In a game on Wednesday night at Truist Park in the Cobb County region of Atlanta, Ga, the Angels baseball club suffered another injury to one of its biggest stars. Was it Mike Trout(again?) Thank heavens no. Was it Zach Neto? He had a bit of a triggering of his shoulder injury that kept him out for a few games this past weekend, but he ended up staying in the game. Were Logan O’Hoppe, Nolan Schanuel, Jo Adell or Taylor Ward banged up? No, not even one of those guys. Instead it was Christian Moore who suffered a very unfortunate injury in the bottom of the 6th inning when he attempted to field a fast rolling ball hit up the middle by Braves second baseman Ozzie Albies. Moore sprained his left thumb(on the glove hand) and was checked on by Angels trainer Eric Munson, who recommended that Moore exit the game as the Halos acting manager Ray Montgomery took starting pitcher Yusei Kikuchi out of the game. Kevin Newman came into the game to play second base for Moore for the rest of the night and the Halos lost 8-3 to Atlanta. And making matters worse, the news came out the next day that the young star second baseman who was the Angels’ first round pick in the draft last year was going to be placed on the injured list. The 10-day one, obviously, but he might be out until after the All-Star Break comes to pass.

This injury is a blow to the Halos offensively, as they just got Jorge Soler back from the IL and a couple of key bats remain on the injured list. Yoán Moncada has been bit the hardest among the position players on the team so far and Chris Taylor has a wrist fracture that will probably keep him out until the end of this month. Thankfully, the pitching staff hasn’t been hit hard so far(knock on wood) as the Angels have used the same five starting pitchers through the first half of games in the regular-season schedule this year. That has never happened in the franchise history of the team squarely rooted in Southern California. With a few occasional injuries to key bullpen arms(Ben Joyce is done for the season, while Robert Stephenson struggles to stay healthy), the Angels have not been bitten as hard by the injury bug this year so far as they have in many seasons past. Let’s hope that luck continues as they need to stay as healthy as possible in order to put together a strong roster that can help the team compete for a playoff spot in the American League.

With Moore’s injury, the Angels decided to call up a minor-league infielder named Chad Stevens, who is the 7th Halos prospect to make his big league debut this season. Joining names such as Moore, Matthew Lugo, Ryan Johnson and Jose Fermin, Stevens will look to get his first big-league hit after he went hitless in his major league debut in the series finale against the Braves. The Angels face an important July schedule against fellow division rivals in the Texas Rangers and Seattle Mariners, who are in a tight race with the Halos to gain the third AL Wild Card spot. With the Houston Astros lifting off and blowing the rest of the AL West away in the dust, the division title seems less feasible at this moment and Wild Card contention seems more realistic. Along with tough games against other eastern teams on the road(Toronto, the Phillies and Mets), the Angels look to finally get above the .500 mark and stay above it. They need to stop winning a game and then losing one the next day, because it feels like one step forward and three steps back for a team looking to end the longest active playoff appearance drought in MLB.

Having to play the rest of this season without their old skipper in Ron Washington(who hasn’t managed since Juneteenth due to a shortness of breath condition that he was diagnosed with in the final game of a road trip), the Angels will hopefully be coached well by Ray Montgomery and the rest of the coaching staff for the remainder of this season. So, instead of an injury bug, it’s a sickness bug that has taken the oldest manager in team history off the field. Hope Wash gets well soon and Christian Moore makes his return onto the field sooner rather than later because he was starting to tap into his clutch gene that can make him one of the best infield hitters in the whole game for many years to come.