The Padres Failed And Scared Away Their Manager, What Now?

The Padres Failed And Scared Away Their Manager, What Now?

Maddie, congrats with that big of a contract. You’ve got 10 October off now. 10 straight October’s off. Come on. You could have had it all the way to LA. My contract. What? We’ll win a World Series before you guys. Say that again. We’ll contact. What? We’ll win the World Series for you guys. Strike three. Dodgers have won it all in 2020. [Music] Your Dodgers have won the World Series. Why would you say that? Like you put me in such an uncomfortable situation. Like you know I’m not happy. You know I’m trying to see if it’ll work out here and I know that it’s to the back over the face to beat the champ. You go to knock him out. The Dodgers stand tall and win backto back titles. [Music] [Laughter] Man, oh man. Oh man. Manny Mat, thank you for being here. Whether you’re part of the 212 plus thousand subscribers or not. And if you have joined those 49% elite humans, consider hitting that button if you like the videos as my god, we haven’t seen something age this poorly since Gotham elected Harvey Dent as their mayor. I mean, jeez. I know it’s the easiest thing in hindsight now, but I feel like even in the moment, you just can’t be saying that. It would have set up an epic mic drop moment if it worked out, if his prophecy came true, but turns out Manny has no sense of the force. He can’t predict the future. And I mean, even though the Dodgers did win before them in 2020, like the first time, I would argue if the Padres’s won in 2024, if they beat the Dodgers and won at all, which I believe they would have if they won that round, that would have mostly fulfilled that prophecy, I think. But that of course did not happen. And that prophecy has gone from aging poorly to aging like milk to aging like Kelly McGillis. Just saw a recent picture of her. No wonder she wasn’t brought back for Top Gun Maverick. Holy Point is, the Padres’s are in a really weird spot right now. This past season was weird. They started out hot. Went 5-0 in March, 14- 11 in April. So basically 19 and 11 for the first month. That’s great. And they were on the Dodgers dick for a while until they weren’t. The Dodgers really pulled away. They were eight games back of the Dodgers on July 5th just for the Padres’s to come right back up on their dicks. And 5 weeks later, the division was tied up. And there were a couple days after that where they were full on one game ahead of the Dodgers. People forget about that how the Dodgers at one point blew an eight-game lead, division lead, especially in that quick of a span of time. But it’s also very obvious as to why it’s forgotten about. But yeah, I mean the Padres’s were good. Not that this was a shock to anyone. They were supposed to be. The playoffs actually kind of were the bare minimum expectation. And in the end, I think it’s completely fair to judge 2025 as a failure for them, especially with where they’re at as an organization. The Padres’s treat their prospects like China treats girl babies. And that’s not entirely a bad way of operating. I mean, a full-on prospect hug is probably just as bad, but AJ Prowler really looks at any halfway decent big leaguer he can get in a trade, goes right to his top prospects, and says, “Get out. Get out. Go. I mean, he literally traded away 11 prospects just this last trade deadline alone. 14 players total he sent away. Bro just does not care. He has zero issue. I’m going to say the N-word, nuking the whole farm. Pller treats his job like it’s a video game. He treats his job like he’s playing a video game on crack, which I honestly respect. But what that does also is of course hurt your future, which doesn’t seem like something the Padres’s have valued much in recent years. Since 2023, the vibe has pretty much been we want to win right now, no matter how ugly it’s going to look in 3 to 5 years. And that ugly looks like, well, it could be here. So, first off, there are a good amount of players becoming free agents. Players who I don’t think will be coming back, mainly because I don’t think the Padres’s will want to pay them. They want to cut payroll for next year, which is something they’ve already been doing for a few years. At least that that’s kind of been the plan. They went from the third most expensive team in 2023 to the 14th most expensive team. They did also then go back up in payroll for 2025. They were eighth. But they’re not interested in getting back to the top of the top. They’re no longer in their phase of acting like the most desperate dude you’ll ever see in a strip club. Just throwing all their money at anyone and everyone. I mean, this team might have been operating on meth for a couple years. I’m not kidding. Hey, Aaron Judge. Here’s $400 million. No. Uh, who’s Trey Turner? You want 342 million? No. Uh, who’s next? Xander Bogard, solid chance. They didn’t even know who he was. They just saw he was one of the top free agents left and proceeded to almost double the Red Sox offer just so they can sign somebody. Some even say if Peter Sidler, the owner who passed away 2 years ago, they say if he never died, the team would have signed Juan Sto. And I honestly kind of believe it, that they would have never traded him and gave him, I guess, what the Mets did, which would have been wild to see. But yeah, the Padres’s aren’t doing any of that anymore. The best free agent who probably isn’t coming back, who hurts the least, has to be Robert Suarez. The man who’s been one of their best relievers for the last four years and their closer for the last two years, which this has been his whole career, by the way. Bro peaked late. He was 31 in his rookie season. But hey, it’s working out. He’s put up a nice career for himself so far, and he’s going to get good money somewhere. Probably not the Padres’s. And that would hurt the Padres’s more if they didn’t already have, you know, arguably the best bullpen in baseball. This is why Prell trading four prospects, including their best prospect for Mason Miller, even though a wild trade, wasn’t actually that stupid. It’s one of those trades that really looks even right away. And of course, it has the chance to age horribly for one of the sides, for the A’s or for the Padres’s, but we’re going to have to wait a while to find out because right now, it actually it makes a lot of sense for the Padres’s. Like unless Miller is exposed as being a part of some illegal gambling ring or some adding him seems perfect because he has four whole years left under contract before he becomes a free agent. So, he’s basically Suarez as his replacement, a younger and better version of him. I don’t know if they’re going to want to do this, but what the Padres’s could also try with Miller is making him a starter. Again, you have four years, so maybe try it out. If it doesn’t work, okay, great. You just have him go back to the bullpen where he might be the best in baseball. And it works out for him too because it’s not like free agency is right around the corner for him. So he doesn’t really have to worry about the money aspect of it. He could just try it out. If it doesn’t work, he’ll be fine. But it’s the trades like the one for Ryan O’Harn and Raone Lauraniano where you’re really taking a leap of faith because O’Harn was only a rental. Like you only have them for 2 months and Lauraniano still does have another year after this under contract. But is that worth six prospects? If you win at all, yes. But they didn’t. So that’s a trade that could really age poorly. I mean, the Juan Sodto trade has already aged kind of poorly. I guess you could say a little weirdly. The Sodto thing is kind of layered because you should also factor in who they got when they traded Sodto to the Yankees, which was Michael King plus several other pretty decent players who have helped the last two years. But they also traded away James Wood, CJ Abrams, and McKenzie Gore for one and a half years of Sodo. They gave up even more than that for Sodto. But just those three names alone are enough to cringe at the fact that the Padres’s gave them up for just again one and a half years of Juan Sto which no championship was won before they traded him. So the O’Harn and Lauriano trade with the Orioles seems similar and it’s because of trades like these as to why the Padres’s have gone from one of the best farm systems in baseball to one of the worst. Now you don’t get a trophy for farm systems. I get that. But it’s definitely not good to have such a depleted one while several of your big league guys are on the way out. Dylan CE being one of those guys, Michael King, who I just mentioned, they got him from the Yankees. They’re both probably gone, which have been two important starting pitchers for you. Make that three starting pitchers with you Darvish. Not because he’s a free agent, but because his arm fell off, so he’s done for 2026. And Darvish is an example of not a trade that’s aged poorly, but a contract that’s aged poorly. Cuz a few years ago, the team signed him to a six-year extension, which maybe would have been ideal a few years before that, but when he’s 36, I don’t know if committing to him for six more years is the smartest thing. Louisa Arise, that’s another free agent. That’s a whole other conversation to have on how valuable of a loss that really is if he leaves, which seems will probably happen. And the Padres’s even scared off their damn manager, which sounds like a joke, but that’s genuinely what happened. So Mike Schult, the man who’s been the Padres’s manager for two years now, a guy who still had two years left on his contract, just straight up retired. Like this wasn’t expected at all. The Padres’s were not thinking they were going to have to search for a new manager this off season. It was solely Schultz’s decision. It seems like he was just done with it all. It was too much. In his own words, he was sick a lot, run down, he wasn’t sleeping. He also had chest pains, hair loss, and death threats from random people over gambling To sum it up best and more of his own words, I’m just tired and want to go home, dude. I’m at super peace with it. And I believe him. Leaving with two years left on the contract doesn’t mean he gets that money remaining. Pretty sure he’s fully leaving that on the table. And it didn’t seem like he cared much about trying to take some of it. So, there’s a lot leaving the Padres’s for 2026. The Dodgers are, of course, they’re the Dodgers. They’re only getting stronger. The Giants, I think the Giants, at least right now, are probably the next best team in the West. So, what now? What does this team do? Well, first off, they needed a manager. And I said needed because they got their guy Craig Stamon, a relief pitcher for the He pitched for the Padres’s and retired after 2022. He had a long and pretty good career. And I guess this is relatively shocking. I don’t know. I saw some clip of him talking about how he values analytics and advanced numbers. Like this is from a few years ago, so I guess that’s good. He obviously has the player feel to it, too, cuz you know, he played. So, this seems like a very under the radar, random, but could be managerial hire. Okay, cool. But what about the players? What What’s going on with this roster? Well, for one, the man you saw in the beginning of this video, he’s still a good player, don’t get it wrong. Very good. But he’s not elite. He wasn’t in 2025, and he hasn’t really been elite for like three straight seasons now. The Phillies president of baseball operations or whatever you want to call him, he recently questioned if Bryce Harper could get back to his elite form. He feels Harper hasn’t quite been what he once was. I feel like that’s a more legit question to ask about Manny Machado. Again, he’s been good the last three years, but he hasn’t necessarily been worth what his contract is paying him. Although, he actually kind of has been in a weird way. So, Machado is on an 11-year, $350 million contract. Lot of money. But the way they structured it was that he would get less money the first 3 years of it, but it would go up after that. So, he’s only been getting 17 million the last three. I say only. Yeah, try explaining to someone had a food stamp. The idea of $17 million not being a lot, but compare that to the 25 million he’s set to make next year and then the 39 million he’s set to make starting in 2027 through the rest of the deal. Almost $40 million for seven straight years until Machado is 40. That doesn’t seem like it’s going to age well. So, it’s ironic because the numbers he’s put up the last 3 years actually probably are worth about 17 million. Like if you look at it, I don’t know how like just relative to the league or whatever. Problem is, you know, unless he did that on purpose, like say he has a great year next year when he gets 25 million, like 8 million better in value, and then like an MVP type season every year he gets paid 39 million for seven straight years. Basically, unless he’s about to up his numbers to match what he’s getting paid, this contract seems like it could age worse than the take that Chris Brown and Rihanna were a great couple. Now, don’t write it off as a bust or something yet. Like maybe Manny still has some MVP level years ahead of him, but that is so much money going toward a guy that really does seem to be on the downhill. Xander Bogart, same thing. But it’s even worse with him because he’s been mostly objectively bad since signing that contract. A contract that ends when he’s 41. I love Xander Bogart so much and I hope he goes off next year. Freaking MVP. I love him. But you just can’t deny that it was a desperate deal the team offered him to begin with. Like I don’t even think they remember doing it. They were so cracked out that off season. The one big contract I don’t think is bad at all is Tatis. He’s still pretty young and I think is entering his prime right now. Like that one isn’t an issue. He’s still a very good player and I think like his best years are ahead of him. But the future of this team overall just looks bleak. It’s just becoming more and more difficult to see even one part of that Machado prophecy coming true. Like obviously they didn’t end up winning one before the Dodgers. It’s been the opposite times three. But it’s hard to see even the Padres’s winning one at all period. That like it’s hard to see that happening. But it’s also not shocking. I mean, we kind of saw this vibe coming when they traded everyone and gave out insane contracts to win right now. It’s like anyone who full sends it on the weekends gets drunk out of their mind and goes out with their friends. It may be fun in the moment, but you know, Monday in your job that you got to go to is around the corner. You’re just doing everything you can to have fun right now, ignoring the inevitable. It’ll be interesting to see what the Padres’s do this off season, but I also don’t think it’ll be much. like they’ll probably go for just some under the radar type moves and nothing big and that’s probably what they should be doing anyway with where they’re at. So yeah, love you.

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