The San Diego Padres lost a grand total of 99 games last year. They were third to last in RBI, second to last in team batting average, and dead last in runs scored. Their pitching was arguably better, but only marginally; they were 10th in ERA and in batting average against, and they allowed the sixth most runs in the National League. All of which was a drastic departure from 2007, when the Padres pitching staff was the best in the league.

After such a disappointing season, you’d think the Padres front office would have a semblance of a plan to right the ship for next year, right? Well…

Take one of their lone shining moments, another strong year from 2007 Cy Young winner, Jake Peavy. His ERA (2.85) was good for third best, and his 10-11 record would’ve easily been way north of .500 had his team provided more run support (they scored 3.63 runs per outing). Surely they can count on him having another strong year in 2009, right? Well…

Peavy’s pretty much done with the team, as the cost-cutting Padres can no longer afford his $11 million salary. They’ve got a scheduled budget of around $50 million for 2009, and they’ve been actively shopping him. In fact, GM Kevin Towers wanted a deal in place before the free agent period began back in mid November. So fine - trade him– that ought to bring in some talented prospects to build around. Well…

Peavy’s still with the team, as the possible trade partners (Cubs, Braves, among others) have not offered the right deal/pieces for Towers to pull the trigger. Which in turn is hampering the team’s ability to make any other moves.

Much of what the Padres need will be addressed by the impending Peavy trade, whether the returns are in the form of a young starting pitcher, or more relief pitching, or perhaps, a young shortstop. And consequently, any further moves will be directly contingent on what they get in said Peavy deal; as in, what to do with Khalil Green and what kind of a deal the Padres could make if, for instance, Towers is able to coax Yunel Escobar from the Braves. But without moving Peavy there is no other first move, because, as of now, that’s what the Padres need to do.

But let’s not concentrate on the what-ifs, let’s get some facts out of the way. The Padres declined to offer Trevor Hoffman arbitration, signaling the end of his storied tenure with the team, and Mark Prior filed for free agency (but he may re-sign). So they need to solidify their rotation and their bullpen (remember, their pitching was the best in the NL in 2007, and way below average in 2008).

They also need to drastically improve their offense. Picking up Brian Giles’ option (lead the team in BA) is a good start, but they could use a run-producing outfielder (Giles collected almost as many RBIs as their other two projected starting outfielders, Scott Hairston and Chase Headly, combined). With Tadahito Iguchi gone, the Padres will give Matt Antonelli a shot at second base, but an upgrade there wouldn’t hurt.

Which brings me back to the budget. Depending on how you look at it, offense is where the Padres need to be focusing their offseason plans, but then again so is pitching, and several free agent, veteran pitchers have indicated their preference for San Diego.  Well…

While the budget hasn’t been set, and mlb.com reports it around $50 million, other figures indicate that it could be close to $40 million, which is a full $30 million less than 2008’s budget. I don’t know about you, but last time I checked, you can’t do much with $40 mil other than hope your prospects are the hottest commodity in the market. The Padres are free of bad contracts, and the low payroll gives off the impression that an opportunity to spend some money is on the horizon.

Well…

The team is currently caught in the middle of owner John Moore’s divorce and at this point it’s not clear what impact, if any, that’ll have on his majority stake, but there’s a very real possibility that his wife, Becky Moores will get the controlling majority.

Oy… You thought 2008 was bad…? It seems 2009 won’t get any better.

– What They Need Index –

Today the Dodgers finalized a trade for Greg Maddux. It was a no-brainer deal. Maddux had a no-trade clause and said he would only go to a west coast team. So the Padres’ options were limited to the Angels, who are the only team in the league that doesn’t need pitching, and the Dodgers, who just lost Brad Penny for the year and needed a fifth starter.

Maddux’s record isn’t impressive (6-9), but he’d have a few more wins if he weren’t playing for the offense-starved Padres. And just about all of his other numbers are good, like his 1.22 WHIP and 3.99 ERA. He doesn’t record many strikeouts, but he doesn’t walk guys either. He hasn’t given up more than three walks in a game this season. And he keeps the ball down – allowing nearly twice as many groundballs as flyballs.

Moreover, he’s hot. In his last three starts he’s given up 1 run, 2 runs, and 1 run.

So this really was a no-brainer. The Dodgers have acquired a good pitcher for cheap. Plus, L.A. fans get to watch one of the greatest pitchers of all time finish his career wearing blue and white.

Dodgers faithful, if trading for the traitorous Manny Ramirez left a sour taste in your mouth, this trade should go down easy.

The Boston Herald is reporting that Manny will get his haircut “some time this week” at a place called Fantastic Sam’s, in a promotional stunt that will benefit some Dodgers charities. But that won’t stop the Dodgers from selling “Manny bandannas,” replicas of the blue skullcap he wears under his baseball cap - with fake dreadlocks attached. “Maybe after he gets his hair cut,” Torre said, “He can wear one of those.”

It’s time to stop running. LoHud Yankees Blog points out that Bobby Abreu has been caught stealing eight times in 22 attempts.

Freakonomics tells us about a new study that finds that athletes often perform unexpectedly worse in front of supportive audiences than they do in front of neutral ones and that the higher audience expectations get, the worse their performers do. So stay dispassionate, Marlins fans. The team will be better off.

Larry Bowa has been vocal in his opposition to the new rule requiring base coaches to wear helmets. During a recent chat on Dodgers.com, he said helmets aren’t necessary and “if you position your body in the right way and take the blow in the back, you can recover from that.”

Joe Posnanski, who will return to Kansas City from China this weekend, struggles with whether or not he should head straight from the airport to the Bruce Springsteen concert:

Anyway, I saw an interview (Springsteen) did with the New York Post where he explained why will not retire and stop touring. He said it was because he had a big ego and that his son called him an ”attention whore.“ But here was my favorite quote:

“When it comes down to it, I like the way it makes me feel. And the way that I can make you feel when I do it … It thrills me, it excites me, it gives me meaning, it gives me purpose.”

See, that’s how Springsteen goes on living. He stays on tour. He performs. He likes the way he makes us feel.

I can’t miss Springsteen in Kansas City, can I?

I’ve seen the boss in concert twice. During this most recent tour, I’ve waited and waited for him to announce that he was coming to Phoenix, but the closest he got was L.A. He’s seemingly played every other city in America, including Hershey, Penn., Hartford, Conn., and Charlottesville, Va. What’s the deal, Bruce? No love for the Grand Canyon State?

Finally, there’s chaos in San Diego! Chaos! Shoot to kill!

(Via Big League Stew)

The San Deigo Padres currently have the worst record in all of baseball, at 38-62. And yet as of this writing they haven’t made any significant moves toward rebuilding the team, and are still acting as if they are trying to contend.

It’s time to get a move on that rebuilding, as the Padres are not going to be contending any time soon if they stand pat.

What the Padres need to do is build a team that can play well in their ballpark. This means building teams the way the Dodgers used to do back when Dodger Stadium was the game’s greatest pitcher’s park.

The Padres should focus on defense. They especially need to find outfielders who can cover the big gaps in the outfield at Petco, and especially in center field. Losing Mike Cameron after last season was a huge blow to the pitching staff.

On offense the Padres should focus on acquiring or developing hitters with skills that won’t be as affected by the big outfield. Hitters who draw a lot of walks, hit line drives, and hopefully have some speed. The Padres should not pay an extra premium to get hitters who hit a lot of home runs in other parks, because a lot of that value will be lost at Petco.

Similarly, when it comes to pitching the Padres should look for pitchers with who don’t walk a lot of guys. There is an opportunity here, in that the Padres can look for flyball pitchers who put up lousy numbers in other parks and can be had for cheap, but who will have a chance to succeed in cavernous Petco Park.

To acquire more of these types of players, the Padres should be prepared to trade most of their big-name veterans, as this year’s team is going nowhere but down any time soon.

In particular, the Padres should look to trade Kevin Kouzmanoff, Khalil Greene, Trevor Hoffman, Randy Wolf, and Tadahito Iguchi. These are all fairly big-name guys who other teams will want, but who are not useful to the Padres. Kouzmanoff and Greene have terrible on-base percentages, and thus have no business playing in a pitcher’s park like Petco, and Kouzmanoff is forcing up-and-coming prospect Chase Headley to left field, where his bat is not as valuable. Meanwhile, Hoffman, Wolf, and Iguchi are big-namers who are set to be free agents, so there is no need to keep them on a last-place team.

Update: The Padres have reportedly traded Randy Wolf to the Astros (!)

- What They Need Index -

It’s intervention time, people.

Astros GM Ed Wade is reportedly in talks to trade for Padres starting pitcher Randy Wolf . This is the act of a desperate man. He needs our help.

The problem is…well, there are lots of problems. But first and foremost, Wolf isn’t that good. He’s been added and dropped by every fantasy manager in America this season, because he strikes guys out (108 K’s) but he also get’s knocked around (4.74 ERA).

The Astros are currently in fifth place, 12 games out of first. They’ve given up 55 more runs than they’ve scored this season.

And yet Wade wants to trade for a starting pitcher – and a mediocre starting pitcher at that. Because, in his mind, the Astros are still right in the thick of it.

I’m not sure if this is a lingering effect from getting body slammed by Shawn Chacon, or what, but Wade needs some tough love. The Astros are not going to win the NL Central. The Cubs (who have scored 109 runs more than they’ve given up) are way too hot and way too stacked. Ditto the Brewers and the Cardinals (who both have a run differencial of +30). Even the Reds have a better shot at walking away with the division. Yet you don’t see the Reds trading away prospects for middle of the road starting pitchers.

And let’s not forget that Chicago recently traded for Rich Harden, who is about as dominant as they come (when healthy). The Brewers just added CC Sabathia (who you might remember from last season’s Cy Young Award ceremony). But that’s no big deal, because the Astros are about to add Randy Wolf!

I know Wade has never been the world’s savviest front office guy. But this is crazy even by his standards. Is it possible Wade was given a "win now or else" directive at the beginning of this season? That would explain a lot.

But directive or no directive, Wade needs to know that this season is lost and that the Astros simply don’t have the talent to be competitive anytime soon. Houston needs to rebuild and they need to start now, by trading guys like … well, everybody not named Hunter Pence. Jose Valverde should be the first to go, followed shortly thereafter by Miggy Tejada.

Why can’t you see what is so obvious that even the Reds can see it, Ed? Why can’t you accept that this Astros team simply isn’t very good? What is it going to take for you to throw in the towel?

Ed, we’re your friends and we care about you. And we’re worried.

Joe Sheehan at Baseball Prospectus Unfiltered thinks people (or at least, Peter Schmuck) aren’t publishing The Truth about Barry Bonds. Some of his points are duly noted—Bonds is not the slow, broken player Schmuck casts him as. But with other points, you get the feeling that Schmuck just got deeply under Sheehan’s skin and then couldn’t get out again—such as when Schmuck claims that Bonds would create “a chronic public relations problem” and Sheehan responds, “Barry Bonds doesn’t create a public relations problem…Barry Bonds has a media relations problem.” That’s pretty weak hair-splitting. And Sheehan’s dismissal of Barry Bonds legal problems looks a bit different now that the indictment as been refiled. Nonetheless, if you’re looking for a spirited defense of Barry Bonds (hard to come by these days), it’s worth a read.

Respect Jeter’s Gangster weighs in on the Jobagate fist-pump controversy with some situations in which it may or may not be appropriate for you to pump your fist.

The Padres’ struggles have inspired a debate over at Gaslamp Ball about whether professional ballplayers even need coaches. I say they do. What do you say?

Ever wondered what happened to the old Tiger Stadium? Joe Lapointe has an article in The New York Times and Fabrizio Constantini an eye-opening slide show. (Did you know that they auctioned off one of the dugout urinals last year? I somehow missed that story. And somehow, my life was complete without that particular piece of information.) It’s weird to think that the Tigers have been in Comerica for almost ten years, and that Tiger Stadium has been mouldering scarcely a mile away the entire time. My one beef with the slide show—I like artsy detail shots as much as any amateur shutterbug, but I would have liked a picture of the entire field included, to serve as an establishing shot. And some “before” shots would have been nice to go along with the “afters.”

Bleeding Blue and Teal weighs in on Griffey-to-Seattle trade talk and how such a move might actually make sense.

As draft day approaches, Minor League Ball looks at some high school hitters of interest. If you root for a craptastic team with a high pick, you can start drooling over them now. If you root for a great team with a lot of money, you can start hoping they develop “signability issues.”

Yanksfan Soxfan brings us a blind item from the NY Daily News about a “formerly awesome” pitcher whose shoulder woes are actually due to “years of smoking pot” and “one drug-addled incident in which he had to carry a passed-out date up three flights of stairs.” Guesses in the comments range from the preposterous (Schilling, Pedro) to the “hmmmm…maybe” (Gagne, Zito, Pavano). Got a better guess? Let ‘em know!

If you’ve got cabin fever because it’s a gorgeous May Day and you came into work today like a good doobie instead of calling in sick and going hiking like you really, really wanted to, maybe you should take a look at Slate’s series on baseball in the Dominican Republic (with, of course, an accompanying slide show).

Dan Graziano of the Star Ledger prints some email correspondence with Carlos Delgado’s agent. Neither man comes off looking very good (hint: someone calls someone a retard). Yes, these men are professionals! Do not try this at home!

Razzball takes a look back at Pete Rose’s 1983 season, a year “Pete evaded success like it was the taxman.”

Joe Posnanski brings you Brian Bannister’s crazy day-night splits.

And I said Over The Monster’s picture of Mike Lowell (above) looked like “George Clooney-meets-Humphrey Bogart-meets-UFH.” Paul countered, “He just looks like he’s giving Tek the ol’ stink eye.” What do you think, UmpBumpers?

What else should I be reading? Help me procrastinate better!

You gotta feel for the guy.

Today, it was announced that the San Diego Padres released center fielder Jim Edmonds. The team had stumbled out of the gate in 2008 to a thus-far-disappointing 12-23 record and felt that they needed to make a change.

Prior to the season, we had speculated that Edmonds would be a “boom-or-bust” addition to the Pads, and clearly, the organization already labeled him the latter. Edmonds was batting an abysmal .178/.265/.233 line prior to today. Admittedly, I am yet to see a San Diego game this year, but the article (linked above) mentions how it wasn’t just poor offense that did him in:

While Edmonds once made spectacular catches while with the Cardinals and Angels, he clearly lost a step or two and simply couldn’t catch up to fly balls.

Again, not having seen Edmonds play, it’s difficult for me to comment much on this, except to say that I’m sure his decline on defense is made far more visible by the very spacious outfield at Petco Park.

For those of you now wondering if your team should sign Jim, there are things to note:

PRO: Edmonds has a .227 BABiP this year, which is well below his career norm (more in the .300 area). So there’s room for improvement.

CON: His BABiP has been decreasing annually since 2004, so it might not be much of a fluke.

PRO: His line-drive rate is as good, if not better than, his prime, so when he makes contact, it’s been solid a good portion of the time.

CON: He’s also making contact on fewer occasions. His strikeout rate is at 23.3%, which is higher than his career norm. And he always was very strike-out prone to begin with. Combine this with a BABiP trending down, and it’s a big warning sign.

PRO: But he’s back to seeing 4.2 pitchers per plate appearance! The old, more patient Jim is back!

CON: Despite this, he’s still not walking as often as he used to. Besides, when you’re batting .178, it doesn’t matter much anyway. You’re still an offensive liability.

PRO: But the glove! THE GLOVE! In a smaller outfield, he can still be a good defensive player, right?

CON: Probably not. At least not in center field. Even last year, playing in Busch Stadium which has much less space in center towards the corners, it was becoming clear that those Gold Gloves were a thing of the past.

So is this it for Jim? Knowing what I mentioned above, would you still take a chance on him?

The Blue Jays debuted their throwback uniforms last night, as they plan to do for every Friday home game this season. Behold:

They look a bit silly, but isn’t that just part of the fun? The Royals have also brought their powder blues back (though only from the waist up). Last year, the Padres busted out their old all-yellow duds. What other teams could bring back some kickass vintage duds? Let’s look at the contenders:

Read the rest of this entry »

With nary a weekend between us and Super Tuesday, you’d think the pro-war crowd would be subdued, since, ya know, the war is kind of unpopular these days and the front runners have all but ensured a pullout.

What’s interesting, though, is how people find ways to support the troops without explicity being in favor of the war. Those are two different things. Hell, my book order from Amazon came with a plastic, mailable pouch where they ask people to donate used cell phones for the troops to call home. Had I a spare cell phone, you bet I would’ve sent it. Doesn’t mean that I was too happy about the war in the first place.

And now, White Sox hurler Mark Buehrle, has convinced management to have the team wear camouflage unis this 4th of July to show support for the men in uniform. The gimmick is right up the Sox alley:

The Sox are famous for all their uniform changes throughout the years and I think they pioneered the St. Patrick’s day jerseys that are popping up around the league.

But:

Mind you, this would have been 100 times cooler if the San Diego Padres hadn’t been wearing military themed uniforms for a while now.

Right; so what do Padres‘ fans have to say about all this?

There is only one Team of the Military and every body knows it’s the the Padres. The rest of these teams are unpatriotic communists. You know it’s true.

Apparently it was Mark Buehrle who magically came up with the idea while watching any number of Padres games over the last decade. Not only did he insist that the White Sox wear the camo on the 4th of July, but he had it put into his contract. Buehrle is a fraud and a war profiteer!

The White Sox are a disgrace. I’m calling for Congress to get involved. I want Mark Buehrle under oath! Let’s have him tell Uncle Sam where he came up with this idea, so that we can put him behind bars where all copy cats belong!

You know, that’s interesting. I’ve actually been to San Diego to watch these very Sox play against those very same Padres; when we left the stadium after a 2-1 Padre victory, some badass douche bag stepped to us, taunting the victory: “This is Padres country, son.” How appropriate from a fan of the team represented by priests.

[H/T White Sox Cards]

This is one of a series of posts in which we grade each team’s wily hot stove maneuvers and tragic offseason blunders.

With a Park Factor of .755, Petco Park was by far and away the most pitching-friendly stadium in all of MLB in 2007. A hitter was 25% less likely to earn a round-tripper in San Diego than the average ballpark. So it comes as no surprise that the San Diego Padres pitching staff put up numbers that were the cream of the crop in many important categories, such as ERA (1st), Batting Average Against (3rd), OBP Against (1st), SLG Against (1st), BB/9 (3rd) and HR/9 (1st). It should also come as no surprise that the Pads’ offensive numbers were less than stellar, and going into the offseason, this was the most obvious area in which they needed to improve. So let’s take a look and see how they did.

Losing two of your better hitters is usually not the way offenses improve, but that’s what the Padres need to do after losing both Mike Cameron and Milton Bradley to free agency, although the latter didn’t play much anyway due to an injury that received very little notice if I recall correctly. But these were still bats that needed to be replaced, and the Padres picked up centerfielder Jim Edmonds in place of Cameron and will ask Scott Hairston to play left in most games. The only other bat that the team managed to get was Tadahito Iguchi, who should be an offensive upgrade over Geoff Blum and Marcus Giles.

But it’s the Edmonds acquisition that’s most intriguing in a “boom or bust” kind of way. Here we have a centerfielder who is in the twilight of what some will argue is a Hall of Fame career. His numbers have been declining since 2005 and 2007 was rather unkind to Jim as injuries (shoulder, groin, and pinched nerve) built up. While he was able to play in 117 games, those weren’t exactly very successful appearances. He had a career low in OBP (.325) and had the worst slugging percentage (.403) since 1994. How much of this rapid decline was due to age alone? How badly did the injuries affect him? If Edmonds’ struggles in 2007 was more a result of the latter than the former, he still should be capable of replacing, or even surpassing, what offensive value Mike Cameron possessed. But if it really was just old age, Petco Park sure is not going to help the matter. It should also be noted that Edmonds’ pitch selection wasn’t what it used to be either, as he saw only 3.89 pitches per plate appearance - his lowest since 1997 - which resulted in the low walk total. But regardless of health, what Edmonds is not going to be able to replace is Cameron’s glove. While some may still think of Edmonds as the elite centerfielder, he’s no longer that guy. And the flyball pitchers of the Padres might be seeing a few more balls drop in in that huge San Diego centerfield this coming year.

While this doesn’t qualify as an offseason transaction, it should also be interesting to see if the aforementioned Scott Hairston is for real. The 27-year old slugged a ridiculous .644 since he was acquired from Arizona in July. Although no one in their right minds should expect him to repeat that level of success (and the stats do show it was probably a fluke), it still merits attention.

On the pitching side, the Padres didn’t lose much at all (unless you are the president of the Brett Tomko Fan Club. In which case, the Padres lost everything). But they did gain two starting pitchers on one-year deals that may pay some serious dividends.

Randy Wolf had a decent start to his 2007 campaign, but that’s about the only good thing that can be said about his season, as his ERA skyrocketed in June and was shut down for the year in July following shoulder surgery. Although we can’t ignore the fact that the Dodgers turned down his $9 million 2008 option - which may be indicative of what little faith they had in his repaired arm - the Padres did wisely sign him for only one year at $4.75 million guaranteed. I’ve written about the Mark Prior deal before, and nothing has happened since to make me change my mind that this was a good investment on the Padres’ part. If Prior can’t go, the Padres lose only a million. If he can perform, he’s owed $3 million max.

It does seem like the team ought to be concerned about the health of their rotation, however, as in addition to the brittle Wolf and Prior, Greg Maddux has to break down sometime, right? They have a decent filler in Justin Germano, however, but they may find themselves asking “Who else we got?” one more than one occasion.

The other thing that may come back to bite the Padres in the keester is that shallow bench, having lost both Blum and Rob Mackowiak to free agency. Unless they make a couple more acquisitions over the next few weeks, it appears that Kevin Towers will simply let some of the youngsters (super prospect Chase Headley, Drew Macias, Callix Crabbe) earn their way towards Opening Day.

Additions: Jim Edmonds, Tadahito Iguchi, Randy Wolf, Mark Prior, Carlos Guevara

Losses: Mike Cameron, Milton Bradley, Brett Tomko, Rob Mackowiak, Geoff Blum, Jack Cassel, Doug Brocail, Marcus Giles

Lineup:

C - Josh Bard

1B - Adrian Gonzalez

2B - Tadahito Iguchi

SS - Khalil Greene

3B - Kevin Kouzmanoff

LF - Scott Hairston

CF - Jim Edmonds

RF - Brian Giles

Rotation:

SP: Jake Peavy

SP: Chris Young

SP: Greg Maddux

SP: Randy Wolf

SP: Mark Prior

Bullpen:

CL: Trevor Hoffman

Set-Up: Heath Bell/Cla Meridith

Offseason Grade: C+

Maybe I’m too pessimistic about Edmonds’ chances to rebound, but the growth of Adrian Gonzalez is going to take on a new level of importance. The Padres needed some guys capable of posting solid batting averages and OBPs and didn’t really get it. Pitching wise, if health were not a factor, what they did in this arena alone would have earned them at least a B.

- Hot Offseason Action Index -