Padres Editorial: Get Ready For A Busy Trade Deadline

With the 2015 MLB Trade Deadline approaching quickly, many in the baseball world are anticipating AJ Preller and the San Diego Padres to be very active. After the slurry of off-season moves the Padres made to rejuvenate their major league ball club, everyone in the organization fan base hoped to be in a better position in the NL and NL West standings.

Our friend Dennis Lin of the Union Tribune recently had a chance to ask Preller and Padres brass, Ron Fowler and Mike Dee, about where the Padres find themselves now and what we can expect as we near the trade deadline:

Preller:

"“It’s obviously not where we want to be,” Preller said of the Padres’ current position. “We were hoping that we’d be in a better place in the standings and just in general playing better, more consistent baseball. We’ve seen flashes of it early in the year. The offense had some explosive moments; we put some runs on the board in a hurry. The pitching wasn’t as good at that time. Now it’s kind of a flip, vice versa.”“I still think that this team, especially the way we’ve pitched the last few weeks, you could make the case that we’re going to get to the finish line in a way that can be competitive,” he said. “I think we have some components that can help us get there. We’ve got to improve a lot of areas; we need a more consistent offensive approach and attack. … I think in a lot of ways the team will tell us as we get going, and I think we get a better sense of where we stand in the next 10 days, two weeks.”"

Fowler:

"“We’re way disappointed in this year to date,” Padres executive chairman Ron Fowler said Wednesday. “We’ve been evaluating the team very closely. … We fully hope that they’re going to play better for the remainder of the season.”"

Dee:

"“We think he’s done an outstanding job,” Padres president and CEO Mike Dee told the Union-Tribune. “The major league club is one part of it; it’s a big part of it. We all wish we were winning more games, but listen, you’ve got to swing to hit, and (Preller) took a big swing this season with this team.”“This was a franchise that was stuck in neutral for the last 10 years, so I give A.J. a lot of credit for rolling to the dice to see if we could add to this year’s team to compete, to compete with this group, and I think we still may. If we don’t, then we’ll reassess and reshuffle the deck and see if we can find a different chemistry, a different combination, that can improve the roster.”"

Just a quick thought, ownership has to be pleased with Preller so far because the moves he made brought in a lot of money for the Padres by selling a ton of tickets. If Preller has to let some big league talent go in exchange for promising prospects, ownership probably isn’t worried about a loss in revenue because of the new (rumored – hopefully Brown) uniforms they’re going to selling next season and 2016 All-Star Game merch.

If the Padres are preparing to be both sellers and buyers in the coming weeks, then the free-agents after this season would be the most obvious trade candidates: Justin Upton, Ian Kennedy, Joaquin Benoit, and Will Venable.

Other trade candidates with longer contracts include: Andrew Cashner, Tyson Ross, Yonder Alonso, James Shields, and Craig Kimbrel; sorry, there’s no chance the Padres will be able to trade Matt Kemp or Melvin Upton Jr.

My personal opinion is that if the Padres think they still have a chance at making the playoffs this season, then they are seriously kidding themselves. It’s not happening this season. I think it’s best for, not just this season, but the future of this club if we sell-off what we can, especially the players in the last year of their contracts, who aren’t good enough for us to re-sign in the offseason anyway like Venable, Kennedy, and Alexi Amarista; someone has got to want the Little Ninja, right?

Who do you guys think the Padres will trade? Who would you trade them to and for whom?

One trade candidate the Padres are actively scouting now, via Ken Rosenthal’s report, are the Toronto Bluejays. High-ranking Padres scouts were recently spotted scouting top Bluejay prospects, RHP Jeff Hoffman (Single-A) and LHP Daniel Norris (Triple-A).

Padres Editorial: Get Ready For A Busy Trade Deadline

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