Padres’ issues go beyond Bud Black
By Tim Haberin
With patience finally running out on their sluggish 2015 performance, the San Diego Padres dismissed longtime manager Bud Black yesterday after nine seasons helming the club. Black oversaw a 649-713 record and won the National League Manager of the Year award in 2010. Today the organization named its Triple-A manager Pat Murphy as interim skipper.
The Padres have certainly disappointed after a series of high-profile additions during the offseason. Black’s firing, however, reads more as an easy “drastic measure” than an attempt to address what is really wrong with the team. To put it simply, the preseason predictions and hype surrounding the Friars may have been too optimistic. While the acquisitions they made over the winter were effective headline-grabbers, they may not have been the best ingredients of a postseason-worthy club.
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Perhaps their biggest new piece was outfielder Matt Kemp, the former Dodgers All-Star traded to division rival San Diego in December. The deal was nearly derailed, however, by the health issues that have plagued Kemp for several years. A physical exam revealed severe arthritis in both hips, and the Padres attempted to rework the trade before finally agreeing to its original parameters.
Kemp’s extensive injury history is nothing new, of course. Through various trade rumors, it was generally accepted that any team dealing for him would be taking on a risk. But “severe arthritis” is not a term you want to hear connected to a 30-year-old athlete. Kemp still had star power and name recognition, however, and the Padres presumably decided that their need for a splashy move outweighed any red flags.
To Kemp’s credit, he has played in just about every game for San Diego so far this year. However, his performance has not helped his case for still being one of the game’s foremost outfielders. Through 66 games he is slashing a lowly .246/.288/.346. The once-vaunted power that helped him swat an NL-most 39 homers in 2011 appears to be all but zapped. He has managed to hit only three home runs at present. Once a good bet to swipe 30+ bags, he has also turned into a virtual nonfactor on the base paths.
Only a day after the Kemp trade, San Diego also landed Wil Myers in a three-team deal. Myers burst onto the scene with the Rays in 2013, capturing the Rookie of the Year award despite not receiving a call-up until mid-June. His sophomore campaign was far more arduous, as his average plummeted to .222 and he missed nearly half the season with a wrist injury. Trading for Myers was another gamble, but probably a better one to take considering his youth and upside.
Myers has looked noticeably better than he did a year ago, hitting .277 with five home runs and 19 RBI. Unfortunately, the same nagging injuries have limited him to 35 games. Yesterday, after only three games back in the lineup, the Padres returned him to the DL with continued wrist trouble. Myers could very well still be a factor in San Diego, but it’s increasingly looking like it won’t be this year.
The Padres also attempted to augment their pitching staff by signing James Shields and trading for closer Craig Kimbrel. Shields has pitched solidly (3.59 ERA) but there is enough evidence to think he is not quite the ace some make him out to be. Though Kimbrel is 16-for-17 in save opportunities, he hasn’t looked nearly as dominant as he did in his Braves days. His ERA (3.81) is over two runs higher than it was last season, and he has already given up nearly as many hits and runs as he did in all of 2014.
That might be more of a statement on how otherworldly Kimbrel was in the past than an indictment on the current version of him. Newly 27 years old, the Padres shouldn’t complain about penciling Kimbrel in as their closer for the next few years, even if he hasn’t been quite so sharp thus far in his new home. Trading for a premium closer is a move for a team that is only a piece or two away, which should indicate how much San Diego was overestimating itself when it pulled the trigger.
If one big-name addition has lived up to its billing, it’s Justin Upton. After his swap from the Braves, the 27-year-old left fielder has put up a .281/.359/.479 slash line with 13 home runs, 41 RBI and 13 steals.
Overall, Bud Black comes out of this situation looking more like a scapegoat than the main culprit. While they have not been the force that some imagined, the Padres are three games under .500 and a manageable five games out of a Wild Card spot. Underwhelming compared to where they thought they would be, but not a full-on disaster either.
After nine seasons, it could be that Black’s time in San Diego was nearing its end anyway. But dismissing him now just looks like an impulsive attempt to salvage something out of a season that opened to so much fanfare. Instead, the Padres might consider interrogating the organizational thought process that judged putting a Matt Kemp with two bad hips into cavernous Petco Park would transform them into a legitimate contender.
A highly respected figure in the game, Black should have little problem landing on his feet. In the meantime, it will be interesting to see how the Padres fare without him.