Angels are finally willing to blow it up — and Neto's the prize

For years the Angels have been the team that hoards its stars no matter how bad things get. That's apparently changing. Mark Feinsand reported sources say the Angels are open to trading shortstop Zach Neto, lefty Reid Detmers and righty Jose Soriano, which is about as clear a white-flag signal as this front office has sent in a decade.

Mark Feinsand

@Feinsand

Sources: Angels open to trading Neto, Detmers, Soriano. Plus Deadline notes on the Royals, Rockies, Braves, Mariners and more. t.co/yrUlseG6Hs

The Neto piece is the one that'll get division rivals fired up. MLB Trade Rumors flagged the Rays as newly engaged on the 25-year-old shortstop, joining a market that reportedly already included the Red Sox. Neto's been a legitimately above-average big leaguer since 2024 — power, speed, a real defensive profile at short — and critically, he's cheap and controlled all the way through 2029. That's the kind of asset that doesn't hit the market unless a team is genuinely rebuilding, not just tinkering.

MLB Trade Rumors

@mlbtraderumors

Rays Interested In Zach Neto t.co/KU5OQBfNuu

Not everyone's convinced this actually happens. Dan Szymborski was blunt about it, arguing that trading Neto would require the Angels to admit how bad their situation actually is — and that kind of self-awareness hasn't exactly been the organization's calling card.

Dan Szymborski

@DSzymborski

I'm not really convinced that the Angels are going to trade Zach Neto. Trading Neto would suggest the Angels are aware of the dire straits they're in, which would be a rather unusual thing for them to be.

There's a real structural wrinkle here too. The Angels fired GM Perry Minasian back in late June with the team buried at the bottom of the AL West, and installed former Cardinals executive John Mozeliak as interim GM and baseball-ops consultant. Mozeliak is running the show for now, but he's not the permanent hire — which raises the question MLB Trade Rumors' own podcast posed: does ownership actually let an interim boss pull the trigger on trading away the face of the current core?

MLB Trade Rumors

@mlbtraderumors

The Angels are listening on Detmers, Soriano and Neto but will ownership allow an interim front office leader to make such franchise-altering moves? The MLBTR Podcast looks at that and more in a trade deadline preview episode. t.co/QQI5wmfebu

That's the tension defining this whole situation. The Angels have real leverage with two AL East contenders — Boston and Tampa Bay — both fighting for Neto, and that kind of competition usually drives the return up. But it also takes a front office with actual conviction to walk away from a controllable, 25-year-old shortstop rather than talk itself into running it back one more time. With the deadline set for August 3, the Angels have days, not weeks, to decide which version of themselves shows up.