The Padres went home disappointed in October, falling to the eventual World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers. While their 2024 payroll was much lower than in 2023, the Padres are still expected to be in the top-half of payrolls in baseball this coming season.
A good chunk of their roster is set in stone. They have key players locked in for multi-year deals, such as Manny Machado, Xander Bogaerts, Jake Cronenworth and Fernando Tatis Jr. among others.
The key to the Padres offseason is retaining their current free agents, while also exploring extensions for players on expiring deals.
Padres free agents:
- Jurickson Profar
- Kyle Higashioka
- Tanner Scott
- Ha-Seong Kim
- David Peralta
- Donovan Solano
- Martin Perez
- Elias Diaz
- Nick Ahmed
Higashioka is now out of reach – he signed with the Texas Rangers. Higashioka, along with starting pitcher Michael King, arrived in San Diego as part of the Juan Soto trade last offseason. Higashioka performed well in clutch moments, including in the final week of the season and into the playoffs with three home runs.
Re-signing Profar remains an option. He enjoyed a career season in 2024, as he hit 24 home runs and drove in 85 runs on his way to his first career All-Star selection.
Peralta served as a useful utility player, filling the designated hitter slot as well as playing in the outfield. All three players would help fill holes on the roster.
In terms of extensions for players currently under contract, King and Dylan Cease are prime candidates for extensions, as they are free agents after the 2025 season.
If they are unable to sign those two players to contract extensions, there are free agents they can bring in to help bridge the gap.
Outfielder Tyler O’Neill and pitchers Max Fried and Shane Bieber are potential candidates for the Padres to target, should they lose any of their current free agents to other teams.
O’Neill could serve as corner outfield depth, whereas Fried and Bieber could help bolster a rotation that is in need of more starting pitchers outside of the top three of Cease, King and Yu Darvish.
Bieber, coming off of Tommy John surgery, could come cheaper than Fried on the free agent market. Depending on how much money general manager A.J. Preller is willing to shell out, these three players could help bolster an already strong San Diego team.
One wild card to watch for is Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki, who sported a 2.35 earned run average over 111 innings for the Chiba Lotte Marines. Suitors for the 23-year-old are yet to be determined, however, don’t count the Padres out. Sasaki’s reported relationship with Darvish could be a big factor in the Padres’ ability to sign the Japanese pitcher.
With the annual Winter Meetings set to take place in Dallas from Dec. 9-12, more possible deals could rise to the surface before team executives head to the Lone Star state. And with Preller’s history of swinging trades, even more transactions could be coming in the near future.
