Memorial Day 2023 is now fading into the rear view and the San Diego Padres find themselves at a crossroads. By all accounts this team has underwhelmed this year, with the only disagreement being to what degree. The crossroads confronting the Padres is whether to continue on in hopes of positive regression to the mean from several key players, or make changes.
Before discussing possible courses of action, it is worth taking stock of some of the injuries that have played an outsized role in the long periods of mediocrity we have witnessed from this team. The most obvious injury loss has been to the “offense first” catcher, Luis Campusano. Campusano has been out since April after injuring the thumb on this catching hand while catching warm-up tosses (has anyone ever heard of such a freak injury?). Initially thought to be just a few weeks on the IL has, in classic Padres fashion, been revealed to mean surgery and several months on the IL. Meanwhile, Austin Nola, who last year put up playable, if underwhelming, numbers, has fallen off a cliff. Nola’s OPS+ (where 100 is league average) currently sits at 25 (no, that is not a typo). For context, last year, Nola’s “underwhelming” OPS+ was 91. Of course, Nola has been sharing time with rookie Brett Sullivan, currently sitting on an OPS+ of 37. For what it’s worth, in just 22 plate appearances, Campusano was carrying an OPS+ of 80, had just hit his first homerun of the year, and was making consistent hard contact at the time of his inopportune injury. Would Campusano being in the lineup fix everything? Probably not but getting any kind of production out of the bottom of the order might have been enough to change the course of several close games over the past six weeks.
Padres depth pieces David Dahl and Jose Azocar also went down with injuries in April forcing the Padres to rely on even further down depth pieces, Brandon Dixon and Adam Engel. If you don’t remember Adam Engel it would not be surprising and the less said about his Padres tenure, the better. Brandon Dixon has performed like the AAAA player he likely is. He has put together some spectacularly inept displays in some games, and proven to be a tough out in others. He even hit a homerun against former super-hype prospect, MacKenzie Gore in the Nationals series. By the way, it should be noted, given his San Diego origins, that Brandon Dixon had a 15 homerun season in 2019 for the Tigers (did anyone know that?). Jose Azocar is back, and just got a little league-style homerun at Yankee stadium on Sunday, so already he’s an upgrade over Adam Engel. David Dahl is allegedly in his rehab assignment and so might be back with the club soon. Again, neither Azocar nor Dahl will definitively resolve any of the issues that have plagued this team offensively, but any upgrades are a welcome sight.
Manny Machado’s unfortunate injury, however, has opened the door to consistent playing time for the much-maligned (and until recently, not unfairly) Rougned Odor. Odor, as you will no doubt recall, delivered one of the great gut-punches to this team in 2023 when he got unceremoniously picked off against the Royals in an absolutely critical situation, contributing, as much as anyone, to the disgraceful series loss. Since then, all he’s done is hit. He broke the dam against the Red Sox, he hit the potentially season saving three-run homerun against the Nationals, and another homerun in the Bronx. All in a week’s work, which put him in contention for NL Player of the Week honors. In fact, to the extent the Padres have hit at all with runners in scoring position, Odor has been, until very recently, responsible for most of those hits over the last two weeks. Given how Manny’s season started, if that hand injury isn’t quite sufficiently healed, he should not be rushed back.
So, what can be done? Obviously the Padres have a dire need to upgrade at catcher and the obvious replacement might not be ready until late July or August. With Pedro Severino no longer part of the Padres organization, internal help is unlikely. That leaves the free-agent market and the trade market to search for short-term reinforcements.
Credit: San Diego Union Tribune
On the free agent front, the Padres just claimed former New York Yankees slugger Gary Sanchez. Sanchez is now several years removed from his last productive season, yet regarded as a “gotta be better than Nola” choice. With his homer in Miami, it’s already looking true enough, at least offensively. Defensively, we’ll just have to hope for the best.
On the trade market, there are three intriguing names: Travis D’Arnaud of the Braves, Salvador Perez of the Royals, and former Padre Yasmani Grandal of the White Sox. D’Arnaud is a capable backup catcher who has chipped in with some very big hits for the Braves during his tenure (but then again, so has Nola for the Padres). In his age 34 season, he has only appeared in 16 games but still posts an OPS+ of 107 at the time of this writing. He is only signed through this year with a club option for 2024. Given how little he has been playing this year, and the fact that D’Arnaud would know he was playing for his next contract, AJ should be looking into this as a serious trade option.
Salvador Perez is less likely, mainly due to his cost. The veteran catcher is still putting up great numbers, and looks to have plenty left in the tank. He could easily slot in the number 5 spot in the lineup and be interchangeable in the DH/Catching role with Campusano when he returns. If cost is the concern (and $20M/year is certainly a lot), then AJ will have to get creative. Luckily we have a couple of prospects that the Royals might be interested in: Jackson Merrill and Dylan Lesko. Yes, the Royals already have Bobby Witt Jr. at shortstop, but Merrill can still learn another position as he climbs through the minors. Dylan Lesko was once considered a generational talent, but injuries have stopped his progress cold. The 2022 first round pick for the Padres still has not thrown a single competitive pitch while in the organization. A team like the Royals who are several years away from contending, would likely take the chance on either of those prospects, and in return, might pay a significant chunk of Perez’s remaining salary. Perez is currently signed through 2025, which would actually work well timing-wise for the Padres to pass the torch to a certain highly regarded catching prospect while giving the Padres the opportunity to see what they have with Campusano. Merrill and Lesko are blue chip talents, and we’re not advocating for this trade (in fact we hope AJ is not pursuing such a deal), but it’s a natural area for speculation.
Finally, there’s the “bring him home” option of re-acquiring Yasmani Grandal. This is probably the least exciting option because Grandal is probably in the sunset of his career, while Perez and to a lesser extent D’Arnaud look to have at least one or two good seasons left. But even if Grandal came to San Diego and produced at a pedestrian .650 OPS, that would still be an enormous upgrade over Nola/Sullivan. He is out of contract at the end of the year and would probably cost very little to acquire. But like Perez, Grandal is quite expensive so it might take a decent prospect (but by no means Merrill or Lesko) to get the White Sox to chip in on salary.
At present, if Gary Sanchez does not prove to be the answer, those seem to be AJ’s next best options. None of the present value of those options seem worth the future value of one of the Padres blue chippers, but we’d get behind a deal for a second tier prospect (Hi Josh Mears!).
First base is another area where the Padres should look for an upgrade. Jake Cronenworth is defensively quite adept there, especially when compared to he who shall not be named (who is also, unsurprisingly, available off the proverbial trash heap). But, like almost every Padre, Crone has gotten off to a slow start. First base is one of those positions where offense is valued above defense and much of Crone’s value comes from his gold glove caliber defense. Internally, there is San Diegan Alfonso Rivas at El Paso who is putting together a nice year, but there are real questions about whether his production would be even close to replicable at Petco Park. Would Rivas be better than Brandon Dixon? The organization seems to think not. So what is AJ to do? Hold his nose and pull from the trash heap? Pursue trades? Beg the Red Birds for Goldschmidt? It is likely too early for many teams to pull the trigger on big trades, such as for a star first baseman, but the next three weeks could be telling. However, it is never too early to lay groundwork for such trades. After all, the Padres are not going to be the only team looking to make upgrades.
Centerfield is another area of some concern. Trent Grisham is fresh off another gold glove campaign. Unfortunately, his 2022 gold glove was accompanied by a, putting it mildly, frustrating season at the plate. He set a career high in strikeouts (150) and also career lows in batting average (.184) and OPS+ (82). So far, 2023 is looking a lot like 2022 for Trent Grisham. He has been one of poster boys for this team’s well-documented offensive struggles. At one point recently he had an astonishing stat: He had come to bat with the bases loaded 7 times, and, amazingly, had 7 strikeouts in those at bats. In 2023, with runners in scoring position, Grisham is hitting a dreadful .125/.186/.225 with a 39% K-rate. That is simply not good enough. He has a knack for following up a particularly costly or inept string of displays by hitting a homerun or getting a dramatic hit just when everyone (including probably AJ) is ready to send Grisham to El Paso for some re-tooling. Such is the sorry state of the Padres offense in the not so early part of 2023 that we are scared of letting anyone go who is currently contributing anything offensively.
But, AJ needs to be brave and do what is best for this team. Trent Grisham needs to figure out how to be that pesky yet surprisingly powerful on-base machine we all fell in love with during the short 2020 season. The player that the Brewers used a precious first round pick on. The player who has been missing in action for almost two years. What we’ve gotten since the middle of 2021 is a player prone to prolonged stretches of non-competitive and often rally killing at-bats with only the occasional meaningful contribution. Yes, he has a flair for the dramatic, such as crucial walk-off homeruns last year or his displays in the early rounds of last year’s postseason. But how long can we allow him to rest on the past? He’s not showing significant sustainable improvement at the major league level over his last 600 at-bats. The Padres are also blessed with attractive options in centerfield… to wit a certain superstar currently playing right beside Grisham.
Yes, it may be time for El Niño to make his comparison to The Kid even harder to ignore by transitioning to centerfield. No disrespect to Grisham, but Fernando is easily twice the athlete Grisham is, can cover much more ground, can make mind-blowing catches and throws that take your breath away. Fernando is still learning to play right field, but is already in the gold glove conversation. He’s even played some centerfield (in 2021) and would likely find it more to his liking since he will have a larger area to patrol and greater responsibility. Jose Azocar and David Dahl (when he returns) would likely be an adequate platoon for right field while Grisham re-tools.
AJ could also decide to deal Trent Grisham to address another of this team’s pressing needs. After all, Grisham’s floor is a gold glove centerfielder with some pop, and his ceiling, if he ever puts it together, is a perennial all-star at a premium position. He’s also cheap. Teams looking to build through young but experienced talent might see Grisham as a reclamation project or change of scenery candidate, and be willing to part with a good, but “wasted on this team” veteran. If there’s concern over letting cheap controllable (severely underperforming) talent leave, that’s an issue for Mr. Seidler to decide.
The other obvious trade candidate is fan favorite Ha-Seong Kim. But Kim is more valuable to this team than Grisham. He offers elite defensive versatility at three infield positions, which is coming in very handy with Manny out for the last few weeks. Kim is also a more productive hitter than Grisham, which again, is something the Padres can’t really afford to give away, at least until the big four start playing like they should. Jake Cronenworth just got signed to a long-term deal, so he is likely off the board as a trade candidate.
The other names mentioned in the trade-o-sphere are Blake Snell and Josh Hader, both of whom are free agents at year’s end. But trading either of them, while there’s still a glimmer of hope for making the postseason this year would be a mistake. If Blake Snell follows his usual trajectory, he is going to transform into a top 10 pitcher in the second half of the year. Given that the Padres will likely be playing catch-up to secure a wild card spot, Snell’s second half might prove to be the difference between making and not making the postseason. It would also be a mistake to trade Josh Hader since the Padres currently have no one to play the lock-down closer role. Robert Suarez is on an uncertain timeline for return and who knows what he’ll even look like after such a long absence. If the Padres offense modestly improves there are going to likely be a lot of one run contests and a lock-down closer will be worth his weight in gold to this team. Of course, if things take a dramatic turn for the worse, then shopping those two around would make sense.
AJ certainly has work to do and we hope that this is something of a useful roadmap for him. Every GM has to make tough decisions, which includes, sometimes “shooting Old Yeller” for the greater good.
LFGSD
p.s. Most of the foregoing was written in advance of the Marlins series. Gary Sanchez has already shown his upside and downside. He hit an absolute rocket for a homerun, which proved the only run the Padres would score in game 2. He also blundered defensively late in that game by being out of position on a critical relay and helping pave the way to another stinging loss. And yes, our “lock-down closer” blew another save. However, we remain of the opinion that Josh Hader is the closer this team needs, recent and extremely small samples notwithstanding.