A.J. Preller swung the trade deadline and changed the shape of the NL wild-card race.
The San Diego Padres were staring at major needs, and their GM answered by landing starters Casey Mize and Robbie Ray. Given San Diego’s ownership situation, that wasn’t supposed to be possible. The team’s sale wasn’t approved until after the deadline, which made it seem like Preller would be working with a tight budget and limited options.
Instead, he doubled down. He dealt from an already thin farm system to get the two arms, and the move has helped push the Padres into a hot streak that has them passing the Arizona Diamondbacks in the race.
It was the kind of aggressive deadline work Preller has made his trademark, and this time he was operating on what amounted to a future budget. The cost in prospects will sting later, but the message was clear: San Diego is going for it now. Preller made that point in his followup after the deadline and didn’t back off.
The catch is obvious. Mize and Ray are both set to become free agents after the season, which leaves the Padres facing the possibility of rebuilding much of their rotation depending on what happens next.
Arizona took a very different route. Diamondbacks GM Mike Hazen stayed conservative, with the club’s biggest deadline move being the addition of outfielder Lars Nootbar. He’s a solid player, but not the kind of piece that flips a race.
Mize and Ray have been that for San Diego, even if their overall numbers have only been average. The Padres needed help badly behind Michael King, and their pitching-by-committee plan was running out of steam. Those additions gave the club real traction.
Since then, the results have been impossible to ignore. The Padres have won 12 of 13 and now sit tied with the Chicago Cubs for the top wild-card spot. That was hard to imagine before Aug. 3, and Preller is at the center of it.
The Diamondbacks, meanwhile, are hanging on. They’re four games behind the Philadelphia Phillies in the wild-card chase, with the Padres one game ahead of Philadelphia. San Diego’s magic number is three, while the Phillies have plenty more to sweat over.
None of it happens without Preller, and none of it happens without the new ownership group either. Jose E.
Feliciano and Kwanza Jones deserve credit for recognizing the moment and backing it. That move looks like it could bring another year of playoff baseball to San Diego.
But this was Preller’s show. He made two bold trades that would have stopped plenty of general managers cold, and in the process he turned the deadline into the biggest difference-maker in this Padres-Diamondbacks race.
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