{"id":203655,"date":"2026-03-04T09:09:33","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/203655\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T09:09:33","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:09:33","slug":"former-angels-manager-says-his-health-is-why-he-wasnt-brought-back-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/203655\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Angels Manager Says His Health Is Why He Wasn&#8217;t Brought Back In 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Los Angeles Angels are focusing on having an improved season in 2025, where they won 72 games to 90 losses. They\u2019ve brought in several new players to make an impact on the field and overhauled their coaching staff under new manager Kurt Suzuki.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, former Angels manager Ron Washington revisited his time with the Angels and discussed why he was not brought back to be the skipper for the 2026 campaign.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it was tough for [the Angels] to trust my health,\u201d Washington said of why he thinks Los Angeles didn&#8217;t bring him back via Foul Territory TV. \u201cIf I wouldn\u2019t have went down, I think I\u2019d still be in Anaheim.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Washington became the manager for the Halos in 2024, leading the Angels to a 63-99 record in his first season. In 2025, the Angels saw a huge improvement under Washington, increasing their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/managers\/washiro01.shtml\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:win percentage to .486;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">win percentage to .486<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The problem was that Washington was only able to manage 74 games for the Angels last year due to health concerns. In June of last season, Washington underwent major heart surgery that ended his year as the club\u2019s skipper.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was disappointing because just as my issue hit me last year in June, I had my team going in the right direction,\u201d Washington added. \u201cI had the attitude good. They was committed to what we was trying to do \u2013 and then [the health concern] came down.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Bench coach Ray Montgomery took over as manager for the rest of the season. The Angels went 36-52 the rest of the year under Montgomery, finishing last in the American League West.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI made a difference in that clubhouse, and I made a difference on that team. I\u2019m not patting myself on the back, but I did make a difference, and I could see the difference wasn&#8217;t there when I wasn\u2019t there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>In the offseason, the Angels decided not to pick up Washington\u2019s option and instead hired former catcher Kurt Suzuki on a one-year contract to be the club\u2019s manager in 2026. Washington found a way to stay in baseball, joining the San Francisco Giants\u2019 coaching staff as an infield coach.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m enjoying myself here with the Giants. They took a chance on me and my health.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Angels did look like a much more competitive squad under Washington last season, but the front office ultimately decided it was time for a change after his health concerns and another 90-loss season \u2013 even if most of those 90 losses weren\u2019t tied to his name.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Bringing in Suzuki injected some youth into the clubhouse as he is just 42 years old. Perhaps under a new manager and brand new coaching staff, something can finally click in Anaheim \u2013 Angels fans can only hope.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Angels are focusing on having an improved season in 2025, where they won 72 games&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":203656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,10900,47,2866,13809,4820,17203],"class_list":["post-203655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-kurt-suzuki","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-angels","tag-ron-washington","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-the-angels"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}