It’s the eighth inning of a one-run game in Oakland, and left-handed slugger Matt Olson is at the plate. Mike Trout, shaded slightly toward right field, immediately breaks to play the slice off Olson’s bat as the ball spins away from him. It has some serious top spin and will drop within three seconds, so Trout lowers himself and springs off his left leg, making his body parallel to the ground as he stretches out.

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Trout doesn’t dive too often, but this is potentially a game-altering situation. This time, the baseball nestles into the pocket of Trout’s glove as he hits the ground. Game potentially saved.

“You turn around and you see Mike out there and you’re like, ‘OK, well, something cool is gonna happen,’” said Angels reliever Ty Buttrey, who was on the mound, “And of course, he dove for it and got it.”

Of course, it’s not a routine play. Trout, a three-time AL MVP, constantly is in search of ways to reshape and improve his game. That play he made on Saturday reinforced what had been a focus for him entering the series — his ability to make better jumps off the bat to track down baseballs from his spot in center field. He can thank Twitter for that.

Trout has essentially been the best player in the game since his first full season in 2012, but he has not quite been the elite defensive player he was, as he has learned to manage his body more carefully over a 162-game season. The stolen bases started to fade, as did some of the ridiculous home-run robbing catches. A year ago, his biggest defensive goal was improving what had been considered an average arm for a center fielder, so he took on a new long-toss program with then-teammate Kole Calhoun that led to Trout eventually hitting 98 mph on a throw during a game. He again was named a Gold Glove finalist, but he has yet to add the honor to his resume.

In this abridged 2020 season, you won’t see Trout at his typical perch on, or atop, the Wins Above Replacement leaderboards. Among position players on FanGraphs, he entered Monday tied for 24th at 1.0 fWAR. At Baseball-Reference, 66 different position players top Trout’s 0.6 bWAR. The main reason? Defense.

As has been pointed out already this season, the early-season defensive metrics have not been kind to the Angels’ superstar. His Ultimate Zone Rating per 150 defensive games, for example, would be minus-12.9, a career-worst by far. At one point this season, Trout’s Defensive Runs Saved hovered at minus-6. He has been worth minus-1 Outs Above Average, according to Statcast.

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Most damning, his outfield jump ranked among the worst in baseball, coming in at the first percentile of outfielders, per Statcast. A Twitter thread from MLB.com’s Statcast expert, Mike Petriello, also caught Trout’s attention recently.

“I read it somewhere, I guess on social media, one of you guys posted it about my jumps,” Trout said in a Zoom video conference on Monday. “Just little stuff like that you really don’t realize it till you see the numbers.”

Mike Trout Defensive Metrics in CF

Note: Metrics courtesy of Baseball Savant and FanGraphs. DRS is Defensive Runs Saved. OAA is Outs Above Average, which began tracking in 2016. UZR is Ultimate Zone Rating.

While Petriello attributed some of it to a small sample, he also pointed out some clips that reflected the negative grade.

Petriello, citing Statcasts’ internal data, said Trout got a jump minus-15 feet below average on this Nick Solak double. Trout froze until the ball was close to over his head, and he had to attempt a leaping grab he couldn’t make.

The “jump” as a whole, as Statcast defines it, is an outfielder’s feet covered heading in the correct direction within the first three seconds after contact.

“I just didn’t really notice I was doing it,” Trout said of the numbers. “I noticed there was a couple balls that dropped in front of me earlier in the year that I thought I could have caught, but I just was basing on, I thought I was playing too deep. And then obviously looking at the numbers, the first step times were down. So I just emphasized these last couple games, after I saw that, to really work on it, and I’m still working on it today.”

Trout is, indeed, playing deeper than usual. He wants to make sure he stays healthy as he approaches 30, and he prefers moving in on a ball to prevent having it go over his head. The center fielder has an average depth of 325 feet in center field this season, a notable increase from last season and the deepest he’s played since tracking began in 2016. His sprint speed remains elite — his 28.9 feet-per-second average remains in the 95th percentile and is the second-fastest of anyone his age — which allows him to still track down balls in the gaps.

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Playing baseballs in front of him has presented some early-season issues as well. Petriello’s thread pointed to one ball on which Trout broke back, then froze as a Kyle Seager liner dropped in front of him for a base hit. Petriello said Trout’s jump on the play registered at minus-22 feet below average.

But Trout’s point about his first step is interesting, especially because Angels manager Joe Maddon backed it up.

“I still haven’t seen him misplay things yet,” said Maddon, pointing to the uncertainties he finds in defensive metrics and saying they lack context. “I watched yesterday, watched him get preset and ready — that’s what it really comes down to when you talk about first steps. It’s really what you do before your first step. And then once you activate your first step is exactly how you maneuver with your foot. … I haven’t really detected a heavy technical problem here. I’m sure that he’s probably involved with this because he’s heard of a few things.”

Trout’s first step remains below average, but his “reaction” — the component of the “jump” that captures the first 1.5 seconds after contact — has actually improved thus far. The rest of the league, however, has managed to further the gap within the allotted sample.

Mike Trout's Jumps

Note: Data courtesy of Baseball Savant. Reaction, burst and route are all components of Statcast’s “jump” metric, which is measured in feet traveled in the correct direction.

A 60-game season will not provide much opportunity for Trout to play his way back into form. Statistical anomalies will be a given over the course of the 2020 season, particularly when already accounting for the imperfections of modern defensive metrics and the fact that it simply could come down to the opportunities Trout gets in center this year. It also has presented unique challenges, like adapting to hearing the ball off the bat without the instant crowd feedback that he’s grown so accustomed.

“The biggest thing is the acoustics off the bat,” Trout said. “I really noticed that when we played the exhibition games in Dodger Stadium. Just a different sound. It’s tough to see it or hear if they read the ball off the bat, if it’s squared up or not.

“It’s just a little transition. I mean I’m usually in the outfield seeing fans, talking to fans and just seeing and hearing that loud crowd noise. Obviously, it’s a little different when they just pour crowd noise in. It’s different in every stadium, but it’s definitely something you got to get used to.”

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While the small-sample defensive metrics haven’t graded Trout well among his counterparts, he still figures to remain an integral figure in center field for years to come. The club’s two top outfield prospects, Jo Adell (who has since debuted) and Brandon Marsh, each have started getting extra work in the corners over the past year. Trout’s speed is still there. Even with Statcast’s harsh grading, he still is taking good routes to the baseball, post-jump. At age 29, he still is in the midst of his physical prime.

Perhaps all it took was a tweet to lock things back into focus.

“I just looked into it and just told myself, “How could I get better?” Trout said.

(Top photo of Mike Trout: Ezra Shaw / Getty Images)

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