Angels' Mike Trout Fights Back Tears Reacting to Another Major Injury

Noah Camras | Apr 30, 2024

Apr 23, 2024; Anaheim, California, USA; Los Angeles Angels center fielder Mike Trout (27) returns to / Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports

Los Angeles Angels superstar outfielder Mike Trout will be out indefinitely after suffering a torn meniscus. He will undergo surgery, and is without a timetable for return.

The news was announced on Tuesday by Angels general manager Perry Minasian. Shortly after, Trout spoke to reporters.

"Just frustrating," Trout said to reporters as he fought back tears. "It's crazy because I look back, I don't even know when I did it."

Mike Trout was emotional, as you might expect, but somehow composed. … pic.twitter.com/ZlEOULxRh2

— Alden González (@Alden_Gonzalez) April 30, 2024

Trout said it happened after the third inning of Monday night's win when he felt "a little bit of an ache" in his knee as he was running back to the dugout. However, he was able to stay in the game and continue to play, and it wasn't until he he sat back down and got back up that he "started feeling it."

"I mentioned something in like the seventh, eighth inning to the guys in there, just to give them a heads up that it was nothing crazy-crazy," Trout said.

Unfortunately, it ended up being worse than Trout thought.

Trout got it looked at on Tuesday, and received the unfortunate diagnosis that would be be out for what will likely be a significant chunk of the 2024 season. The news was as shocking to him as it was to anyone else.

"It's just one of them things, like, my body — I wasn't feeling it hitting, I wasn't feeling it running," Trout said. "It was just sore. I was telling myself, maybe I banged it on something and I didn't realize it. After the game getting treatment, it was really sore. The plan was to see how it felt in the morning. If I woke up and it was sore, get it looked at. That was the plan. Last night was tough for me to sleep. It was aching all night. I texted Frosty (Angels athletic trainer Mike Frostad) first thing: I need to get this looked at."

Trout hasn't played a full season since the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, and hasn't appeared in at least 140 games in a season since 2018.

Trout was a lone bright spot for the 11-18 Angels, whose season already feels all but over. With their three-time Most Valuable Player award winner on the sidelines for the foreseeable future, the road to getting back to the top of the American League West just got much more difficult.