This past offseason, the Los Angeles Angels signed Aaron Loup to a two-year, $17 million deal looking to fortify their bullpen following the left-hander posting a dominant season for the New York Mets with a 0.95 ERA in 56.2 innings.
However, Loup has not found that same success in 2022, and he hasn’t even been close to it. In 29 innings this season, the 34-year-old has already more than doubled the amount of runs he gave up all last season and his ERA sits at 4.66.
Over his last 30 games, he’s been even worse, allowing 15 earned runs in just 24 innings (5.63 ERA). Loup believes this stretch is one of the worst he’s ever had in his career, which began in 2012, via Jeff Fletcher of the O.C. Register:
“I’ve had struggles over my career, looking back on it, this is no doubt one of the worst, if not the worst one,” Loup said. “It’s tough, especially after you have a season like last year and it seems like you could do no wrong. You come in and then you hit a rough patch and it seems like even when you feel like you’re doing things right, it’s still going wrong. So it makes it tough, but you’ve just got to keep going. It’s baseball. It’s part of it sometimes.”
Loup is working to find the issues and figure out what’s going wrong and he’s putting trust in his coaches to help identify the issues. But for now, he’s also focusing on keeping a positive mindset as he tries to find his way back to being an effective Major League reliever:
Loup said he and pitching coaches Matt Wise and Dom Chiti have worked to identify the issues.
“They’ve helped me out every step of the way,” Loup said. “They’re probably working the same as I am trying to figure it out. They know what I can do. They see what I can do. They’re trying to figure out the same thing I’m trying to figure out. I’ve got no complaints.”
The Angels will need Loup to figure it out sooner than later with their playoff hopes shrinking by the day. The club seems likely to add a bullpen piece or two if they are still in contention in a few weeks, but if they aren’t maybe another club would take a chance on figuring out what’s wrong with Loup.
Mike Trout re-affirms commitment to Angels
It seems as though every season — usually during an Angels rough patch — the concept of trading Mike Trout is revisited. Yes, a Trout trade would bring back a historic haul of prospects, but it would mean dealing away one of the greatest players in MLB history squarely in his prime.
Perhaps the biggest snag in this conversation is Trout’s no-trade clause, meaning he would have to approve any trade. And when Trout was asked about the idea of being dealt, he made sure to make it known he is happy in Anaheim
