The Padres Have a MASSIVE OPPORTUNITY…

The Padres’s have a massive opportunity as these players are underrated free agent picks that could massively help this team. How much would they cost? How did they fit our team? Let’s talk about it. Hi, welcome back to another episode of Padres’s Digest with your host Andrew. Happy Thanksgiving. Happy Black Friday. Hope you bought me something nice. But we’re back from the holidays. We’re back in full I don’t know news circles, whatever. But today we’re talking about more underrated free agent picks. I’m using the same Jeff Passan article we used for the last one we did or the one I did with the hitters. So, I got three potential good pitchers. Names you probably recognize. They’re not going to be like super dirt cheap, but they’re not going to be like Dylan CE making 30 years uh 30 million a year expensive. Let’s put it that way. Cuz that is insane. 30 million for Dylan CE. I don’t have a problem with Dylan CE, but in no way, shape, or form am I ever gonna pay him 30 million a year? Oh my god. Anyways, let’s just start. Also, please subscribe if you would like. Super close to 3,000. Like super super close. Send it to your friends. Send the channel to your friends. Do whatever you got to. Let’s get to 3,000. Let’s do our first live stream. Let’s be happy happy people. Uh anyways, today three pitchers, like I said, let’s start with our first pitcher, Mel Kelly. You probably recognize him from the Diamondbacks, but he was on the Rangers last year. Well, for a little bit, right? So, why does he fit San Diego? He is a legit workhorse with elite command. He throws six pitches and commands all of them. Nothing flashy. Effective. Everything is effective. Key notes 327 erra from 2021 to 24. Reliable 170 to 180 inning pitch guy. Veteran stability for the rotation. A perfect number three who brings stabil stability behind Paveta and Musgrove amongst other pitchers. So how does he look? So 2025 he had a 352 erra and 32 games started which is pretty pretty pretty good. Not amazing not crazy but for a number three starter I would take that probably any day of the week right so pitching run value is pretty great fastball isn’t great I mean his fastball vo is at 92 so and he’s getting old right he’ll be 38 by the time the season starts I think his birthday is did it say on here? No, but I think I saw his birthday was like in February. But yeah, he’s he’s older obviously. Don’t get me wrong. He’s older. His expected ERA was much higher than what his regular ERA should have been. But again, we have Randy Vasquez on our team. So, let’s take expected ERA with a grain of salt. Uh, and of course, as always, we have the greatest pitching coach of all time, Ruben Ya all time. Can I say that? I don’t know. Whatever. But Ruben Ya on our team. So, fastball might not be great, but his breaking stuff, his offspe stuff, his run value on that is pretty great. He can get people to chase. He’s in a 91st percentile in chase rate. Walk doesn’t walk that many people. Everything else you might not think is great. It’s around average. And honestly, we don’t need anything that great. We just need someone who can eat innings, pitch well enough to help us win games. Offensively, we should be scoring more runs than we did last year. So, we don’t need any more shutouts to win games. Well, well, we shouldn’t. I hope not at least. But last year when we had like what was it like 20 shutouts? Uh, I’m hoping that as long as we can give up at least less than three runs, we can win a majority of games. And I think Mel Kelly is a solid option in doing so. A one-year deal. I’ll show you the um projected contracts from Chat GBT. I know Chat GBT is my best friend, but I’m Let me rephrase that. I meant to say I know Chad GBT isn’t always accurate, but he’s my best friend and he helps me make these videos. So, yeah. Uh, anyways, that’s Mel Kelly. Hi, Mel Kelly. Moving on to our next person, a name you also might be familiar with. Zack Latell. I thought I did Adrien Hower. So, hold on. What did I do to myself? Uh, okay. Yeah, I did do it backwards. That’s okay. Zack Lattell’s the last one. Next one. Adrien Hower. He is 31 and he’ll be 31 going into next season. Why does he fit San Diego? Extreme ground ball pitcher who limits homers. Perfect perco infield defense, which is very good. Not as good as it used to be. Obviously, Machado’s defense is going down, but I still think his defense is better than 70% of third baseman’s in the league. Bogart’s had a good defensive year. Craig Kronorf has always been pretty good defensively, whoever we put at first base, I’m hoping does a good enough job, right? But a 50% ground ball rate, which is great. I mean, think of Wani Peralta. His ERA was pretty good for last year, and he’s a ground ball pitcher. Just n I guess it’s 0.9 home runs per nine innings for his career, which is good. contact manager, durable backend type, cheap, effective number five who keeps the ball in the park. I would say more number four than number five, maybe even number three depending on our rotation. But there’s good in him, right? So Adrian Hower last year 3.31 erra, very very good, right? 5.84 in 2024 412 in 2023 is not great, but he did look better this year in 21 games started. So pitching run value is around average. Fast ball is pretty good. Everything else is a little below average, but he he does not let people hit the ball hard as we see. He’s a ground ball pitcher. He doesn’t walk that many people. Uh people do hit him hard, but again, his job is to get the ball on the ground, which he does effective job with. Fastball VO is around 95 is around average, which is crazy to think about nowadays that 95 is around average, but you know what? That’s fine. Uh, but just know his job is to let people hit the ball on the ground and let the defense scoop the ball up and get them out, right? And that’s all we need. We need people who can pitch well enough to keep us in the ball games. Like I keep saying, you need people who can pitch well enough to keep us into ball games. And I think Adrien Hower would be a good choice for someone to help us stay into ball games. Uh, I mean, look at his whip. Where’s his whip? 128. So pretty good. Pretty good whip. Pretty good RA. I mean, really good RA. Can he replicate that next year? I don’t know. I guess he is 32 years old. I don’t know what chat GBT was saying, but yeah, 32 years old, a good three, four type, maybe four, five. Uh, somewhere on this rotation, he could fit nicely. Let’s put it that way. And then I spoil the last one obviously. Zack Latell 29. Uh, hold on, let me see if Chad GBT lied about that. 30 years old. Okay, Chad GBT is one year in the fast. That’s fine. Rays pitching lab product, but he’s on the he was on the Reds, but now he or he was on the Rays is probably what you know him for. Exactly the type of buy low the Padres’s love. Massive workload jump and legit splitter. We do love splitters. Keynotes, giant bug in my face. Love that. He’s a 186.2 innings pitch, 11th in MLB. That’s probably from last year because Chad GBT lives in the past. Low fast ball velocity but great splitter. Giant bug in my face. Pound the zone mentality. Padres’s fit durable number four starter with hidden upside in Petco because Petco is a pitcher’s paradise. So let’s take a look at these numbers real quick. So his fast ball run value uh okay no 186 was the 2025. So I’m sorry I doubt you chat GBT but a good fast ball right above average fast ball. A little below average on pitching run value but he gets people to chase. He does not walk people. 98th percentile in walks. So his whip is around what? 110. Yeah 110. So he he’s solid. He eats innings. I mean, 381 isn’t like amazing. It’s not bad. I mean, even a four isn’t bad. Four is around average, I would say. I know we probably expect people to hit like 30. We we we’ve had good pitchers, right? We had Dylan East, we had Michael King, so we expect pitchers to be like a 3.31 or whatever, but 3.81 is not bad by any stretch of the imagination. So, I would take that any day of the week. Even if he goes to like a 2023 number, it’s his RA is like a 410. I would still take that to be honest. His job is that he eats innings. So we would love someone who can eat some innings. And again, Ruben Neb is on our team so maybe he’ll work up on that slider. You can see his pitch usage. Slider, fast ball, four seam fast ball. Um, so yeah, I mean, I don’t see why not, right? I’ll I’ll show you the values in a sec or the contract values in a sec, but let’s just just just know we need people who can pitch well well enough, right? We don’t need a number one. Nick Lever for right now is our number one. If we want to splurge on a Ranger Suarez or literally anyone else, I know we made a video on Chris Basset and other people, but I think with our budgetary restraints, let’s put it that way, these are some solid options and they shouldn’t be super expensive, right? So, Maro Kelly, one year, 14 or 2 years for 24, 12 million a year. I know it’s not cheap, right? But it’s definitely not horrible. I mean, he’s still a solid enough pitcher that teams will want him. Uh, workhouse command guy, six pitch, mix, reliable number three type. So, you might want you might think it’s an overpay. I think for what the average contracts given out and again using like Dylan CE as a benchmark, people overpay for starters. He might be worth 1 million or he might be worth 10 million or whatever, but you’re gonna have to overpay in this kind of free agent market. Zack Lattell, same thing. three years, 42, 48 million. I think I don’t know if I’d give him three years to be honest, but 14 million for a guy who can eat innings, has good upside, have a little Ruben Yaba magic. Also, please apply if you’d like. I don’t hate it, right? 14 million a year. It it depends. Again, people are going to overpay for pitchers. That’s fine. And my favorite probably honestly Adrien Hower I think he’d be the best fit for the Padres’s but 8 to 10 million a year 16 to 20 million two-year deal I like that the most ground ball pitcher low home runs for nine solid number five innings eater again I would put him at number three or four to be honest on this rotation cuz who do you have Musgrove Vasquez JP Sears maybe Kyle Hart like we’re not swimming and starting pitching right now so yeah I I think personally I like Adrien Hower and the other two, but if I had a choice, Adrien Hower. If not, we can bring back or not bring back, but we can resign Sherzer and Verlander for like their age 45 season or whatever. Like, they’re still effective pitchers, but they’re old. That’s an understatement. They’re old. No offense to them, but they’re old. But let me know what you guys think. Do you guys have any other pitchers you would like us to talk about, or do you think these are three solid options? You think it’s too much of an overpay? Or do you think you just hate them and you want videos on, I don’t know, Jacob Deg Grom or something? He’s not a free agent, but you know what I mean, right? Uh, but yeah, thank you guys so much for watching. Have a fantastic rest of your day. Please subscribe. Go Padres’s and I don’t know, happy Thanksgiving. Merry Christmas. We there yet? Merry Christmas. Whatever.

Today, Andrew McFarland brings a batch of pitchers who aren’t super expensive but also not super cheap, but are good, solid, quality pitchers that would be a boost to any starting rotation…

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