Why Zach Neto, not Mike Trout, is the Angels player Red Sox should pursue originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

The Boston Red Sox should consider acquiring a right-handed slugger from the Los Angeles Angels, but it isn’t Mike Trout.

Michael Felger of 98.5 The Sports Hub’s Felger & Mazz sparked the Trout-to-Boston rumors on Tuesday, citing a “loose” source that told him “don’t be surprised” if the Red Sox end up with the three-time MVP.

“They think he’s a better leader than (Alex) Bregman and will hit a bunch of home runs at Fenway Park,” Felger relayed from his supposed source. “And L.A. likes (Jarren) Duran and (Brayan) Bello.”

The chances of such a deal are slim to none. Trout’s contract, which pays him $37.1 million per year through 2030, includes a full no-trade clause. While he could choose to waive it, the 34-year-old has been incredibly loyal to the Angels. It’s unlikely he suddenly opts to leave L.A., especially for a last-place Boston club at this stage of his 16-year MLB career.

If Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow calls Angels general manager Perry Minasian about a potential trade, shortstop Zach Neto makes more sense.

Almost a decade younger than Trout at 25 years old, Neto is coming off back-to-back seasons with a 5.1 bWAR. The 2022 first-round draft pick notched 23 homers with a .761 OPS in 2024 and 26 homers with a .791 OPS in 2025.

Boston’s lackluster lineup desperately needs that kind of pop, particularly from the right side. Neto has also been a solid defender for most of his four MLB seasons, though he has had some uncharacteristic mental miscues this year.

It’s been an odd season all around for Neto, who entered the campaign as one of MLB Network’s top 10 shortstops and widely considered one of the league’s most underrated talents. Through 43 games, he’s slashing .216/.322/.386 with six homers, 18 RBI, and 62 strikeouts. He leads all American League shortstops with six errors.

None of that should dissuade Boston from pursuing Neto, who’s under team control through 2029. He may benefit from a change of scenery, because as bad as the Red Sox have been so far this season (17-24), the Angels have been even worse (16-28). They haven’t had a winning season since 2015.

Neto offers far more upside than current Red Sox shortstop Trevor Story, whose early-season struggles have once again sparked DFA debates. The 33-year-old has offered zero value at the plate so far in 2026, and his defense has rapidly declined over the last three years.

According to Sean McAdam of MassLive.com, the Red Sox inquired about Neto during the offseason, but the Angels set a “very high bar” when it came to the return. Perhaps his recent struggles, and what appears to be another lost season for L.A., will bring down the cost. If it’s true that the Angels are eyeing Duran and Bello, that’s a good place to start.

Neto wouldn’t solve all of Boston’s problems this season, but he’s an exciting young talent who would give Sox fans something to be excited about long-term. Breslow should be operating like his job is on the line, and a big splash for Neto is the kind of move that could buy him more time.

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The misery continues for the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park, and the locals could be getting restless again tonight against the Philadelphia Phillies.

With last night’s win, Philadelphia improved to 8-3 in May, and my Phillies vs Red Sox predictions jump on the visitors here, even with Boston’s likely edge in the pitching matchup. 

Take a closer look at this clash with my free MLB picks for Wednesday, May 13.

Who will win Phillies vs Red Sox today: Phillies (+109)

After two early runs, it turned out to be a nail-biter for the Philadelphia Phillies in yesterday’s series opener, but they’ve now won seven of their last nine games.

Rookie Andrew Painter takes the ball tonight and, though he drags in an ugly 6.89 ERA, I see the Philly bats giving him enough run support to outlast the Boston Red Sox.

Kyle Schwarberhas now homered in five straight contests, and both Trea Turner and Alec Bohm have had success against Boston starter Sonny Gray.

With an out-of-sorts lineup, the Red Sox are 7-13 at Fenway this season, and I’m fading them tonight.

COVERS INTEL: The Red Sox are 6-19 this year when they allow a home run, and the Phillies have mashed 50 dingers, ninth-most in the majors.

Phillies vs Red Sox Over/Under pick: Under 9 (-115)

It’s hard to take the Over here after watching these lineups flail away in clutch moments last night, so I’m grabbing the Under, which has been a winning ticket in three of the last four meetings between these teams.

Though I’m banking on the Phillies to get more traction at the plate tonight, the Red Sox have scored just four runs across their past three outings, and only three ballclubs have served up fewer runs this year than Boston.

For all of Painter’s bumpy spells, five of his seven starts have finished with a total below 9, and Gray looked sharp last week after shaking off a hamstring issue.

Phillies vs Red Sox odds

• Moneyline: Phillies +109 | Red Sox -131
• Run line: Phillies +1.5 (-186) | Red Sox -1.5 (+153)
• Over/Under: Over 9 (-105) | Under 9 (-115)

Phillies vs Red Sox trend

The Under is 8-3-1 in Boston's last 12 games. Find more MLB betting trends for Phillies vs. Red Sox.

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Alex Verdugo’s hopes of returning to MLB just took a massive hit at a time when it’s uncertain if he still is worthy of a major-league roster spot.

Verdugo, on a minor-league deal with the Padres, is set to undergo season-ending surgery after suffering a shoulder injury and has been released by the team, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune.

The 29-year-old will have not played a major-league game in roughly 20 months when the 2027 season — if there’s no lockout — begins.

Verdugo signed with the Padres in March after a disappointing 2025 season with the Braves, in which he appeared in 56 games and posted a career .585 OPS.

No team signed him after the Braves released him in July with a slashline of .239/.296/.289 and a -0.3 bWAR, failing to homer in 213 plate appearances.

The Padres took a shot on him in spring training to add depth but he did not break camp with the team, and did not appear in any minor-league games with the team.

It’s unclear if the lack of minors game is tied to the potential shoulder issues.

It’s fair to wonder about his MLB future now since teams have essentially not deemed him worthy of a roster spot for the majority of the 2025 and ’26 seasons.

Verdugo’s career has trended in the wrong direction since the Red Sox traded the former second-round pick to the Yankees before the 2024 season.

He posted a .761 OPS in four seasons with the Red Sox, but tallied a .647 mark with the Yankees.

Verdugo started hot with the Bronx Bombers before enduring a brutal second half while hitting .233, his lowest mark for any full season.

Although the Yankees played him 149 times that season and throughout the playoffs, he signed just a one-year, $1.5 million deal with the Braves in March 2025.

Verdugo began his career with the Dodgers before being traded to Boston in the Mookie Betts swap, and is a career .270/.326/.406 hitter in 856 games.

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The Chicago Cubs hope to end a three-game skid when they face the Atlanta Braves tonight.

The opening game of the series between the top two teams in the National League was dominated by the Braves, but my Cubs vs. Braves predictions back Chicago to even the series tonight.

Find out why in my MLB picks for May 13.

Who will win Cubs vs Braves today: Cubs (-127)

JR Ritchie has had a solid start to his MLB career with the Atlanta Braves, but his metrics suggest some serious issues ahead. 

His FIP is three runs higher than his ERA, largely due to a BB/9 rate of 6.23 that is among the worst of any starter.

That sets him up for failure against the Chicago Cubs, whose 13.2% walk rate over the last two weeks is the best in baseball. They’re also third in xwOBA in that timeframe, thanks to the third-lowest strikeout rate.

Chicago's offense will provide run support to Shota Imanaga as he claims another victory. 

COVERS INTEL:Ritchie has a 21.1% HR/FB rate this season, which could be problematic given the weather in Atlanta tonight is the second-most favorable for hitters of any game on today’s schedule.

Cubs vs Braves Over/Under pick: Over 8.5 (-108)

The Cubs have only two runs in the last three games, and those both came last night despite having just one hit.

They’ll get back on track against Ritchie, who ranks in the 20th percentile or worse in chase rate, walk rate, strikeout rate, and xERA.

Imanaga will limit Atlanta’s offense, but that will change once he exits. Chicago’s bullpen ranks second-worst in HR/FB rate, third-worst in HR rate, and dead last in xERA over the past week. 

That will allow the Braves, whose .336 BABIP over the past week leads the majors, to get some late runs.  

Cubs vs Braves odds

• Moneyline: Cubs -127 | Braves +122
• Run line: Cubs -1.5 (+127) | Braves +1.5 (-133)
• Over/Under: Over 8.5 (-108) | Under 8.5 (+104)

Cubs vs Braves trend

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The glass of baseball is always half full and half empty at the same time and the 2026 A’s are no exception. Half full: the A’s still own sole possession of 1st place at the 1/4 mark. Half empty: their 21-20 record puts them currently on pace for only 84 wins.

The Good

Let’s start today with a big positive from the ‘half full department’. I think we should take a moment to realize just how good Shea Langeliers has been in 2026. He hasn’t just been the A’s best hitter nor is he simply the best catcher in the AL 1/4 of the way through the season. Langeliers can legitimately lay claim to being one of the best 2 or 3 hitters in the American League so far in 2026.

Sound like hyperbole? Langeliers has played in all but 4 games, missing most of those due to paternity leave, and he is batting, for the season, .340/.396/.641 with 12 HR. That’s a 48 HR pace and the league lead in batting (.020 points ahead of Josh Jung).

Shea’s 183 wRC+ is rivaled by few AL hitters. Even the legendary Aaron Judge is barely ahead of him at 185 wRC+. The only clearly superior hitter, by wRC+, would be Ben Rice (198). And once you factor in position and defensive value, Shea rises in overall WAR: Rice currently sits at 1.9 fWAR, Langeliers at 2.4 fWAR.

That’s right, Langeliers is on pace for a 9.6 fWAR season. Who knows how the voting will go, but he really should be a no-brainer to start the All-Star game as the American League’s catcher.

The Fugly

One wants to avoid the temptation to panic over small samples, but with Lawrence Butler the sample is growing ever larger: since the 2025 All-Star break Butler has just been bad. Last July-September you can wonder how much his knee might have been a factor, but that’s not really an excuse for how 2026 has begun.

The sample is now 96 games and here is how the numbers shake down:

2nd half of 2025, 58 games: .203/.268/.351, 70 wRC+
1st half of 2026, 38 games: .175/.277/.275, 56 wRC+

In aggregate you have a sub .200 hitter with an OBP in the low .270s and slugging in the low-mid .300s with a wRC+ in the mid-60s.

Against LHPs in his career now, Butler is batting just .221/.262/.378, 77 wRC+, which is why he is already becoming a platoon player in year 2 of his contract extension.

Defensively, Butler is fine in RF, even a tick above average, but he is terrible in CF despite the A’s insistence on pulling a Bleday and trotting him out there anyway. He’s already at -3 OAA in just 121.2 innings so he’s not providing valuable versatility to offset his hitting woes.

The A’s should now be legitimately concerned. There’s room for hope in that Butler has had his share of bad batted ball luck with hard hit outs. His expected BA stands at .232, which is a lot better than his actual .175 — but it’s not good and would only raise his OBP to a respectable .325.

Yes it would be nice if Butler were actually batting .232/.325/.400 but you don’t always exactly match your “expected” metrics and can’t just lean on that to excuse performance. Butler has struggled mightily at the plate for nearly 2/3 of a season now and is only really playable in RF — where Carlos Cortes can also play.

More Fugly: Pitching Splits

Meanwhile, on the mound….the A’s flat out need to figure out how to pitch in Sacramento. The team now has a 6.02 ERA at home for the season in 17 games in contrast to its 3.28 ERA in 24 away games. That’s absurd and it’s the same mound, same field, same conditions for the A’s and their opponents.

Sure the A’s could reasonably have a team ERA even a full point higher at home than on the road and chalk it up to “park effects”. But an ERA 2.74 runs/game higher at home than on the road? Serving up 2 runs every 3 innings? Come on, folks, you need to get a handle on this if the team is to contend for anything.

Trying to reverse the trend tonight will be one of the A’s biggest “split offenders,” JT Ginn. In a small sample so far in 2026, Ginn has a 7.62 ERA at home, 1.48 on the road. Last year, though, was similar: 6.85 at home, 3.14 on the road. It means Ginn will take a career ERA in Sacramento of 7.01 into tonight’s start.

Presumably, tonight we will see the debut of Henry Bolte, likely in CF and batting 9th. Here’s hoping The Bolte Era coincides with the team pitching better at home, Lawrence Butler hitting better everywhere, and Shea Langeliers not changing a thing.

It’s hard to find too much to gripe about with the 2026 Atlanta Braves through 42 games.

At the plate, they lead the majors in batting average (.272), slugging percentage (.452), wOBA (.347), wRC+ (121), and have scored the most runs of any team (233).

On the mound and with the gloves, they’re tops in runs allowed (143) and defensive efficiency (.249 BABIP-against), fifth in defensive value, while also tied for second in quality starts (20). Though the pitching has had some ups and downs, the defense has buoyed it, and they’re in the top half of MLB in FIP and xFIP.

There’s only been one real glaring issue through the first quarter of the season. There’s been an undeniable spike in baserunners being picked off under new first base coach Antoan Richardson.

With two more pickoffs in Tuesday night’s 5-2 win over the Chicago Cubs, the Braves have been picked off 10 times this season. That’s two more than any other major league team.

It’s also already as many pickoffs as the Braves had on the bases in all 162 games last season and more than they had in three of their four entire seasons between 2021-24.

It would seem that Braves manager Walt Weiss has seen enough of the new way the Braves are trying to be aggressive on the basepaths.

“To be honest, it’s gotten to a point where we’re going to have to make an adjustment there. I don’t think it’s costing us games, but it just shouldn’t happen at this rate,” Weiss said postgame Tuesday. “I know we’re trying to do some things different, and the guys are working their butts off trying to be really good at it. Antoan has been awesome. He’s got passion, he’s accountable. That’s just something we’ve got to clean up.”

While Weiss can say none of the pickoffs have cost them games — and it’s clearly not stopping the Braves’ winning ways — these issues have come up in some critical spots.

Most notably, pinch-runner Jorge Mateo was picked off when he represented the tying run in the eighth inning of the rubber match at Seattle, which remains the only series the Braves have lost this season.

The new baserunning belief has paid dividends in some ways. The Braves are tied for fourth in the majors in bases taken (46) and have only run into six outs on the bases (fourth fewest), a stat that doesn’t count pickoffs. They’re 11th in Statcast’s baserunning measure (which does not include steals, steal attempts, or pickoffs), after finishing handily in the bottom ten each of the last two seasons (and sixth in 2023).

But it’s not even like the team is stealing bases at a crazy rate. Atlanta’s 21 stolen bases rank 21st in the majors and the Braves’ 67.74% stolen-base percentage is the worst in the majors. In pure stolen base value, the Braves are also dead last; when you add stolen base and baserunning value together, they’re 22nd.

So if the upside of stolen bases isn’t going to be there with this team — which it likely doesn’t need to be given its slugging — the risk of getting picked off shouldn’t be nearly that serious… or common.

Alternatively, if they’re going to have this aggressive approach, they need to at least be a bit more selective about who uses it. Look at Tuesday’s two pickoffs as proof. Michael Harris II, given his speed, may be justified in risking an aggressive baserunning approach, even if it sometimes ends up with him picked off. Matt Olson — he of the ten career stolen bases in 11 seasons — simply shouldn’t be risking outs by doing whatever he was doing on Tuesday night.

On the one hand, it’s a good sign that pickoffs are one of the few things Braves fans have to lament this season. On the other hand, there’s just no reason for it to be this bad, this often. Hopefully they follow their skipper’s direction and clean it up soon.

The Nationals have been a surprisingly fun team to watch so far in 2026. As we have documented, the offense has been absolutely electric and the pitching staff has stabilized after a rough start to the season. However, the defense has been very rough, and it is showing no signs of improvement.

Even in last night’s comprehensive win, the Nats had two errors and a passed ball. This team just does not play error free baseball very often. In fact, the Nats are averaging nearly an error per game, with 41 errors in 42 games. Right now, they are on pace to have the most errors by any team since the beginning of the 21st century.

We knew heading into the season that this team was not going to be great defensively. They were not great last year, and have a number of players in the lineup not known for their defense. The Nats two best players, James Wood and CJ Abrams, are not great defensively, and that sets the tone in a way.

That is not necessarily the worst thing in the world. Defense is not like hitting and pitching. You do not need to be an elite defensive team to win a World Series. The Dodgers have been middle of the pack defensively the past two seasons, and so were the Nats in 2019. Going all in on defense is not the solution, but the Nats need to get to an acceptable level.

Averaging nearly an error a game is not an acceptable level of defensive play. Blake Butera knows this very well. He has spoken multiple times about the need to clean up the defense. At one point a week or two ago, he mentioned that he was going to change up the routine. It does not seem like that worked. Before yesterday’s game, he talked about how the Nats were not utilizing their athleticism in the field. I think there has been some pressing going on lately.

As Butera mentioned, this is an athletic team. You can see that on the bases. While there have been some base running mistakes, they have been a much better team on the basepaths this season. The Nats are first in Baseball Savant’s baserunning metric and second in BsR. This team is getting much better in a lot of areas, but fielding is not one of them.

Some of this is pretty predictable. The new regime talked a big game about making CJ Abrams a better defensive shortstop, but that has not happened. Abrams has 7 errors on the season and has -7 outs above average, as well as -4 DRS. He is just not equipped to be a shortstop long term. In fact, I think some of these defensive issues would have been mitigated by moving Abrams to second base before the season and playing Nasim Nunez at shortstop. However, I understand the new regime’s desire to give Abrams another shot at short.

I do not want to single out Abrams though, because he has been far from the only problem. Outside of Nasim Nunez, the whole infield has been a mess. Luis Garcia Jr. and Curtis Mead have both been producing with the bat, but neither are natural first baseman and it shows. 

The most disappointing player defensively has been Brady House, and it has not been close. House is tied with Abrams for the team lead in errors, and has a much worse fielding percentage at .908 compared to .956 for Abrams. As you would expect from someone as mistake prone as that, the defensive metrics are not great. His OAA is only -2, but his DRS is the same as Abrams at -4. 

Coming into the season, House’s defense was seen as a big strength for him. The young third baseman posted 2 outs above average last year, and made some great plays. He showed off his rocket arm and good range from his background as a shortstop. The big question with House was the development of his bat.

To his credit, House clearly put in a lot of work to improve offensively. House’s OPS is up over 100 points. He is walking more and hitting for much more power. House has been close to a league average hitter this year, with a 95 wRC+. However, he has gone from an asset to a liability on defense. It has been a disappointing development, and hopefully he can bounce back.

A lot of the problems seem to come when House is coming in on balls. That was how he made his error last night, and it was not the first one like that. There are also times where House just seems to be caught in between and is indecisive. The natural talent is there for him to be a good defender, and he has shown he can play good defense. Unlike Abrams, House has the range and arm for his position, he just needs to clean up the miscues.

The Nats defense has been the most mistake prone in baseball, but it has not been the worst. That is a key distinction, and one that can be tough to realize if you watch them play every night. For the season, the Nats are 25th in fielding run value at -7. In Fangraphs defensive metric, they rank 25th and they are 27th in defensive runs saved. 

So yes, the defense is bad, but it is not as bad as the error numbers suggest. That comes down to a few factors. The Nats do have a couple real defensive wizards in the lineup. Nasim Nunez and Jacob Young are both very good defensive players, which helps them out. The Nats have gotten much better defense from their catchers. They have been a top 5 framing team this season. 

The defense absolutely is a real issue, and they need to cut down on the errors. Making nearly an error a game is simply unacceptable at the big league level. They have 12 more errors than the next closest team. However, the defense is not as bad as the errors make them look. On offense, the new staff has really gotten through to the players, but it has been tougher to make them click on the defensive side of the ball.