MLB Offseason Preview - San Diego Padres

San Diego Padres

National League	West Division
68-94	23 GB of Division Lead
Manager Andy Green	GM A.J. Preller
AAA affiliate El Paso Chihuahuas	AA affiliate San Antonio Missions

2016 Rankings

Hitting	AVG – 30th	OPS – 29th	Runs – 20th	HR – 20th	SB – 5th
Starting Pitching	ERA – 21st	K/9 – 24th	H/9 – 20th
Relief Pitching	ERA – 23rd	K/9 – 19th	H/9 – 14th

Top Hitters

POS.	Name	AVG	OBP	Slug	HR	RBIs	WAR	SB
1B	Wil Myers	.259	.336	.461	28	94	3.2	28
3B	Yangervis Solarte	.286	.341	.467	15	71	2.2
2B	Ryan Schimpf	.217	.336	.533	20	51	1.8

Top Pitchers

POS.	Name	Record	ERA	IP/Saves	K	BB	ERA+	WAR
SP	Drew Pomeranz	8-7	2.47	102.0 IP	115	41	164	3.4
RP	Brad Hand	4-4	2.92	89.1 IP	111	36	139	1.8
RP	Ryan Buchter	3-0	2.86	63.0 IP	78	31	142	1.4

Trades that Occurred During Season

• Traded SP James Shields to the Chicago White Sox for Fernando Tatis and Erik Johnson
• Traded CP Fernando Rodney to Miami for Chris Paddock
• Traded SP Drew Pomeranz to Boston for Anderson Espinoza
• Traded OF Melvin Upton Jr to Toronto for Hansel Rodriguez
• Traded SP Andrew Cashner, Tayson Guerrero, and Colin Rea to Miami for Luis Castillo, Josh Naylor, Carter Capps, and Jared Cosart (got Rea back after San Diego lied about physicals)
• Traded OF Matt Kemp to Atlanta for Hector Olivera

Impending Free Agents

• OF Jon Jay
• RP Carlos Villanueva
• P Brandon Morrow
• SP Edwin Jackson
• SP Clayton Richard
• 2B Adam Rosaler
• LF Skip Schumaker

Top Prospects

POS.	Name	Level
CF	Manuel Margot	MLB
SS	Cody Reed	High A
SP	Anderson Espinoza	A
OF	Hunter Renfroe	MLB

Team MVP

• I think that the only player who would qualify as the Padres' MVP this season is Wil Myers, who is finally living up to the high prospect ranking he was given before reaching the majors. During the 2012 season, Myers was ranked as the fourth overall prospect in all of baseball by Baseball America and won AL Rookie of the year in 2013 as a member of the Tampa Bay Rays.  Myers had a below average season last year, his first in San Diego, and was injury plagued for most of it.  This season, however, he broke out, and made the All-Star team and greatly outperformed the league minimum salary he earned this season, which was $524,000. Fangraphs estimated his value for this past season to be $30.7 million and gave the Padres one of the highest values relative to salary in baseball.  Myers proved to be the Padres' most dangerous hitter and is one of their most important core pieces for the team's future.

Success/Failure

• Success - On the field, the Padres were not successful, or even really competitive for that matter.  Off the field, however, San Diego's front office was able to make some moves to correct the failings that took place when they traded prospects for players like Matt Kemp, the Upton brothers, and Craig Kimbrel.  Trading for these players in an attempt to find immediate success, stripped the Padres' solid farm system down to one of the worst in baseball.  Starting last offseason, and continuing through this past baseball season, GM A.J. Preller reversed a lot of these moves by trading Craig Kimbrel to the Red Sox and getting top-30 prospect Manuel Margot in return.  He also got rid of Matt Kemp's massive contract by taking on Hector Olivera's contract and traded Drew Pomeranz to Boston, a team in need of pitching, and got the the Red Sox best pitching prospect, Anderson Espinoza in return.  Espinoza, while only 18 years old, is highly talented and is already the Padres' best prospect.  Their only move that was unsuccessful was attempting to trade pitchers Andrew Cashner and Colin Rea to the Marlins for low-level prospects.  After the trade was approved, news broke that the Padres had made a habit out of keeping multiple physical reports on players and were withholding medical information from teams when trade negotiations occurred.  This resulted in Rea being traded back to the Padres and Preller being suspended and there is potential for long-term ramifications in how other teams will engage in trade talks with San Diego in the future.

Offseason Outlook

• For the Padres this offseason, and for next year, they need to just focus on continuing to develop their prospects.  They have already traded away all of their valuable assets, except for Wil Myers, who is an important part of their future.  They have received a great deal of talent in return for the trades they've made and have set up their future in terms of young players. The only thing they can do now is wait for their prospects to make it to the majors and draft well in addition.

*All stats and information come from baseball-reference.com, fangraphs.com, espn.com, rosterresource.com, baseballamerica.com, and spotrac.com