A meeting between Moreno and Trout early in Spring Training was the impetus for his extensionGETTY IMAGES
Angels CF Mike Trout said the thought "never crossed my mind" that he would not return to the Angels when he became a free agent, which led to the team locking him up with a record-breaking extension two years before he was scheduled to hit the open market, according to Alden Gonzalez of ESPN.com. A "critical juncture" in creating the extension happened on a "random spring afternoon earlier this month, when Trout came out of a game and, as is his custom," went to shake Angels Owner Arte Moreno's hand. Moreno, seeking a face-to-face meeting with Trout, said, "Can I have 10 or 15 minutes?" The two then sat in the manager's office at Tempe Diablo Stadium and "went over everything, from the team to the future to the fans to Trout's overall experience as a member of the Angels." Moreno said, "We ended up in there an hour, talking about all kinds of stuff." Angels GM Billy Eppler said that the meeting with Moreno was "really big" in regards to completing the deal with Trout. Two days after his meeting with Moreno, Trout "sent Eppler an early-morning text message asking if the two could meet privately." Eppler: "At that point, I started to feel like we had an opportunity to get something done." Gonzalez noted a deal was "completed only a week or so later" (ESPN.com, 3/25). CBSSN's Adam Schein said Trout "needed to be convinced" that Eppler would build a "winning team around him." Schein: "Prior GMs have not done that" ("Time to Schein," CBSSN, 3/25).
FITTING RESULT: THE ATHLETIC's Fabian Ardaya wrote it is "perhaps fitting that Trout will spend his entire career without ever hitting the free-agent market." Trout has been a "grateful and graceful superstar, but not an attention-seeking one." He has "spent his career thus far shying away from the distractions and controversy that would almost certainly follow the bidding war for his services." Trout has also "openly spoken against free agency this spring, noting the slow, icy market for 26-year old mega-free agents Manny Machado and Bryce Harper." Trout said that he is "glad they will never have to go through such a process again of signing just weeks before the start of the season." By observing the Machado and Harper deals, Trout "realized even he might not be safe from the current state of baseball free agency and club spending on the open market" (THEATHLETIC.com, 3/25).
