Good morning,
Nick Pivetta, who to date is A.J. Preller’s finest 2025 acquisition, felt an extra charge last night in the wake of the Padres’ bountiful trade deadline.
“I’ve been thinking about it since (Thursday) night,” Pivetta said. “I think it was really important for us to win today, you know, set the tone for what we’ve done. Obviously, hats off to A.J. He’s a wizard with that stuff. It seems like we got a good group of guys that we added. It’s really exciting. But I definitely really wanted to just set the tone and get a win today.”
Pivetta did his part, allowing one baserunner in seven innings in the Padres’ 4-1 victory over the Cardinals.
It was just one victory. But it was also symbolically illustrative of the imperative facing the Padres after Preller added six players on Thursday.
“Just keep building momentum,” Fernando Tatis Jr. said .
Put another way, the Padres know they need to win lots of games.
I have been all over Petco Park and never seen a case holding any trophies for the trade deadlines and offseasons the Padres have “won.”
The moves they made Thursday must be followed by winning.
They are 3½ games up on the Reds in the race for the National League’s final wild-card spot and three games behind the Dodgers in the National League West.
Finishing ahead of the Dodgers is their stated goal for the regular season and seems to have grown into a real possibility.
“I think even without the trades, it was a real thing,” Jackson Merrill said. I think we have the same mindset now. I don’t think we put any more pressure on ourselves, I think we just go play and have fun.”
What happened last night was a nice way to start off post-deadline, as the victory came with the closer they acquired Thursday and their incumbent closer working a scoreless inning apiece at the end.
You can read in my game story (here) how the victory went down and about what other Padres said about the latest Prellerpalooza.
No Haders
There was no reason for it to be any different last night or on any night Robert Suarez is rested.
“We do have a guy in Robert who is leading this league in saves, a two-time All-Star,” Mike Shildt said. “And this guy has been fantastic for us for almost going on two years now.”
So it was that Suarez pitched his customary ninth inning last night, earning his major league-leading 31st save.
Mason Miller, the closer acquired from the Athletics on Thursday, worked the eighth.
“It’s going to be fluid,” Shildt said of how he will distribute the workload in a bullpen that was arguably the best in the major leagues even before Miller’s arrival. “We’re going to pass the ball around every day, with the exception of coming off an off day. We’ve got eight guys we like a lot. Five guys have brought it home with tighter (leads). We’re going to go with good matchups, good lanes. We’re going to go with freshness.
“As far as the closer role, there’ll be opportunities for Mason to take that role down at some point. … It’s a good, good situation, quite clearly. But it’ll always be fluid. And the great news (is) all those guys in there just want to win. They’re going to be ready to take the ball when their number is called. So that means a lot too. Nobody down there, including Suarez, is saying, ‘I’ve got to do this. I’ve got to do that. And I’m grateful for that.”
Shildt had Jeremiah Estrada warming up in the seventh inning in case Pivetta faltered. When that didn’t happen, Miller got ready.
It would previously have been a rested Jason Adam, whose 26 holds are second most in MLB, working the eighth inning.
The Padres added Miller to a bullpen that already led the majors in ERA (2.93), batting average allowed (.216) and WHIP (1.16) in order to equip their staff for the postseason, when teams lean on their bullpens and fewer runs are generally scored.
The Dodgers, for instance, got six innings out of a starter just twice in their 16 postseason games en route to winning the World Series in 2024. That is a somewhat extreme example, but here is a look at the postseason pitching breakdown the past three seasons.
Beyond bolstering the ‘pen for the playoffs, a more immediate and arguably just as important benefit to having another high-leverage arm is that it will presumably provide more opportunity to rest for Adam, Suarez, Estrada and Adrian Morejón. Adam, Estrada and Morejón have all made 52 appearances, which is tied for fourth-most in the major leagues.
“There’s all kinds of benefits,” Adam said. “It can shorten games. It can also give guys rest when they need it. There’s a little more depth there to do that. It’s all around great stuff.”
Miller time
Mason Miller seemed relieved to get in last night’s game.
“Get the jitters out of there a little bit,” he said.
He arrived in San Diego around noon yesterday after a flight from Sacramento, met a bunch of new people and about 8½ hours later made his Padres debut.
“Long but fun day,” he said.
Miller’s first pitch last night was a 102.4 mph fastball, the fastest by a Padres player this season.
His second pitch was a 102.8 mph, tied with one that Andres Muñoz threw on Aug. 10, 2019, as the fastest by a Padres pitcher since at least 2015.
All seven of Miller’s fastballs were at least 101.5 mph.
The first two sliders he threw were hit for singles, bringing the potential tying run to the plate with no outs. He then struck out Jordan Walker on three consecutive fastballs — at 102, 101.9 and 102.6 mph — and got Yohel Pozo to ground a slider to Manny Machado, who started a double play.
“Big play behind me to get out of that inning,” said Miller, who had not pitched since Saturday.
Miller made his MLB debut with the Oakland A’s and had only once in his career pitched in front of a home crowd as big as last night’s gathering of 44,933 at Petco Park. This year, the Athletics are averaging 9,745 playing in a Triple-A ballpark in Sacramento.
“It was loud,” Miller said of his entrance last night. “Really exciting getting into that game, feeling the energy. I’ve got the natural energy just going in the game, being a player and feeling it. But having all those fans behind you is a special feeling.”
On the rise
Pivetta’s best season is only getting better.
The 32-year-old right-hander, who had never had an ERA below 4.04 in any of his previous eight MLB seasons, ranks sixth in the National League this season with a 2.73 ERA after allowing only Willson Contreras’ fourth-inning solo homer last night.
Pivetta’s 0.94 WHIP and .191 average allowed are third-best in the NL. His 128⅔ innings are tied for sixth most.
He faced 22 batters last night, the sixth time this season he has faced no more than three batters over the minimum. It was the sixth time he has completed seven innings and the fifth time he has done so while allowing one or zero runs.
And in his past seven starts, he is 4-1 with a 1.01 ERA.
Selective hitter
Luis Arraez has been like a new man.
As he has put together a 14-game hitting streak, tied for the longest in his career and during which he is batting .411, he has stopped swinging as much. Especially at pitches outside the zone.
Even after a night in which he felt compelled to swing more following an early strike call on a ball well outside the strike zone, Arraez’s swing rate is down almost 10 percentage points and his chase rate is down almost 6½ percentage points over the past 14 games.
“I try hard to get better,” he said last night. “If I get on base, we will win a lot of games.”
Arraez was batting .282 with a .316 on-base percentage before the streak started. As recently as June 16, he was batting .274 with a .307 OBP.
At the time, through his first 65 games, he was walking 4.5% of the time. He is walking just 5.2% of the time in 39 games since. But a guy who makes contact on an MLB-best 96.5% of his swings is going to end a lot of at-bats before he has a chance to walk.
“I try to walk, I try to get more on base for Manny and the people behind me,” Arraez said. “Sometimes it’s hard, and I put the ball in play.”
Fortunately for the Padres, more of those balls are dropping. His batting average on balls in play is .407 during his hitting streak and .339 over his past 32 games. It was a career-low .274 before that.
By going 23-for-56 during his streak, Arraez has his batting average up to .297, and his OBP has climbed to .333.
He has swung at 42% of all pitches he has seen over the past 14 games, down from 50% before that. He has chased at a 27.2% rate, down from 33.6% before that.
The three-time batting champion smiled as he affirmed there is a correlation between his hitting better and being more selective. That has not been the case the past two seasons. And there was a time when he was not all that interested in refining his plate discipline.
But even three-time batting champions can try to get better.
“We have tremendous coaches here,” he said. “They try to help me with that. I try to hit more pitches in the zone. I have more chance to get more hits or maybe more walks and get on base and score more runs. … It’s working for me.”
Bonus
There are a couple reasons the Padres were willing to add about $4 million to their payroll in 2025.
One of them is that they saved themselves money in 2026.
How much can’t yet be determined.
But four of the six players they acquired Thursday are under club control for at least one more season. Two have four seasons before becoming eligible for free agency. Another has three.
Without adding anyone, the Padres would go into spring training with five experienced starting pitchers, a dozen relievers, three starting outfielders, three infield spots covered, a catcher and a DH/first baseman under contract.
That is not to say they won’t have work to do. But that is a fuller roster than they had this past spring for roughly the same amount of money they had committed at the time.
The other reason the relatively paltry commitment of $4 million was made is that sometimes you spend money to make money.
A deep playoff run could net them four or five times that investment.
Also, the time is now
Another reason the Padres are all in for 2026 is that they know they do not have an abundance of time to maximize the current roster.
Maybe Leo De Vries would have helped them next season. Or the season after that.
But at some point in the not-too-distant future, it is likely that
Xander Bogaerts, who turns 33 in October, and Machado, who turned 33 last month, will experience a decline in production. It could be steep.
The thing about aging ballplayers is that they age differently but age always catches up with them.
It is possible Bogaerts and/or Machado could sustain an above-average level of production for another five years. But even that could render the final three years of their contracts as wasted money. (And not a little, as Machado will make $39 million a year from 2027-33 and Bogaerts makes $25 million each season through ‘33.)
And three lost years at the end — when they will both play their age 38 through 40 seasons — might be a best-case scenario.
Over the past 25 seasons, just 23 players 38 or older have had an OPS of at least .800 while logging at least 400 plate appearances.
That group includes Hall of Famers Craig Biggio, Chipper Jones, Edgar Martinez, David Ortiz, Frank Thomas and Jim Thome. It also includes Barry Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield, all of whom have been linked to PED use.
Here for it
Merrill monitored the machinations by the Padres front office Thursday with increasing glee and validation.
“That’s why I signed,” he said, referring to the nine-year, $135 million contract he agreed to in April. “That’s why I signed for what I did — before I could have gone crazy and made a bunch more. I wanted to be here. I saw it as a better opportunity to be here and prove to people that I wanted to play here and win. Now, they’re proving to us that they want us to win. It’s incredible.”
Unruffled Sheets
The right-handed-hitting Ramón Laureano started in left field last night against a left-handed starting pitcher, and he actually has better numbers against righties this season. Ryan O’Hearn was an All-Star while playing first base and DH this season.
Depending on how those two former Orioles hit, Gavin Sheets might be the player most affected by the trade deadline.
He started 93 of the Padres’ 109 games before Thursday, including 32 of the previous 41 in left field. His other starts were at DH and first base.
“Obviously, things will change a little bit, but the way I’m gonna go about my business will be the exact same,” Sheets said yesterday afternoon. “… Winning baseball is the most fun baseball. So whatever it is, whatever that given role is each day, it’s go out and help win a baseball game. It’s the best brand of baseball, and that’s the baseball we’re gonna play now.
“Everybody in here knows that everybody’s roles change a little bit, whether it’s bullpen arms or hitters. But the goal is exactly the same, if not even more pronounced now — it’s to win a World Series, and it’s fun baseball.”
As we have discussed a lot here, Sheets is in the midst of a renaissance year. He has tied a career high in home runs (15), has driven in more runs (54) and scored more runs (39) than he had in any of his previous four seasons. He also is hitting 99 points better against left-handers than he did over those previous four seasons.
“When I came in here, I had two goals,” he said. “I had a personal goal of being a better player and getting a fresh slate. And I think that has happened. I’ve got some career highs already, and we’re at Aug. 1. And the second goal was to win a World Series. So after yesterday, I think that both goals are well intact, and it’s exactly why I came here.”
Dreamy day
Tatis said Wednesday that he would not be checking in on the trade deadline developments.
“I’ll be sleeping,” he said. “I’ll let A.J. do this thing.”
Tatis followed through.
He didn’t check his phone until more than an hour after the 3 p.m. deadline passed.
“When I saw the news, I was really happy,” he said. “I’m so happy A.J. is my G.M. … It’s really, really big acquisitions, and it’s a really well-rounded team right now.”
Tidbits
- Last night’s game was the Padres’ third quickest of the season. All of their three quickest games (2:03, 2:07 and 2:08) have been started by Pivetta.
- The Padres have scored at least four runs in an inning in four of their past five games and six of their 14 games since the All-Star break. They scored that many runs in an inning four times in their final 42 games of the first half.
- Machado was 1-for-4 last night and is batting .500 (19-for-38) during a nine-game hitting streak.
- Elias Díaz drove in the Padres’ second run last night and has six RBIs in his past four games. His four-game RBI streak is tied for the second-longest active streak in the majors.
- Tatis was 0-for-3, but his walk in the fourth inning led to him scoring. He has walked in a career-high six straight games.
- Merrill was 2-for-4 and drove in the final two runs in the Padres four-run fourth inning. He has seven RBIs in the past five games.
- The Padres have scored at least four runs in their past five games. They are 43-14 when scoring at least four runs (compared to 18-35 when scoring three or fewer.) The Padres’ .754 winning percentage in games in which they score four or more runs is better than the .720 winning percentage league-wide. Problem is, the Padres have played the 10th fewest such games.
- Jeff Sanders wrote (here) about Dylan Cease and his pleasure at remaining with the Padres. Also mentioned in that story is Michael King’s pending rehab assignment, which will come for Triple-A El Paso on Sunday in Round Rock, Texas.
- Tyler Wade was designated for assignment Friday for the second time this season. That leaves Bryce Johnson, who also could not be optioned to the minor leagues, as the primary pinch-runner and potential defensive replacement in games Sheets starts in left field. Johnson is batting .333 (15-for-45). And with the additions they made, the Padres decision makers felt the versatility Wade provided, which was his greatest tangible asset, was no longer necessary. You can read in Sanders’ game preview (here) from yesterday about the other roster moves the Padres made.
All right, that’s it for me.
Talk to you tomorrow.
P.S. I feel like this is a good time to bring this up. We have an absolutely incredible subscription offer for you — $2 for two years of the Union-Tribune online. That’s right. It is true that is only half as long as Mason Miller is under team control, but it is also far less expensive than he will be. This newsletter is free for you, but all my company spends in order for us to produce the 600 or so articles we post on the Padres each year (including this newsletter) is far from free. I’d love it if you would consider subscribing (here). Thank you.
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