The Los Angeles Angels made a hail mary attempt to head into next season with a plus after placing multiple players on waivers this past week, a move that could have put them under the luxury tax threshold.
Lucas Giolito, Matt Moore, Reynaldo López, Hunter Renfroe, Dominic Leone and Randal Grichuk were up for grabs if other Major League teams wanted their services. All of whom were claimed except for Grichuk, which threw a wrench in general manager Perry Minasian’s plan.
Because Grichuk wasn’t picked up by another club, the Angels are on hook for his remaining salary. With the Angels clearly out of contention, their two-tiered decision fell flat, per Jeff Fletcher of the O.C. Register:
“It’s baseball,” Minasian said. “Things happen. At the time we made the decisions we made, we felt like they were the right decisions. And sometimes you do things that work. Sometimes you do things that don’t. For multiple reasons, we just haven’t played well. You can look at different parts, whether it be on the pitching end, offensively, situational hitting, bullpen, defense. That’s something we’ll look at at the end of the year and really go through it and try to learn from it.”
Grichuk has nearly $1.7 million left on his current deal for this season, and now that they’ll finish above the threshold, they’ll pay 20% for every dollar above the $233 million limit.
Their decisions weren’t only motivated by money, but for draft pick implications as their compensatory pick for qualifying offer players gets pushed back. Because Shohei Ohtani is likely to get slapped with the qualifying offer if they’re unable to agree long-term, that pick won’t follow the second round.
Angels future unclear
A plus for the Angels is their quality of youth that is already in Major League Baseball, the negative is their inability to have adequate depth around them. With some solid veteran options such as Brandon Drury, Luis Rengifo, Eduardo Escobar, and star Mike Trout, they have enough to boost the rookies on the roster.
The call-up of 21-year-old Kyren Paris is another piece to the youth influx with Angels baseball, and frankly, another move that puts them in a halfway spot considering they won’t be in position to compete for a few seasons.
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