The 2026 Padres have only been successful as a way of giving a third-string slugger a return to the glory days he never had. Let me explain,
In 2019, Ty France was all set to take hold of third base in San Diego. It was looking like he was next in the depth chart, he was a highly-prized corner prospect, the stars were aligning. And then the Padres signed Manny Machado, locking up third for the next 4 years, and ultimately the next 14 years. Machado was 26, fully in his prime, and ready to carry the team on his shoulders. Which meant France...was now going to be the backup. Eric Hosmer was covering first, eventually Fernando Tatis would take short; Ty France was completely blocked from the playing time he'd just thought was about to be his. The resulting rookie season was a .234, -0.2 WAR campaign. Despite 20 games of .300 hitting in 2020, the Padres still had no room for France, and dealt him to Seattle for Austin Nola [who would not, ultimately, solve the Padres' catching woes] and two relievers. This deal also brought Andres Muños to Seattle, but that's less important.
What's important is that Ty France, in Seattle, becomes a corner infield mainstay, having an all-star season in 2022, and being a decent part of the M's 2022 playoff squad. Then he stops hitting consistently, gets traded to Cincinnati, and splits the following season between the Twins and the AL Champion Jays. And as a result of his strong postseason as a bench bat, he rejoins the San Diego Padres, 7 years later, as a bench 1B option. And now he's got an .800 OPS, 10 homers and 30 RBIs in a basically everyday role for the Padres.
Right now, Ty France is the best hitter on this team, something that may have happened if the Padres never traded him. Although what's worrying is that this team has Tatis, Machado, Jake Cronenworth, Jackson Merrill, Xander Bogaerts and Miguel Andujar...and TY FRANCE has the highest OPS. That's a twilight zone twist, man. Okay, you get to be a star for the team that drafted you...but at the risk of literally everyone else in the lineup. The bizarre bit is that France was away from this team long enough to miss the rest of Machado's prime. Machado's been here 7 years, arguably cemented a Hall of Fame case, become a Padres legend, hit a ton of home runs and dialed back down...and NOW France is back being the hero. Good for him honestly, but it just feels a bit poorly timed.
Obviously there's still things that work about this team. They can steal bases, the rotation isn't too bad, the bullpen's still good. The depth is just gone, and when the team isn't hitting that becomes all the more clear. It's really France and Bogaerts coming off the best, and you can make the case that Bogie isn't even hitting all that well. When Samad Taylor's batting near the front of your lineup, you've gotta question what went wrong.
Clearly any team with Fernando Tatis and Mason Miller can't be completely counted out, but this is dire. They could use one of their usual post-ASG-break swoons, because otherwise they're really gonna need to think about the future after this season's over.
Coming Tomorrow- A guy I still can't believe stayed around longer than the real reason we traded Michael King to San Diego.
No comments:
Post a Comment