Let me be honest: I can’t imagine ever being Perry Minasian. I’m too contrarian and skeptical of ownership to bend the knee in Moreno’s regime, and too focused on scouting, drafting, farm and player development to measurably succeed under his watch. Against the tide, I would also be asking for a payroll boost this year (call it a managerial “advance” on 50% of Rendon’s salary that will be off the books in 2027), because I don’t think the team can advance without some investment.
I do want to participate in this annual CtPG game, but I also want to give some sense of what I’d actually try to do, absent the arbitrary rules of this sim. As recently as 2023, the Angels payroll was as high as $227M, $17M north of Jeff’s current sim payroll limit, and the only Arturo’s Law that any of us really believes is inviolable is the luxury tax threshold, which is $244M in 2026.
So I’m using a little editorial discretion here, and offering multiple scenarios (A-D) – three largely conforming to the rules of the game, and one contemplating an elevated budget midway between the CtPG number and the luxury tax threshold. The lineups I propose also progress from largely achievable to something like fan-fiction, dependent on some trade scenarios that other teams’ GMs might find unappetizing.
I’ll give away the store by stating my candidate list and projected lineups upfront, and provide iterations that progress, left to right, from the most probable and least expensive to the most speculative and most capital-intensive.
The following list is a shopping list – I’m not suggesting the team pick up every player on this list, but some permutation thereof. I’m in each case using the more modest salary projection from Fangraphs or MLBTR, just for the sake of the game, though we all know that the Angels often have to pay a premium to outbid other teams for player services.
Subtractions
All scenarios assume we non-tender Connor Brogdon, Carson Fullmer and Carter Kieboom, and trade Taylor Ward, to start with a baseline budget of +$40M for new additions. Scenarios C and D explore potential trades of Jo Adell and Logan O’Hoppe, bringing available spend to $48M. (Scenario D also contemplates a 2023-level payroll of $227M, and a budget of +$65M.)
Acquisition Targets
Free Agents
- Harrison Bader (OF), 2yrs, $24M (’26: $10M, ‘27: $14M)
- Cody Bellinger (OF), 5 yrs, $135M (’26: $24M, ’27-30: $29M)
- Mike Yastrzemski (OF), 1yr, $8M (+ $2M buyout, mutual option)
- Jake Fraley (OF), 1yr, $2M
- Jorge Polanco (2B/3B), 3yrs, $42M (’26: $12M, ‘27-28: $15M)
- Song Sung-mun (3B/IF), 2yrs, $10M (’26: $3M, ’27:$5M, $2M buyout / option)
- Cody Ponce (SP), 2yrs, $16M (’26: $7M, ’27: $9M)
- Erasmo Ramirez, 1yr, $1M
- Josh Winckowski, 1yr, $800k
- Phil Maton (RP), 1yr, $5M
- Minor league deals: Nolan Gorman (3B)
Trade Targets
- MLB (pitching): Javier Assad (SP), Craig Yoho (RP)
- MLB (positional): Ryan Ward (OF), Alex Freeland (3B/IF), Jeferson Quero (C), Kevin Alcantara (OF)
- MiLB (positional): James Tibbs (OF), Andrew Fischer (3B/1B), Josiah Hartshorn (OF)
Trade analysis to follow below.
Projected Lineups
| Scenario A | Scenario B | Scenario C | Scenario D |
| Rada, L, LF | Rada, L, CF | Rada, L, LF | Rada, L, LF |
| Neto, R, SS | Neto, R, SS | Neto, R, SS | Neto, R, SS |
| Schanuel, L, 1B | Bellinger, L, LF | Schanuel, L, 1B | Bellinger, L, RF |
| Trout, R, DH | Trout, R, DH | Trout, R, DH | Trout, R, DH |
| Adell, R, RF | Adell, R, RF | Polanco, S, 2B | Polanco, S. 2B |
| Polanco, S, 2B | Schanuel, L, 1B | Yastrzemski, L, RF | Schanuel, L, 1B |
| Song, L, 3B | Polanco, S, 2B | Freeland, S, 3B | Freeland, S, 3B |
| O’Hoppe, R, C | O’Hoppe, R, C | J Quero, R, C | J Quero, R, C |
| Bader, R, CF | Song, L, 3B | Bader, R, CF | Bader, R, CF |
| D’Arnaud | D’Arnaud | D’Arnaud | D’Arnaud |
| Fraley | R. Ward | Alcantara | Alcantara |
| R. Ward | Soler | R. Ward | R. Ward |
| Soler | Gorman | Soler | Soler |
| Guzman | Guzman | Guzman | Guzman |
| Kikuchi (SP) | Kikuchi (SP) | Kikuchi (SP) | Kikuchi (SP) |
| Soriano (SP) | Soriano (SP) | Soriano (SP) | Soriano (SP) |
| Detmers (SP) | Detmers (SP) | Detmers (SP) | Detmers (SP) |
| Rodriguez (SP) | Rodriguez (SP) | Ponce (SP) | Ponce (SP) |
| Ponce (SP) | Erasmo (SP/LR) | Assad (SP) | Assad (SP) |
| Erasmo (SP/LR) | Winckowski (SP/LR) | Rodriguez (SP) | Rodriguez (SP) |
| Winckowski (SP/LR) | Silseth | Erasmo (SP/LR) | Erasmo (SP/LR) |
| Klassen | Klassen | Stephenson | Stephenson |
| Lawyerson | Lawyerson | Yoho | Yoho |
| Burke | Burke | Lawyerson | Lawyerson |
| Stephenson | Stephenson | Burke | Burke |
| Joyce | Joyce | Maton | Helsley |
SCENARIO A
My baseline scenario is probably the most realistic – it leans on acquirable targets in free agency, and demands no esoteric trades.
In this scenario, the Halos get a veteran centerfielder with consistently plus defensive metrics in Harrison Bader, place Rada in LF (with Trout occasionally rotating in as the ego demands), and retain Adell in RF. Significant defensive improvement.
A bench that includes Fraley and PCL MVP Ryan Ward offers left-handed versatility in the outfield, with a mix portfolio of pop, contact and glove depending on the player. Fraley, non-tendered by the Rays this week, typically maintains above-average walk rates, and keeps his Ks in check, while Ward is a slugger who is buried in the Dodgers organization (notes on him below). Given Trout’s and Soler’s penchant for injury, I’m reserving more of the bench for outfield depth here.
Polanco, solid infield bat and glove and one of the steadiest contributors in the game going back eight seasons, takes over daily duties at the keystone, while we take a chance on the Korean slugger Song Sung-Mun at the hot corner, with Guzman in reserve for all three left-infield slots. Both Song and Guzman offer positional flexibility and utility characteristics, with above-average gloves, thus allowing the team to mix-and-match across the dirt as the long season wends on.
Joining the rotation, as another Korean import, is Cody Ponce. There’s much to be said about this guy, but he completely remade himself in the KBO – rebuilt his body, added velocity, and developed a killer splitter – he may be one of the great bargains of the 2026 draft class.
The rotation also picks up some “cheap eats” in Erasmo Ramirez and recently DFA’d Josh Winckowski – depth starter candidates who can also provide bulk relief in the middle innings. Essentially a “four for two” scenario with Ponce and Rodriguez to fill the 4/5 slots in a dodgy rotation that lacks elite arms given present payroll limitations.
SCENARIO B
Scenario B retains Polanco at 2B, and Song at 3B, but takes a bigger swing with Cody Bellinger.
I know some Halos fans are not hot on Bellinger in part due to his tenure on two much-hated behemoths (Dodgers, Yankees), but there’s not a tier one player on the free agent market who checks as many boxes for the Angels as Bellinger does. Plays defense at a high level at all OF positions. Is left-handed. Is a model of bat control, with a K-rate below 16% each of the past three seasons, in which he’s averaged an OPS+ 25% better than the average MLB hitter. He has no QO attached, so there’s no hit to the farm system. For Moreno, he’s billboard ready.
The only real knock on Bellinger, outside of a contract that’s likely to be 5-6 years at $25-30M AAV, is that his home/road splits in 2025 definitely favored Yankees Stadium. But those same splits really weren’t in evidence with the Cubs, and there were several seasons he hit better at Dodgers Stadium, not exactly a hitter’s park with its evening marine layer. While Bellinger benefitted from the Yankees short porch, I don’t think it’s definitive or that he wouldn’t adjust to a new park. I think his skill set will travel, and we’d be getting him largely before the age curve sets in, in his age 30-34 seasons.
To afford Bellinger, I back-weight the contract a bit, and regrettably subtract Bader, Fraley and Ponce from the free agent list. This moves Rada to centerfield, his natural position. But it also produces a daily lineup and outfield that feels much more like that of an MLB contender, with a good balance of handedness, contact, and power. On the bench, I weight a bit more toward power and infield depth, adding LH Nolan Gorman in a trade, as SB insurance vs Song and Guzman.
The downside of this scenario and a $210M payroll is less depth in the rotation (likely requiring the team to lean on folks like Aldegheri, Farris, Dana or other in-house options down the stretch), and more of home-brew bullpen situation, requiring the team to look more toward the farm, and abandon reliever-conversion projects with guys like Klassen, Hurtado and Cortez.
SCENARIO C
This scenario returns to our baseline A scenario, with free agent pickups of Bader, Polanco and Ponce, but sees what we might get if we trade Jo Adell and Logan O’Hoppe for players with multiple years of control and near-MLB prospects. Can we solve some problems more durably than some of the patchwork solutions found in free agency? Likewise, can we turn some of the prospects we have enduring questions about (Christian Moore, Caden Dana) into players with a stronger fit it the organization?
Target one: the Dodgers’ Alex Freeland.
Freeman is pretty blocked in LA as a natural shortstop on a team with Mookie at short and Muncy at third. You can imagine him in a rotation with Kim and Edman at 2B, but he’s largely a depth and utility piece at the moment. I don’t want to suggest that he’s the holy grail solution for the Angels at 3B, but he does offer a more defensively sound replacement for Luis Rengifo there, while also offering super-ute flexibility across the diamond and potentially the outfield. I think he can mature into a good glove with a solid average and 15-20 HRs with regular play.
It’s hard to say what the appetite for Adell would be on the Dodgers, but I think this is pretty fair trade that doesn’t subtract much from the LAD’s depth, and also returns a AA prospect with great BB rates and left handed pop (20 HRs in ’25) who might prove a potential replacement for Adell down the road.
But what if we could shop Adell elsewhere, for a more diversified return, and craft a package for the Dodgers that still returns Freeland without Adell being the centerpiece? Here are a couple exchanges that might do the trick:
Yes, it hurts a little to lose Lugo, but the upside projection for Lugo actually looks a lot like Alex Freeland, roughly 3-4 years down the road. And Kent is one of nearly a dozen young developmental arms in the Angels’ organization at this point. This I follow up with an exchange that’s a bit more speculative, but which I like quite a bit:
In this instance, the Angels bring back an MLB-ready OF to swap in for Adell, and a longer horizon slugger with an Orange County pedigree to ballast the farm. Along the way, the Angels nab a young backend starter with three years of control to join Ponce and Rodriguez and add depth to the rotation. Alcantara is a big 6’6″ athlete who is a 60-grade runner with 70-grade raw power and a plus glove in centerfield. He has some hit tool concerns, like Adell did/does, but the secondary tools make him a much more projectable weapon in the near term.
Now we progress to my final trade scenario, and this one might be the most fantasy oriented. How about we upgrade our battery and swap in a projectable catcher whose glove and game-calling we feel confident about?
On the one hand, leaving Dana and Fischer out of this trade might make it more plausible, but why not get spicy here at the end? The Brewers are rumored to be seeking an offense-oriented middle infielder they can pair with emerging franchise player Brice Turang, and a catcher to pair will primary backstop Contreras. The acquisition of O’Hoppe blocks Quero in this scenario, and we get a catcher with strong contact skills and low K rate, solid-average power, and a big, big arm with strong blocking skill behind the plate.
We also acquire a late reliever in Craig Yoho with an elite changeup (comped with Devin Williams’ airbender) who led all qualified MiLB relievers in ERA and K-rate for two seasons in a row.
The more reach-y component of the trade is Fischer for Dana – do the Brewers want a young project starter with lots of nice secondaries but FB command and sequencing issues? Do they want to give up a just-drafted slugging 3B to complete this package? (Well, at minimum, let’s try to believe in the Moore for Quero swap and leave the other prospects for the outer lands of the imagination.)
Wrapping up, the additional savings of $8M by letting go of Adell and O’Hoppe also allows us some room to play in free agency a bit. I bring in a reliable reliever with a good four year track record in Phil Maton, and a good bridge piece in Mike Yastrzemski to more gently transition the team to the next generation of outfielders (Alcantara, Raudi, Rada, Hartshorn) we’ve brought into the mix.
This lineup trades some slugging for a deeper rotation and bullpen, and more of a prospect pipeline and expanded young MLB core.
SCENARIO D
Scenario D is what it looks like – an all-of-the-above strategy that comes at a little bit of a premium above Jeff’s $210 median payroll estimate. We acquire both Bader and Bellinger, plus Polanco and Ponce – while turning aside some of the fringier concepts like Yaz, Song and Fraley. We also inherit our trade pieces from scenario C, with long horizon players at catcher, outfield and third base. We even upgrade our bullpen acquisition from Maton to veteran closer Ryan Helsley – a guy looking for a little redemption after 3.5 excellent years, but a rough two months in Flushing with the Metropolitans. Depending on his cost, final payroll for this package is still likely only $227M-$230M. Both well under the luxury tax threshold, and within a zone of historical precedent for the Angels.
I think that roster even looks a little, well, contender-ish. Or at least a mite better than .500 – a mark the team hasn’t sniffed in over a decade.
Addenda
I wasn’t explicit above about how I might procure the lesser players like Ward and Gorman, so let’s quickly cover that (though I think there are several alternatives, as they were already 40 man bubble players).
Gorman is a known quantity, but Ryan Ward may be new to many of you.
Ryan Ward is a lefty big bopper on the bubble end of a Dodgers 40-man crunch. A couple more free agent acquisitions, and he’s likely to be available for a song. He has a ton of raw and in-game power, and his K rate has declined markedly over three full seasons at AAA Oklahoma City – he has solid bat control and hard contact to match. That said, he’s defensively limited to an outfield corner and 1B, and the Dodgers have the deepest system in baseball in terms of outfield talent, so he’s well down the totem pole.
In an ideal world, Ward is actually a feasible replacement for the current Taylor Ward, though less sure of a bet. I like him as a 4th outfielder that you roster and give 300-400 PAs as a platoon weapon, or a guy you bring off the bench as a substitute for Schanuel when you need more than a PH single late in a game.
Since the trade of Taylor Ward came right in the middle of me drafting this piece, I think it’s worth looking at the trade I had previously queued up for him in my own sim:
No team had been rumored to be more attached to Taylor Ward than the Royals, so this seemed like a natural match.
In this trade, we wind back the clock to July of 2025, when the Royals traded their backup catcher for two pitchers in Ryan Bergert and Stephen Kolek, both of whom saw some late season success in the Royals’ rotation. Kolek in particular can profile as both starter or reliever. The Royals have enough depth to absorb the subtraction of two players they didn’t have mid-season last, and I have to think they would have traded a backup catcher for Ward had he been available, no?
One caveat: Bergert experienced some elbow discomfort that put him on the IL in September, so there’s always the specter of TJ in his future. But he was also a top-three prospect in the Padres org, with a reliable backend starter profile and six years of control, so even if he goes under the knife in the future, the team is likely to get 3-4 serviceable years out of him in the future. So in many ways, this is very like the Gray-Rod trade, with an insurance policy in Kolek. No doubt exchange in my book, but it’s alt-history at this point.
First Principles & Motivating Factors
Finally, much like Gitch, I began this exercise by mooring myself to some philosophical precepts before grilling the meat. This may be a bit tl;dr for most readers, so I’ll leave them here at the end of the assignment.
This is not a normal team. It’s an unmoored team in a perpetual doom loop and state of constant low-level crisis. No rational course of roster-building is likely to find root in the IRL Angels, but this is only a simulation, so I’ll simply pretend that the rational is still possible in Anaheim, and their moneyed hedgehog of an owner is responsive to organizational improvement respecting certain constraints.
The Angels aren’t near their contention window in 2026. I don’t think anyone on this site, save perhaps RexFregosi (hi Rex!), would disagree with that statement. The Angels’ contention window is more plausibly imagined, should they break a decade-long cycle of water-treading, in 2028-2030.
The Angels need help at virtually every position outside of shortstop, and investing in first base seems rather inefficient given the playoffs are several years out, so Schanuel and Neto are essentially givens on the roster.
With that, however, investing in the outfield and 2B/3B seems justifiable and well-targeted, as the team has very little coming up from the farm in the next couple of years to fill holes in these areas.
Meanwhile, the Angels do not appear to have the budget or win potential to justify playing in the deep end of the free agent pitching pool this year, though they do have a deep well of MiLB pitching talent 3+ years out. While not investing in frontline pitching limits the team’s current ceiling, it still makes more sense to go with youth and quantity in the backend of the rotation, and patch a few holes on short deals with mid-career journeymen.
If you assume, like I do, that the team is not contending in the next two years, there’s little reason not to trade marketable players on expiring contracts for whatever may come, and do the same with MLB-ready prospects that we have long-term doubts about.
Also, if you assume, like I do, that the team is not contending soon, then we have plenty of flexibility to let a few prospects sink or swim, and see what we have with them. Nelson Rada and Denzer Guzman are two such prospects I’d like to roster in 2026.
Lastly, given budget limitations, it’s a good moment to wrap up some of the club’s reliever-to-starter conversion projects. Prospects like Klassen, Cortez, Hurtado, Natera Jr? Let’s just point them straight to the MLB bullpen, and land them there sooner rather than later.
