Alex McCoy is forcing his way onto the radar in a hurry.
The Padres’ farm system has been labeled the weakest in baseball by ESPN, FanGraphs and MLB Pipeline, and McCoy wasn’t exactly arriving with much national fanfare. He just moved onto Pipeline’s Padres top-30 list at No. 26, and he still isn’t on any national Top 100 list. But the outfielder is making noise in the Arizona Fall League, where he’s been one of the more dangerous bats in the early going.
McCoy reached the AFL after a solid 2026 regular season that was split between advanced Class-A Fort Worth and Double-A San Antonio. His Double-A stint, which began after a midseason promotion, produced a .314/.360/.467 line in 25 games. For a player the Padres signed as an undrafted free agent out of Hofstra in July 2024, that kind of jump is starting to look like a smart bet.
The AFL sample is still small - just 12 games - but McCoy has kept the momentum rolling. He has five home runs and a .997 OPS, and while the strikeout total is a little loud at 20 in 48 at-bats, the power is even louder.
His fifth homer of the fall came off the bat at 116.3 mph, a number that stands out even in a major league context. Only 10 major league hitters produced a harder-hit ball in a game this season.
That blast against the Glendale Desert Dogs was more than just a big swing in one game. For rookies with at least 200 balls in play, max exit velocity is considered more predictive than wRC+, and the relationship is pretty clear: every extra mile per hour of max EV tends to push league-average wOBAcon up by about 11 points and league-average hard-hit rate by roughly 1.8 percentage points.
That’s the kind of contact quality that can change a player’s trajectory fast. McCoy’s 116.3-mph shot doesn’t guarantee anything, but it does underline why he’s suddenly drawing attention. No matter what happens the rest of the way in the AFL, he’s now a name worth tracking.
In Other News...
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That puts a spotlight on a handful of young players who have put themselves into the conversation, including Tucker Musgrove, Gutierrez, Jagger Haynes, Braedon Karpathios and Jake Cunningham. San Diego has to balance present roster pressure against future upside, and these are the kinds of calls that can shape a farm system for years, even if the final move does not come until the calendar and the labor situation finally catch up. [Read more 🡒]
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Pitching was the bigger problem, with the staff posting a rough ERA and run differential that made it hard to find much comfort in the results. Still, there were individual bright spots worth noting, especially catcher Ethan Salas, who showed strong work on both sides of the ball before reaching San Diego, and Braedon Karpathios, whose late-season promotion offered another glimpse of a prospect with some upside. [Read more 🡒]
Padres Face A Tough Walker Buehler Call This Offseason
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The problem for San Diego is that value cuts both ways. Buehlers strong year has raised his market, and the Padres are still weighing whether they want to commit to a multiyear deal or keep looking for starters who can consistently work deeper into games. Before they sit down to talk contract, the club would be wise to set a firm price and have other rotation plans in place, because this is the kind of decision that can shape the whole offseason. [Read more 🡒]