Again in April, the Angels optioned David Fletcher to Triple-A after which outrighted him off the 40-man roster.  After two months within the minors, Fletcher is heading again to the Present, as FanSided’s Robert Murray (through Twitter) studies that the Angels are calling Fletcher again as much as the energetic roster.  The corresponding transfer isn’t but recognized, nevertheless it marks one thing of a mini-overhaul of the Angels’ infield, between Fletcher’s return and yesterday’s acquisition of Eduardo Escobar from the Mets.

Fletcher had solely two hits in his first 16 plate appearances of the 2023 season, main the Halos to lastly make a troublesome determination on a participant who seemed like a constructing block simply a few years in the past.  Anaheim signed Fletcher to a five-year, $26MM contract extension in April 2021, and sadly, the infielder’s productiveness has since tailed off.  Fletcher hit .260/.295/.327 over 893 PA in 2021-22, with a hip harm costing him an enormous chunk of the 2022 marketing campaign.

Nevertheless, it appears like Fletcher may need discovered one thing at Triple-A Salt Lake, as he’s hitting .378/.432/.478 over 197 PA.  Fletcher does have an enormous .407 BABIP, and numbers from the Pacific Coast League ought to be taken with a grain of salt basically given the league’s hitter-friendly nature, nevertheless it’s exhausting to argue that Fletcher hasn’t been doing all he can to earn one other shot on the Angels’ roster.

In an interview yesterday with The Athletic’s Sam Blum (previous to the information of Fletcher’s call-up), Fletcher stated he wasn’t certain why the Angels hadn’t already known as up again as much as the massive leagues.  There additionally gave the impression to be one thing of an absence of communication between Fletcher and the entrance workplace, because the infielder stated “I haven’t heard a lot from them” for the reason that Triple-A demotion, and that the workforce was considerably imprecise on what it precisely wished Fletcher to work on hitting-wise.

Anthony Rendon and Zach Neto are each on the Angels’ 10-day injured checklist, whereas Gio Urshela’s season could also be over as a consequence of a pelvic fracture.  These accidents have left Anaheim very skinny within the infield, and whereas there might have been some query over why Fletcher hadn’t already been known as up, the time is now for the Halos to once more flip to the 29-year-old.

It stays to be seen how this new-look Angels infield will shake out, contemplating that each Fletcher and Escobar are multi-position gamers, and since some 40-man roster strikes must be made to accommodate Fletcher’s return.  Escobar will possible rotate between second and third base, whereas Fletcher may play both shortstop or second base.  Brandon Drury has performed the majority of time at second base this season, however he has additionally seen a variety of time at first base, which may very well be a extra viable possibility since Jared Walsh has struggled since getting back from the injured checklist.