San Diego Padres 2016 Season In Review
The San Diego Padres finished the season with a 68-94 record, “earning” them the 3rd overall selection in the 2017 draft, due to tiebreakers putting them behind the Reds but ahead of the Rays in order. Let’s take a look at the good, the bad, and the Preller of the Padres season:
The Good Stuff
Wil Myers – While he had a rough second half, Myers still finished the season with 28 home runs and 28 stolen bases, posting a slash line of .259/.335/.461, and most importantly, he played 157 games. Myers has struggled to stay healthy in his career, and when he’s been healthy, he’s not flashed the incredible power/speed combo that he was rated so highly for as a prospect. He definitely showed that this year. The 2013 AL Rookie of the Year had totaled 27 home runs and 16 stolen bases in his career coming into this season, never playing more than 88 games in a season. He’ll be just 26 when 2017 opens, so he’s entering the prime of his career and poised to be the Padres’ offensive leader going forward just a year after the Padres were seriously listening to offers in the offseason but didn’t get an offer of requisite value in their eyes for Myers. They’re glad they didn’t make that move!
Alex Dickerson/Ryan Schimpf – Two older prospects (Dickerson is 26, Schimpf is 28) with minimal track records (8 combined plate appearance in the majors before 2016 with over 4.700 combined minor league plate appearances) that combined for 33 doubles, 7 triples, 30 home runs, 88 RBI, and 87 runs in 615 plate appearances. Add in Travis Jankowski, a 25 year-old guy who made the most of his chance by stealing 30 bases in just over 380 plate appearances and playing excellent defense, and you have a collection of older prospects that contributed to the Padres lineup this season.
Brad Hand/Ryan Buchter/Brandon Morrow – Three experienced relievers with plenty of previous failed experiments were picked up on the cheap, and combined, they made 167 appearances, struck out 197 hitters, and had a combined 2.78 ERA for the Padres. The Padres certainly have had success in the past with their park, but since they moved in the fences, they’ve not had these same surprising successes, so to have three members of their bullpen come out of the scrap heap was a very pleasant surprise on the season.
Red Sox trades – The Padres made two significant trades that impacted their future in the last 12 months. In the offseason, the Padres traded closer Craig Kimbrel to Boston and received Logan Allen, Javier Guerra, Carlos Asuaje, and Manuel Margot. Padres fans got to see Margot in the majors already this season and the other three all had solid debuts in the minor league system. Then in July, the Red Sox made a more controversial trade with the Padres in a deal that received scrutiny that we’ll discuss in depth later. Drew Pomeranz, who the Padres acquired from the Athletics before the winter meetings in the offseason, was shipped to Boston for the Red Sox top pitching prospect Anderson Espinoza. Those two deals added a load of talent to the system.
Draft/International Signing Period – Either one of these could be a singular huge moment in the organization, but the Padres had two monster talent acquisition moments this summer, so much so that they actually had two fall Instructional League teams to host all the young players they wanted to get time with this offseason before sending them home for the winter. The Padres drafted 8th in the first round, but they had the 2nd most draft pool money to spend, so they were able to accumulate a significant amount of talent in the June draft. Then came the July signing period. The Yankees, Dodgers, and Red Sox had blown past the international free agent pool before, but the Padres did it with a style that had never been seen before, spending an absolute ton (no official numbers released due to numbers for Venezuelan signees left unpublished because of the political unrest in that country). They added more young talent this year than most teams bring in over 3 years of draft and IFA work!
Next: The Bad
The Bad Stuff
Derek Norris – The power-hitting catcher has never been a guy to hit for a high average, but 2016 was brutal. He slashed .186/.255/.328. He knocked out 14 home runs and actually stole 9 bases as well, but Norris’ rough batting average and high strikeout rate of 30.3% of his plate appearances made the Padres attempt to trade him, but Norris has always been a bat-first catcher, so when his bat was struggling, it was hard to sell him around the league. Norris was arbitration eligible for the first time last offseason, and he’ll start getting more expensive this offseason, so he could end up being a non-tender candidate depending on what his projected cost was.
Tyson Ross – Ross’s season was cut short just 5 1/3 innings into the year with 7 earned runs allowed before an injury to his shoulder ended his season. Ross seemed to be “just around the corner” for a return all season long, and yet never got there. His presence in the rotation would be a major boon for the 2017 team for sure.
Consistent pitching – The Padres got times of great starting pitching from Drew Pomeranz before trade, Colin Rea had a 5 start run from mid-April to early May where he posted a 2.61 ERA before getting injured and eventually ending his season a couple of months later, Andrew Cashner put together a solid three start run just in time to get him traded to Miami at the trade deadline with a crazy 23/3 K/BB ratio over 17 2/3 innings, and even “retread” types like Paul Clemens and Clayton Richard put forth 10+ game runs of success in the rotation, but the team never seemed to have more than two pitchers throwing well at any point in the season, which led to a lot of series losses as they’d take a game or two and then get shelled in the other games of the series.
Of course, none of this was as bad as what transpired mid-season.
Next: Preller
The Preller Debacle
This summer, Padres General Manager A.J. Preller made a number of deals. From June 1st until the non-waiver trading deadline on August 1st, Preller made six significant trades with five teams.
- June 4th – Traded James Shields and cash to the White Sox for Erik Johnson and Fernando Tatis
- June 30th – Traded Fernando Rodney to the Marlins for Chris Paddack
- July 14th – Traded Drew Pomeranz to the Red Sox for Anderson Espinoza
- July 26th – Traded Melvin Upton and cash to the Blue Jays for Hansel Rodriguez
- July 29th – Traded Andrew Cashner, Tayron Guerrero, Colin Rea, and cash to the Marlins for Luis Castillo, Josh Naylor, Carter Capps, and Jarred Cosart. (The Rea for Castillo portion of the deal was eventually rescinded by the league)
- July 30th – Traded Matt Kemp and cash to the Braves for Hector Olivera
On August 1st, Major League Baseball found that the Padres had not disclosed an injury that Collin Rea had previously had after he could not complete his July 30th start for the Marlins. The judgement was that the Padres would return Castillo and get Rea back. Rea went on the DL and did not pitch the rest of the season. This was sadly just the beginning.
Rumors began to fly about how the Padres had hidden, or been less than truthful with, medical information in their trades. Some rumors came out about Kemp in Atlanta having undisclosed treatment procedures he was undergoing before he was traded. He was open with the Atlanta medical staff and knew what treatments he has been receiving, and frankly, the Braves wanted Olivera out of town, so it is quite likely that the Braves never filed anything official with the league office.
Then the big bomb dropped. On September 15th, Major League Baseball levied a significant suspension against Preller, suspending him from team operations for 30 days due to the findings from their investigation into a complaint filed by the Boston Red Sox regarding the Pomeranz deal. The league found that the Padres had been not just withholding information in their trades, but that they held their medical information on an entirely different server, unavailable to teams, while presenting a front of openness by opening their supposed entire file on a player before the deal. This is one of the most egregious acts of deception that has been punished by Major League Baseball upon a front office. Reportedly, the Red Sox chose to have the commissioner’s office pursue suspension rather than reverse the trade.
Preller certainly could have been the fall guy for something that was an organizational philosophy that goes even higher than he. He could be taking the fall for something that went on and that he simply didn’t know about. However, the overwhelming evidence is that these actions centered on Preller and his direction of the front office. How the team will recover and be able to work with their fellow MLB teams again in trade negotiations is anyone’s guess, and it may require them to part ways with Preller.