San Diego Padres: The First Half MVP

The San Diego Padres have had many key players produce during the first half of the season, but none more than this star…

San Diego Padres third baseman Manny Machado was signed to a 10-year, $300M deal before Spring Training. He was supposed to headline what would be an exciting and young team in 2019, but he didn’t do that for the first couple of months offensively.

He is still the best defensive player on the field, but it took him a little while to get relaxed in a new ballpark, so I can’t give him the MVP.

Eric Hosmer is in the same boat as Machado, as he got off to a slow start, but has certainly heated up in the past couple of weeks.

Kirby Yates has been the best closer in all of baseball this season, but because he is a reliever that doesn’t play every day, I can’t give it to him either.

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Another pitcher who has been pretty stellar is Chris Paddack, but since he doesn’t play every day he won’t get the award.

The guy who does play every day is shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr.

Ownership made a statement when they let Tatis and Paddack make it on the Opening Day roster. They wanted to win and Tatis has put the Padres in the position to win every day.

He is the only leadoff hitter they have right now, but he has been everything and more a manager would want a leadoff hitter to be.

Tatis already has a dozen stolen bases and a dozen home runs, and he missed a month which I will get to later.

He has shown extreme hustle on every play he is involved in, including tagging and scoring twice this season on pop-ups to second base.

Tatis has also made some flashy plays on defense as well including multiple diving plays in addition to showing off his elite arm from shortstop.

In early July vs the Giants, he made a sliding stop on a ground ball in the hole, spun, and fired a 94 mph bullet to first where Hosmer made a nice pick to get the out.

He has been a human highlight reel in his first year as a big leaguer, and he should win the Rookie of the Year although Pete Alonso is getting all the love because he plays in New York.

He was injured for about a month with a hamstring injury in May, so he doesn’t nearly have the number of games under his belt as most rookies.

Despite that, Tatis leads all shortstops in average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage, but for some reason didn’t make the All-Star team.

He has certainly been the San Diego Padres best player, starting games off with a bang at the top of the lineup.