Angels part ways with Mike Maddux, two other pitching coaches

ANAHEIM, Calif. - The Los Angeles Angels made a shocking series of moves on Tuesday with the announcement that pitching coach Mike Maddux, bullpen coach Dom Chiti and assistant pitching coach Darryll Scott would all be parting ways with the team.

The dismissals were facilitated by interim general manager John Mozeliak, who has continued his aggressiveness in the front office after a trade deadline where he turned the Angels into sellers for the first time in a long time. Tim Leveque has been named interim pitching coach and Michael Wuertz was named interim bullpen coach to fill the voids left by the dismissals. 

Mozeliak's moves were motivated by one main factor, that being that the Angels' pitching staff wasn't sufficiently using the technology and analytical data available to them to try and improve performance or development. 

"Over the time of of talking with different staff members, different players and there was just this undercurrent of trying to get ourselves to be using all the different tools that you see a lot of pitchers use today... and just really try to leverage that in how we help players grow," Mozeliak said. "I think there was becoming some level of frustration with the inconsistency of that."

Meeting the Interim Staff

Levenque, who worked in the St. Louis Cardinals' organization from 2006-2025, overlapping with Mozeliak's time as St. Louis' general manager and president of baseball operations, will be promoted from Double-A Rocket City's coaching staff to assume the interim role. 

Wuertz was the Angels' Minor League assistant pitching coordinator before assuming the interim bullpen coaching role and has spent a grand total of 11 years coaching in the Angels organization.

The Angels' pitching staff seemed like a bright spot early in the season and Maddux was attracting early praise, but as the months went on and the Angels sank lower and lower in the standings, the pitching staff declined just as rapidly. 

They now have a combined ERA of 4.52, seventh-worst in all of baseball, as well as the seventh-worst combined WHIP at 1.38. 

What Mozeliak gathered from his conversations with players and staff members was that technology and analytical information wasn't being utilized by the pitching staff, but that's not to say that the Angels didn't have access to the facilities and equipment to provide said data. The information simply wasn't making it downstairs. 

"I do feel like a lot of the pre-work going into a game or a start, there were some things that we discussed that we thought maybe could be utilized, and I don't know if it was truly being taken advantage of," Mozeliak said.

Embracing the Modern Day

Baseball in the modern day is more reliant on technology than ever before and while some players and coaches may adopt more of an old-school approach to the game, which Maddux seemingly did, that doesn't mean that the staff as a whole can't benefit from the data that can be gleaned from the tools that the team has at its disposal. 

Reid Detmers, who leads all Angels starters in ERA with 4.00, supports the use of technology, particularly Trackman data, which he's been using since the All-Star break after he said he asked for access to it to help get see his pitch data down on paper. But Detmers believes that even if a pitcher is less hot on analytics, it still doesn't hurt the team to have access to it.

"Not saying we didn't use it all the time, but there was definitely times where we could've used it," Detmers said. "I think if we have it, we might as well use it. Whether or not guys want to use it or not, that's up to them. But if the guys do want to use it, then go for it. In my eyes, it's only going to make you better. It's not going to make you worse."

While these cuts to the pitching coaching staff may be aggressive, Mozeliak affirmed that he wouldn't be making any more changes to the structure for the rest of the season. 

The Rest of the Staff is Safe

The Angels may be struggling at the plate as of late, but Mozeliak didn't point the blame for that to the hitting coaching staff, and instead said that the Angels need to find their identity as an offense, which hasn't happened just yet.

Mozeliak also affirmed that Kurt Suzuki, who is on a one-year managerial contract, is staying put as the Angels skipper for the rest of the season and said that the two have a "positive working relationship."

There are just 43 games left in the season, which draws into question why Mozeliak made these decisions now. But he also made it clear that while winning will still be on the Angels' mind through the final stretch, developing the young talent they have to the best of their abilities will be critical, as will "finding an identity for the team."

To achieve those goals, Mozeliak needed to have an informed staff that could make use of all the tools that the team has available to it.

"There's so many more resources out there that really every team in baseball is utilizing, and so just making sure that the Angels are up to speed with that," Mozeliak said. "Our research and development team upstairs, they're providing a lot of really useful things that I think we can be taking advantage of. And I think moving forward... what can we do to make this a state-of-the-art place for player growth?"