Michael King is the only thing keeping Padres’ rotation from total collapse

We can’t say this Padres rotation is going through a rough patch. It’s barely functioning. Since June 4, a San Diego starting pitcher has completed six innings just five times. Every one of those starts belongs to Michael King.

It’s not a quirky stat to shrug off. It’s another clear explanation for why the Padres are hovering around .500 and struggling to separate themselves from mediocrity. Their rotation has become a nightly countdown to the bullpen, and King is the only starter consistently delaying it.

San Diego starters have thrown 432 innings this season, the fourth-lowest total in baseball. Only the Mets, Nationals and White Sox have received fewer innings from their rotation.

The rest of the numbers are just as ugly. Padres starters rank 27th with 7.67 strikeouts per nine innings, 26th with a 4.69 ERA and 27th with a 4.88 xERA. So it’s not like this is a group getting burned by bad luck. The results are bad because the pitching is bad.

The Padres also rank 29th in quality starts. They have produced only 17 all season, and King owns more than half of them.

Padres quality starts by pitcher:

• Michael King: 9
• Randy Vásquez: 4
• Walker Buehler: 3
• Griffin Canning: 1

Michael King is carrying a rotation that gives the Padres no margin for error

This would be much easier to stomach if the Padres had an offense capable of covering for short starts. But that hasn’t been the case this season.

We’ve recently seen a little bit of life coming from the offense thanks to the return of Luis Campusano. Miguel Andujar has been making the most of his opportunities. And Manny Machado just might raise his batting average over the Mendoza Line by the end of the month. 

But even if the offense continues to pick up, the Padres starting pitching is simply not dominant enough for the first five innings. Their starters rank near the bottom of the league in strikeout rate, ERA, expected ERA and length.

To the bullpen’s credit, it has handled the workload remarkably well. San Diego relievers lead the majors with 4.5 WAR, rank sixth with a 3.70 ERA and have already thrown 389 2/3 innings, also the sixth-highest total in baseball.

Trading Michael King would turn a serious problem into a self-inflicted disaster

King’s name will naturally come up as the trade deadline approaches. If the Padres decide to sell, opposing teams will call. And they should be allowed to. But at this rate, maybe the Padres should politely hang up. 

There is a version of this conversation in which trading King makes sense. A team blows the Padres away with an absurd offer, San Diego accepts that this season is finished and the front office begins reshaping the roster around a longer timeline. Anything short of that would be reckless.

The Padres cannot casually move the only starter giving them dependable innings and then pretend they still have anything left resembling a viable rotation. They are already scraping the bottom of the league with King pitching every fifth day. Remove him, and this goes from a weakness to a complete organizational emergency.

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