Angels Slammed by Insider for Latest Move to Stunt Team Development

The Angels have Major League Baseball's longest-running postseason drought, at 10 years and counting. Their last playoff victory came in 2009.

Against this backdrop, most owners would concede a full-scale team rebuild was necessary. Arte Moreno has resisted that concession at every turn, however, sacrificing prospects and other investments in player development in favor of an older, more expensive, and less healthy 26-man roster than his American League rivals.

Often, the Angels' prioritization of major league success over minor league development flies unseen. We don't have any comprehensive knowledge, for example, of how the team pays its minor league coaches and managers, invests in development tools and facilities at each of its affiliates, and teaches baseball skills to prospects relative to other teams. Any evidence that the Angels lack in these areas is purely anecdotal.

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Then there are days like Tuesday.

Sam Aldegheri is the Angels' No. 5 prospect according to MLB Pipeline, the third-highest-ranked pitcher in the organization. The left-hander was half of the return in the trade that sent Carlos Estevez to the Philadelphia Phillies last July.

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In 14 starts for Double-A Rocket City, Aldegheri had a 3-6 record and a 4.83 ERA prior to his second big league appearance of 2025 against the Rangers. The merits of whether a 23-year-old pitcher with a 1.54 WHIP at Double-A is ready for the majors or not remains debatable.

What isn't debatable, writes Sam Blum of The Athletic, is that the Angels did the opposite of protect their prospect's development by leaving Aldegheri on the mound to throw 64 pitches over two disastrous innings in a 13-1 loss.

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"Protecting him would have been keeping him in Double A, starting games every five days, and waiting until he was ready to stand on that big league mound as a starter," writes Blum. "Protecting him, at the very least, would have been pulling him when it was clear he didn’t have it that night."

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“Listen, it’s a tough spot, when you’re in that position and you’re here to give us length, and then it kind of gets off the rails a little bit — we have to protect him too,” interim manager Ray Montgomery told reporters after the game.

Montgomery went on to say that he was aware that an outing like that could have an effect on Aldegheri’s confidence.

“Of course,” Montgomery said. “Anytime you don’t have success at the major league level, regardless of your status, it affects your psyche. It affects how you feel. Certainly it’ll affect your confidence. But I think that’s part of the growth too. You have to learn from it and bounce back and go forward.”

In isolation, it's fair to criticize Montgomery for leaving a young pitcher in for two innings under the circumstances Aldegheri faced Tuesday. In the broader context of the last decade of Angels baseball, the one outing was a symptom of a greater problem — one beyond the control of one pitcher or one manager.

Developing homegrown pitchers has long been a struggle for the Angels, one that has forced them to over-rely on free agents and draft major-league ready college arms at the expense of a more patient development process. It's a philosophy that rarely leads to success; Aldegheri was merely the latest victim.

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