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Mike Trout home run daily: Power & speed as a rookie

A home run and stolen base in Fausto Carmona’s first game with a new name

By Eric Stephen
Cleveland Indians v Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim Photo by Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images

Hello again from the Mike Trout home run daily, where we look at all 288 home runs in Mike Trout’s career — regular season, postseason, and All-Star Games combined — one game at a time. Today’s random number generator takes us back to Trout’s rookie season.

The Angels on August 15, 2012 were finishing off a series against the Indians on Wednesday night in Anaheim, and the multitude of Trout’s skills were on display this night.

Trout stole second and scored in the second inning, then in the fourth inning against Roberto Hernandez, Trout took him deep. Scroll to 5:39 of this video to watch:

This was Hernandez’s first game of 2012, and his first major league game as Roberto Hernandez, having pitched previously under the name Fausto Carmona for six seasons with Cleveland.

Trout his career is 4-for-14 against Hernandez, and three of the hits are home runs.

With a home run and a stolen base in this game, Trout showed off his power and speed, and was nearing Angels rookie records even though there was still a quarter of the season to be played. Through this game on August 15, Trout was hitting .340/.403/.595 with 22 home runs and 38 stolen bases.

Here is where Trout ranked among Angels all-time rookies in various categories had he not played another game in 2012:

  • Hits: 131 (11th; Wally Joyner had 172 hits in 1986)
  • Home runs: 22 (t-6th; Tim Salmon hit 31 HR in 1993)
  • Runs: 93 (t-2nd; Devon White scored 103 in 1987)
  • Steals: 38 (3rd; Gary Pettis stole 48 in 1984)
  • Total bases: 229 (7th; White had 283 in 1987)
  • Batting average: .340 (1st; Garret Anderson hit .321 in 1995)
  • On-base percentage: .403 (1st; Reggie Willits had a .391 OBP in 2007)
  • Slugging percentage: .595 (1st; Salmon slugged .536 in 1993)
  • OPS: .998 (1st; Salmon had a .918 OPS in 1993)

The 2012 season did not end on August 15, of course, and Trout would go on to lead the American League in runs scored, stolen bases, and OPS+ (168). He set Angels rookie records for batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS, OPS+, runs, hits, total, bases, and steals. Not a bad rookie season at all.

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