Angels News: Taylor Ward Named American League Player Of The Week

Prior to the regular season, Taylor Ward was in the mix to be the starting right-fielder for the Los Angeles Angels, but an injury in the Freeway Series before Opening Day derailed his start to the year. Since his activation on April 16, Ward has been one of the best players in MLB.

Ward was recognized by MLB for his contributions and has been chosen as the American League Player of the Week. This is his first career A.L. player of the week award and the Angels’ first recipient since fellow teammate David Fletcher did in July 2021.

After batting .448 (13-for-29) with 10 runs scored, two doubles, a triple, four home runs, 11 RBI, two walks, and a 1.000 slugging percentage over seven games played this past week, Ward was a one-man wrecking crew helping the Angels to a now, 2.5-game lead in the A.L. West standings.

He logged at least one hit in every game during his award-winning week, including four multi-hit games, and registered his first career multi-home run game in Monday’s win over the Cleveland Guardians, plating all three of the Angels’ runs.

Ward made a bit of history last Wednesday, becoming the second Major Leaguer in the modern era to log a double, triple, grand slam, and four runs scored in a single game, putting him in the same air as Roger Maris, who accomplished that feat on August 3, 1958.

Ward’s presence has helped safeguard the club with a few of their premier bats off to slow starts, but his two-homer game on Monday put the Angels alone in MLB with three multi-homer games from their players. He joined Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani as the other Halos’ players to pull it off.

Angels prospect wins PCL award

25-year-old Jhonathan Diaz was named the Pacific Coast League Player of The Week, which was headlined by eight innings of near-perfect pitching, the only blemishes being one hit, and a hit by pitch.

He owns a 1.96 ERA and 3.62 FIP in 23 innings while striking out 7.04 per nine and walking 3.91 per nine.

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