with the Mets after posting a winning record once in six years with the Angels. Kim is hitting .403 in his first 28 games with the Dodgers.
Until the Angels can collect more success stories of their owns — and a few playoff victories — don’t be surprised to see them rank near the bottom of similar surveys in the future.
For more Angels news, head over to Angels on SI.
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