Mike Trout brought the Angels to his private golf club for team bonding. Then the trades began

It was Aug. 3, the day of baseball’s trade deadline and an off-day on the East Coast before a series in Baltimore. About a dozen Los Angeles Angels were gathered near the first tee, ready to begin a long-awaited round of golf at the course that Tiger Woods designed for superstar Mike Trout.

Little did the players realize, some of them would be former Angels very soon.

“It seemed like every four or five holes someone was getting the call,” said Trout, who watched his team bonding event turn into one big breakup.

Trout, 35, was eager to host his teammates near his hometown of Millville, N.J., at his private, invitation-only club, Trout National — The Reserve. But he’d planned the outing in the spring, without realizing the date’s significance on the baseball calendar. Nor could he know back then that the Angels, a team that rarely acts as sellers at the deadline, would tear it down.

Suffice it to say, no team ever experienced a deadline day like this.

Three players were traded while taking in the rolling hills of Trout National — reliever Brent Suter, outfielder Jo Adell and reliever Ryan Zeferjahn. A fourth, reliever Kirby Yates, learned he was dealt after the round was over while in a car heading back to Trout’s home.

“It was pretty wild watching everybody go,” said Yates, a 12-year veteran. “None of us have ever seen that many guys get traded at once.

“After somebody went, we just kept saying, ‘All right, who’s next?’”

A fifth Angel traded that day, right-hander José Soriano, wasn’t part of the group, which the previous night boarded a bus upon landing in Baltimore for the two-hour drive to Trout’s home in New Jersey.

Soriano, 27, doesn’t golf. He was asleep in his hotel room when he was awakened by a phone call the next morning informing him he was heading to the Toronto Blue Jays.

Everyone else — the dozen or so players who stayed overnight at Trout’s home, plus coaches and staffers who arrived on a bus from Baltimore the following morning — was at Trout National.

“I’m bummed I wasn’t invited,” Angels interim general manager John Mozeliak joked. “I was a little tied up that morning.”

Mozeliak, preoccupied with trade negotiations, did not know nearly half his team was golfing. Trout came to realize, as he organized the outing, that it might be an unusual day. The group, he said, had an idea that trades were coming.

Suter got the first call, right before the players teed off.

“Everyone was putting on a green,” Trout said. “We were all sitting there, all on the tee box.”

Mozeliak, who conducted the calls with Angels assistant GM David Haynes, told Suter he was going to the Atlanta Braves. Suter, 36, is an 11-year veteran. The Braves are his fifth different team. But it was actually the first time he was dealt.

“Never in a thousand years did he think he’d get traded,” Zeferjahn said. “His first question was, ‘Can I finish the round? Can I golf?’”

The answer was yes. Mozeliak recalled telling Suter he’d be hearing from the Braves, then concluding the call by saying, “Hit ‘em straight.”

“I just instantly started hugging everybody,” Suter said. “Luckily, I was able to play the round and enjoy the last couple hours with the guys before I caught the last flight out of Philly to Atlanta.”

The players sensed the action was only beginning.

“Once that happened,” Yates said, referring to the Suter trade, “we all had a feeling this is probably gonna pick up.”

Adell, 27, was next. He was on the seventh hole, a long par four, when Mozeliak and Haynes informed him he was going to the Cleveland Guardians.

“I was in shock,” Adell said.

The 10th overall pick in the 2017 draft, Adell had spent his entire career in the Angels organization. And while he knew a trade was possible, the end came suddenly, in a way he never imagined.

“You were hearing some cheers and some hugs going on throughout the golf course as guys were getting traded,” Adell said. “We got to hole nine and I was pretty much giving out hugs.”

He’d be gone by the turn.

“At least I got to play half the course, though,” Adell said. “That’s the positive.”

Even those that weren’t ultimately traded endured a strange day.

As the round continued, a report surfaced that left-hander Reid Detmers had been traded to the Chicago Cubs. For weeks, Detmers had endured speculation that he was a candidate to be traded. The report, though, turned out to be inaccurate.

“I think it was good he was golfing,” said Trout, whose group included Yates and Detmers. “It took his mind off it. When that trade with the Cubs came out, that’s when we started asking questions. But we knew it wasn’t legit. We were right there with him.”

Detmers completed his round and remained an Angel.

“We were kind of waiting for his phone to ring,” Yates said. “And it never did.”

Zeferjahn, 28, did not originally plan to go on the golf trip, describing himself as a last-minute addition. With four additional years of club control remaining, he also was not an obvious candidate to move.

At the time of the deadline, however, Zeferjahn’s 33.5 percent strikeout rate was ninth-best among major-league relievers. Teams coveted him. The Cubs landed him.

Around the 12th or 13th hole, Zeferjahn said, it started raining. The players gathered in a hut to stay dry.

“That’s when I got the call,” Zeferjahn said. “I was like, ‘Wow.’ It was a surreal moment with everyone around. (The other players) were telling me about the Cubs. It was nice with everyone together one last time.”

Once the round of golf was complete, the players piled into cars to return to Trout’s home. But the whirlwind of trades still wasn’t over.

Yates, who, like Suter, had joined the Angels on a one-year deal, was stunned to receive his call.

“I didn’t think I had a chance,” Yates said. “I did not think there was a market for a 39-year-old throwing 90 mph.”

There was, in the form of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Yates went just before the buzzer. His trade was reported publicly right at 6 p.m.

Yates made his way to Milwaukee, where the Pirates were opening a series against the Brewers, and threw a scoreless inning the next night.

Some of the surviving Angels took a bus right back to the team hotel in Baltimore. Others stopped at Trout’s house first before getting on their own bus. Trout drove to Baltimore with his parents the next day.

Back in Anaheim, Mozeliak sorted through his five deals, appreciative that the players who were golfing “took it in great spirit” when informed of their respective moves.

“I guess if you’re going to get news like that,” Mozeliak said, “you might as well be having fun.”

For Trout, the flurry of trades was somewhat expected, “just because of the rumors and stuff.” But the day he planned for his teammates at Trout National sure wasn’t what he initially envisioned.

“It was just different,” Trout said. “We were all enjoying a round of golf. It was different, for sure.”

With apologies to Jim Nantz, call it a deadline day unlike any other.

— The Athletic’s Sahadev Sharma contributed to this report.