{"id":708240,"date":"2026-05-25T09:33:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/708240\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T09:33:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:33:14","slug":"padres-interested-in-antonio-senzatela","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/708240\/","title":{"rendered":"Padres Interested In Antonio Senzatela"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Padres are known to be looking<\/a> to bolster what is already a strong relief corps, and USA Today\u2019s Bob Nightengale<\/a> writes that Rockies right-hander Antonio Senzatela<\/a> is one of the names on San Diego\u2019s radar.\u00a0 Nightengale also mentions Aroldis Chapman<\/a> as a Padres target, echoing Dennis Lin of the Athletic\u2019s report from a few days ago about the Padres\u2019 long-standing interest in Chapman.<\/p>\n

Senzatela is in the last guaranteed year of a five-year, $50MM extension he signed with Colorado back in October 2021, as the Rockies hold a $14MM club option (with no buyout) on his services for 2027.\u00a0 In this sense Senzatela is basically a rental player for any interested trade suitors, as that club option is unlikely to be exercised regardless of how well the righty pitches over the rest of the 2026 campaign.<\/p>\n

Since signing that extension, Senzatela has tossed only 274 1\/3 big league innings, as a torn ACL and a Tommy John surgery led to two extended stints on the injured list.\u00a0 Finally fully healthy heading into the 2025 season, Senzatela struggled to a 7.42 ERA over 108 innings and 23 starts before the Rockies moved him to the bullpen in August.\u00a0 The role switch seemed to work immediately, as Senzatela then delivered a 2.86 ERA over his first 22 innings as a reliever.<\/p>\n

The improvement has carried over to some extent in 2026, though Senzatela\u2019s sparkling 1.13 ERA carries several red flags.\u00a0 A .195 BABIP is probably the biggest reason why Senzatela\u2019s 3.48 SIERA more than triples his real-world ERA.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t just good luck, however, as Senzatela\u2019s 6.8% walk rate is quite solid and his hard-contact numbers are vastly improved from his career norms.\u00a0 His 22% strikeout is a bit below league average, but also markedly better than the 14.7K% Senzatela posted over his first nine MLB seasons.<\/p>\n

As one might expect, Senzatela\u2019s move to relief pitching has bumped his velocity \u2014 after averaging 94.2mph on his fastball prior to 2026, Senzatela is now up to 97.1mph.\u00a0 Moreso than just the velo, Senzatela\u2019s decreased usage of his four-seamer has made the pitch much more effective, as Senzatela has now introduced a cutter to his arsenal.\u00a0 The four-seamer has been thrown 35.2% of the time while the cutter isn\u2019t far behind at 30.8%, and Statcast\u2019s Run Value metric gives the cutter an impressive +6.<\/p>\n

These results bode well for Senzatela\u2019s chances of landing a decent contract when he hits free agency this winter, as it looks like the move to the pen has resurrected his career.\u00a0 In the shorter term, it makes him an obvious trade chip on a rebuilding Rockies team that is tied with the Angels for the worst record in baseball (20-34).\u00a0 Barring injury, Colorado will surely be moving Senzatela in advance of the trade deadline.<\/p>\n

The wrinkle in regards to the Padres is that San Diego is apparently looking to make a move sooner rather than later.\u00a0 San Diego relievers have already logged 213 2\/3 innings, the seventh-highest total of any relief corps in baseball.\u00a0 Though this heavy workload hasn\u2019t stopped the Friars\u2019 bullpen from being one of the best in the game, the front office is looking to be proactive in adding a relief arm or two to help keep everyone fresh for what the Padres hope is an even deeper playoff run.<\/p>\n

On the flip side, the fact that the Padres\u2019 desire for bullpen help is more of a want than a true need, they may not be operating with much desperation.\u00a0 That reduces what leverage the Rockies may have as one of the few teams in pure seller mode.\u00a0 While the Rox will definitely be selling and the Padres will (barring a total collapse in the next two months) definitely be buying, most prominent trades don\u2019t take place until much closer to the deadline since clubs usually want to take their time in accessing their needs and gauging the market.<\/p>\n

Since the Rockies\u2019 priority should be on amassing talent rather than cutting payroll, Colorado could offer to eat virtually everything remaining on Senzatela\u2019s contract (roughly $8MM of a $12MM 2026 salary) in order to maximize the prospect return.\u00a0 Such an offer could be of particular interest to the Padres, who project to be luxury tax-payors for the second straight season and didn\u2019t much this past winter.\u00a0 Of course, the incoming new ownership group led by Jose E. Feliciano and Kwanza Jones could be willing to stretch the budget in pursuit of the franchise\u2019s elusive first World Series ring.<\/p>\n

It is perhaps worth noting that the Padres and Rockies are very infrequent trade partners<\/a> who haven\u2019t completed a non-cash considerations type of trade since December 2011.\u00a0 This may have less to do with a division rivalry than the fact that the Rockies generally made less trades as an organization than most other clubs, though president of baseball operations Paul DePodesta has already swung several lower-level deals in less than a year on the job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Padres are known to be looking to bolster what is already a strong relief corps, and USA…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":708241,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2290],"tags":[3569,5],"class_list":["post-708240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-baseball","tag-antonio-senzatela","tag-baseball"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116634530819615357","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=708240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708240\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/708241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=708240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=708240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=708240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}