Zach Neto’s glove has become a problem the Angels can’t keep ignoring.
Los Angeles is already buried by a roster full of bat-first players who don’t offer much help on defense, and Neto has drifted from promising young centerpiece to one of the clearest weak spots. The Angels didn’t do anything in the offseason to fix a defense that was already a mess, and the results have been ugly again in 2026.
Last season, the club finished dead last in outs above average at -54 and 28th in defensive runs saved at -45. This year hasn’t been much better. The Angels are 28th in OAA at -21 and 26th in DRS at -9.
Neto is right in the middle of that mess. After a rough 2025 in the field, when he posted -8 OAA but somehow finished with 13 DRS, the hope was that the 25-year-old would clean things up and keep moving toward superstardom.
Instead, his numbers have gone the other way. Among qualified shortstops, he sits 15th of 17 with -7 OAA and 11th in DRS with zero.
The errors tell an even harsher story. Neto committed 11 last season in 125 games, split between six fielding errors and five throwing errors.
He has already blown past that total with 14 errors in just 87 games this year, including nine fielding errors and five throwing errors. That leaves him tied with CJ Abrams of the Nationals for the most errors in the majors, regardless of position.
Neto added another costly mistake in the third inning of the July 5 series finale against the Boston Red Sox. He mishandled an easy ground ball off Wilyer Abreu’s bat that should have ended the inning. Instead, Willson Contreras followed with a homer on the next pitch, flipping a 3-2 Angels lead into a 5-3 deficit.
The Angels may have a way out if they’re willing to try something unconventional.
Rookie Denzer Guzman is at third base now, but not because that’s his best spot. It’s there because Neto has been occupying shortstop.
The scouting reports on Guzman all point in the same direction: he has the tools to be an above-average defensive shortstop. He just started working at third in the minors because it was the faster route to the big leagues.
At this point, Guzman may be the better defender at short, while Neto could make more sense at third. It would take an adjustment, and it wouldn’t erase Neto’s occasional issues with the glove, but his 89th percentile arm strength would fit at the hot corner. More importantly, it would let him avoid the range demands that have become such a problem at shortstop.
With the Angels going nowhere, a Neto-Guzman swap on the left side of the infield is the kind of move that could at least bring some stability over the second half. The only real question is whether the Angels are willing to be bold enough to make it.
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