2019 ZiPS Projections – San Diego Padres

After having typically appeared in the hallowed pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections have now been released at FanGraphs for more than half a decade. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the San Diego Padres.

Batters

There’s no way to talk about the Padres’ offense while ignoring the elephant in the room, San Diego’s big infield acquisition this winter. I’m talking, of course, about Ian Kinsler, who remains one of the most underrated players in baseball. The last time Kinsler failed to put up two WAR in a season was 2006, and even as his bat has declined — to a wRC+ of 93 in 2017 and 87 in 2018 — his glove has continued to add a whole win to his bottom line. He’s a really good transitional pickup as the Padres shift towards their Luis Urias/Fernando Tatis-based future.

Oh, right, you probably want to hear about the other dude! Manny Machado projects better as a third baseman than as a shortstop. Simply put, based on his age, his brief history at short and more lengthy one at third base, and a few other indicators — when you know nothing about a player, generalized speed data does have a relationship with defensive performance — Machado played worse defense at shortstop than ZiPS projected going into 2018. While we’d need to see a few years of him back at third to know whether this was due to a general defensive decline on his part or something shortstop-specific, ZiPS believes he’s a bit more valuable at third right now.

Overall, the projections for the Padres indicate a strong group of position players, no matter how the playing time actually sorts out in 2019. I know I rag on Eric Hosmer’s contract, but from a pure baseball standpoint rather than one of efficiency, if first base is really San Diego’s biggest lineup problem, the team’s probably in a good place.

Pitchers and Prospects (For this team, they’re inseparable!)

At least in the projections, the pitching is what’s currently preventing San Diego from being a serious wild card contender. Machado gets them to the periphery — close enough to .500 that them throwing up a wild card year like the Twins did in 2017 isn’t actually that crazy — but it’s still more likely than not that they’re playing for pride in September rather than the playoffs.

But that’s OK. Machado, like Harper, is a special player, the sort that is hard to develop yourself, so immediately contending with him isn’t as crucial as it would be for a more traditional rental. After all, he’s sticking around and will still be quite young come 2020. And San Diego has a very deep cadre of pitchers on the farm, most of whom ZiPS is very optimistic about long-term. While the rotation WAR totals you’ll see in the depth chart are relatively low, that’s more a function of the low number of projected innings than of the pitchers actually struggling.

After Joey Lucchesi, who I believe ought to be considered an established No. 2 or 3 starter, ZiPS already projects seven other young pitchers to have an ERA+ at least in the high 80s right now (96 is historically about league-average for a starter): Logan Allen, Jacob Nix, Chris Paddack, Eric Lauer, Brett Kennedy, Jesse Scholtens, and Dinelson Lamet, with the last returning from injury sometime this summer. That still doesn’t include MacKenzie Gore, who didn’t receive an official 2019 projection (I don’t like giving pitcher projections for individual seasons until guys have some time at Double-A). Gore is ranked as the No. 22 prospect on Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel’s 2019 Top 100 list, and Luis Patino, Adrian Morejon, and Anderson Espinoza, who ranked in Eric and Kiley’s top 132, haven’t yet received official projections.

In other words, while the Padres 2019 pitching staff is likely to be unimpressive, the weight of talent coming up from the minors is such that even if There Is No Such Thing As A Pitching Prospect, the problem ought to resolve itself in the next couple of years.

That said, looking at the Padres projections, Machado pulls the team close enough that you wonder if they should try to add a short-term starting pitcher. Extra wins here are quite valuable; if Dallas Keuchel isn’t finding this year’s market to his liking, perhaps there’s a number he would accept on a one-year contract. Because at least as ZiPS goes, if you could tempt Keuchel with one-year and $25 million, or with some other one-or-two-or-three year deal, this roster would project as the second-place team in the NL West, over the Colorado Rockies.

As for the bullpen, ZiPS isn’t that much more excited than it is for the rotation. The Padres have wrung a lot out of their bullpen and done so cheaply, getting some good performances even while rebuilding, but they also traded away Brad Hand, Adam Cimber, and Ryan Buchter over the last 18 months or so, which does make the group weaker than it would be otherwise. I won’t fault San Diego for that, simply because the process of sorting out the rotation will likely help sort out the bullpen as well, and because pre-Machado, 2020 and 2021 were better targets for contention than 2019 was.

One pedantic note for 2019: for the WAR graphic, I’m using FanGraphs’ Depth Charts playing time, not the playing time ZiPS spits out, so there will be occasional differences in WAR totals.

Ballpark graphic courtesy Eephus League. Depth charts constructed by way of those listed here at site.

Disclaimer: ZiPS projections are computer-based projections of performance. Performances have not been allocated to predicted playing time in the majors — many of the players listed above are unlikely to play in the majors at all in 2019. ZiPS is projecting equivalent production — a .240 ZiPS projection may end up being .280 in Triple-A or .300 in Double-A, for example. Whether or not a player will play is one of many non-statistical factors one has to take into account when predicting the future.

Players are listed with their most recent teams, unless I have made a mistake. This is very possible, as a lot of minor-league signings go generally unreported in the offseason.

ZiPS’ projections are based on the American League having a 4.29 ERA and the National League having a 4.15 ERA.

Players who are expected to be out due to injury are still projected. More information is always better than less information, and a computer isn’t the tool that should project the injury status of, for example, a pitcher who has had Tommy John surgery.

Both hitters and pitchers are ranked by projected zWAR — which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those which appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR.