Yesterday, Mike Trout turned 21 years old. This was apparently the cue for the entire baseball blogging world to write countless pieces detailing Mike Trout’s utter greatness. To be fair, most outlets had already been doing that on a pretty regular basis anyway, but yesterday it was taken to a whole new level. Me, I declined to partake. However, I now feel left out and really want to write something about Trout, only I am still a horrible contrarian at heart. As a compromise, I will instead present you now with a list of Mike Trout Facts, only they will be facts that are completely boring and in no way impressive:
(OK, so I lied. Even when Trout is unimpressive, he is somehow still impressive somehow. I can’t explain it, he just is. Keep reading and you’ll see what I mean.)
FACT: Mike Trout strikes out in nearly 20% of his plate appearances, which is not good, but also not horrible.
Why this is secretly impressive: He still gets on base 41% of the time, meaning he makes outs via putting the ball in play 39% of the time. Therefore, if you don’t strikeout him out, you have worse than 50/50 odds of getting him out.
FACT: With a -0.6 pitch value against Mike Trout can’t hit the splitfinger.
Why this is secretly impressive: The splitfinger is the only pitch that he has a negative pitch value against. The ONLY pitch.
FACT: Mike Trout has only one outfield assist as a major leaguer.
Why this is secretly impressive: His mediocre arm is literally the only thing that scouts can nitpick him on. Otherwise, Trout is flawless.
FACT: Mike Trout has yet to lay down a successful sacrifice bunt.
Why this is secretly impressive: He is so magical that even he is able to convince the smallball-loving Scioscia that sac bunting is a bad idea even though Trout is a good bunter. The Force is strong with this one.
Why his whole list post is secretly impressive: These are all of the non-impressive facts I could find about Mike Trout.
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