Fitting Yasmany Tomas in San Diego

Pablo Sandoval has joined the Red Sox. It’s not surprising that the Giants were right there in the race for his services. More surprising is that the Padres apparently were, too. And according to reports, all the teams made similar offers, so it’s not like Sandoval is chasing extra millions to Boston. An interesting thing to think about is whether the winner’s curse applies to a situation in which no one really out-bid the competition. An also interesting thing to think about is what the Padres intend to do. It’s a team under new management, and they seem to want to be active.

This is taken right from Dave’s chat earlier Wednesday:

12:04
Comment From AJ Preller
I made a run at Pablo Sandoval but it didn’t work out. What should I do now?

The Padres, to date, have been heavily connected to Yasmany Tomas. One isn’t accustomed to seeing the Padres hot in pursuit of any expensive available player, but he’d appear to be exactly the right kind of fit. In theory, at least, if not in reality, and while Tomas is by no means guaranteed to end up in San Diego, that’s the sort of area where the Padres should probably be putting their money. It’s important that one understands where the Padres are today.

Think about how good you think the Padres are. Correct — they are forgettably mediocre. What follows might come off as unreasonably negative, but I assure you, I’m just passing on the numbers, free of opinion. Last year, the Padres finished with 77 wins. That’s not awful; the Marlins and Rays also had 77 wins. On the other hand, the Padres had a BaseRuns record of 72-90. That was tied for third-worst in baseball, and the Red Sox have already upgraded, and almost literally every single player of consequence on the Rangers got hurt. The Padres, last season, were a relatively bad team.

All right, fine, but what about 2015? 2015 looks worse. Or, perhaps, 2015 just doesn’t look any better. Behold, a table of positional projections, like I’ve used in recent posts about the White Sox and the Red Sox. You’ve got WAR figures and the Padres’ NL rank, and I’ve played no role in this. This is just output from the unbiased Steamer, and Steamer creates projections out of unbiased historical information. Steamer has no reason to be particularly harsh on the Padres, aside from considering the Padres’ own players.

Only the Phillies are projected for a lower team WAR than the Padres in the National League. And while the Phillies have been a mess, they’ve come to terms with the reality that they need to rebuild. Look at the Padres’ NL ranks across the board. They look solid at second base, but they’re tied for third with two other teams, barely removed from the average. The next-best rank is sixth, at DH/PH, which is the least important position included. The Padres look fine behind the plate, and then you can consider the pitch-framing data on Yasmani Grandal and Rene Rivera, but for any credit you give them for framing, you have to take credit away from the pitchers, so that doesn’t make the picture look better. It wouldn’t be impossible for the Padres to contend in 2015, but it would require a handful of stunners.

Here’s another way of looking at things. Steamer projects 186 different players to be worth at least 2 WAR in 2015. Of those players, zero are Padres. A recent Baseball Prospectus article declared that the Padres probably have baseball’s worst core. Last year’s highest-ranking position player was a 30-year-old defensive catcher who hit for the first time in his life. Then Seth Smith had a career year at 31. On the pitching side, Ian Kennedy, Tyson Ross, and Andrew Cashner were pretty good, but Kennedy undershot his peripherals, Ross fell short of three wins, and Cashner made just 19 starts. The Padres have pitching talent, but once you account for the ballpark, they don’t look as good as they seem.

All in all, the Padres can hope for adequacy anywhere and everywhere, but this isn’t a team with a star on it. Not a well-known star, and not an underrated statistical star. Maybe you argue the catchers are underrated, but again, then you’re just making the pitchers worse. Almost everywhere you look, the upside is something in the vicinity of league-average. So the team’s upside is something in the vicinity of league-average, and without the core building blocks, it’s hard to reasonably envision a contender.

There are pieces under control for at least the next three years. Yet, the Padres have been hurt badly by injuries and surprising under-performance. Elbow injuries have been a major setback for promising pitchers, like Casey Kelly, Cory Luebke, and Max Fried. Cameron Maybin hasn’t turned out. Yonder Alonso hasn’t turned out. Ross is good, but he’s awful slider-heavy for a starting pitcher. Rivera might be good, but he’s 31 now. Top prospect Austin Hedges just posted a .589 OPS in Double-A. Rymer Liriano struggled in the majors, and was only all right in Double-A. Matt Wisler, at least, might’ve taken a step forward, navigating the treacherous environment in El Paso.

The bigger point of all this: the Padres are in no way suffering through a talent drought, but there are question marks with just about everyone, and few players have legitimate star upside. Though the team’s prepared to spend more money, it appears difficult to make the Padres into a real contender within at least the next two seasons. With most free agents, you’re looking to get the most value within the first year or two, so if the Padres were to spend big on available guys, they’d be paying for decline just as the rest of the roster might be improving. That doesn’t strike me as the most sensible approach.

Pablo Sandoval, I can sort of understand — he’ll play most of next season before his 29th birthday. There’s reason to believe he might still be a pretty good player three or four years down the road, so that wouldn’t have been a disaster acquisition. But Sandoval’s young for a free agent. Chase Headley is 30. Jon Lester’s almost 31. Max Scherzer is 30. James Shields is almost 33.

Yasmany Tomas just recently turned 24. He has his whole peak in front of him. And this is why he’d be such a good fit for the Padres, on longer terms. There are question about his defensive position, but he’d be blocked pretty much nowhere in San Diego. They could try him out at a variety of places and allow him to settle. And while some question Tomas’ athleticism, his bat is his selling point, and the Padres don’t have a hitter anywhere with Tomas’ kind of upside. He’s a young potential star, and though that’s what makes him desirable to every team in baseball, he’s an excellent fit for a Padres team with current flexibility and a need for that kind of future splash.

In that way he could function as San Diego’s equivalent of Chicago’s Jose Abreu. The Padres could acquire and lock up a long-term part of their core, and while San Diego doesn’t have its own equivalent of Chris Sale, you have to start somewhere. Abreu made sense for a rebuilding team looking to add to the top of its roster. And so it is for Tomas today, as the Padres look to follow something like the White Sox’s approach.

There’s the obvious risk, that’ll prevent Tomas from becoming a $150-million player. There’s a point at which the Padres can’t afford to bid any higher. But even if they got him and he were to bust, the Padres are an organization in need of bigger upside. They have an accumulation of average-level players, and at some point you need to roll the dice on something bigger. If Tomas doesn’t hit, the Padres would need to rely that much more on cheap talent coming through the farm. But if he did hit, the Padres would have something they don’t currently have. This is a good time for a new front office to be bold.