Ty France spent years in and out of the Padres’ story. Now he’s back in the middle of it, and MLB.com thinks October could be where he really breaks through.
For San Diego, France’s return has been one of the quiet successes of the season. After rejoining the club in February and earning a place on the Opening Day roster, he locked down first base and gave the Padres the kind of steady production they were looking for. He played in 133 games, started 127 of them at first, and posted a .295 average with an .865 OPS, a career-high 21 home runs and 72 RBIs.
That kind of season is why he’ll be in the spotlight when San Diego opens the Wild Card round of the NL playoffs on Tuesday night against the visiting Chicago Cubs.
MLB.com writer Max Ralph sees France as one of the players who could jump from useful regular to postseason difference-maker.
"An All-Star in 2022 and a frequent Gold Glove candidate at first base, France struggled through below-average offense the past two seasons. But he’s having a career year (by a wide margin) in 2026, with the underlying numbers to back it up," the writer opined.
"He’s making hard contact more than ever, pulling the ball in the air more than the past two years and swinging more than ever - especially at strikes. France hasn’t had much success in two postseason trips in his career, but this year has all the makings of an October breakout on an intriguing team."
France’s path to this moment has been anything but straight. He first surfaced with San Diego in 2019, when Fernando "El Nino" Tatis Jr. was sidelined twice and France was the stopgap at third base.
He hit .235 with two homers and 10 RBIs in that first stint before going back down, then forced his way back into the picture by tearing up Triple-A Pacific Coast League pitching for the El Paso Chihuahuas, batting .399 with 27 homers and 89 RBIs. When Tatis was lost for the season in August, France returned and finished with a .234 average, seven homers and 34 RBIs in 69 games.
His time in San Diego seemed to end in August 2020, when the Padres dealt him, along with pitcher Andres Munoz, catcher Luis Torrens and outfielder Taylor Trammell, to the Seattle Mariners for pitchers Austin Adams and Dan Altavilla and catcher Austin Nola.
France then put together three solid seasons in Seattle and made the AL All-Star team in 2022. His next two stops came in quick succession: a July 2024 trade-deadline move sent him to the Cincinnati Reds, then he signed with the Minnesota Twins in February 2025 before another deadline trade shipped him to the Toronto Blue Jays. Toronto went on to lose the 2025 World Series to the Dodgers, and France was later rewarded for his work at first base with a Gold Glove.
That path eventually looped him back to where it started. Before the 2026 season, he signed with the Padres again, and this time the fit has stuck.
Looking back, San Diego’s rise traces all the way to that 2019 season, when the club finished 70-92, last in the NL West and 36 games behind the Dodgers, yet started building the expectation that better days were coming. The Padres have turned that promise into five playoff appearances in the next seven seasons, including a record third straight in 2026.
The momentum of that era was underlined in February 2019, when general manager A.J. Preller went outside the club’s usual market position and signed Manny Machado to a then-MLB-record 10-year, $300-million contract. Machado played 156 games that year, hit .256 with 32 home runs and 85 RBIs, and split time between third base and shortstop.
Tatis arrived that same season as a 20-year-old already carrying star-level buzz, and he delivered immediately before hamstring and back injuries interrupted his year. Even in just 84 games, he hit .317 with 22 homers and 53 RBIs and finished third in NL Rookie of the Year voting behind Pete Alonso and Mike Soroka.
Now France is part of that same Padres core trying to push the club through another October run. Machado and Tatis still draw the headlines, but if San Diego finally gets to the top of the mountain, France may end up being one of the names that helped carry it there.
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