Padres Stay Aggressive With Sale Looming and Dodgers Ahead

Arguably, no team knows the struggle of competing with the two-time defending MLB champion Dodgers quite like the Padres, but San Diego is making a flurry of moves in recent days to try to keep up with its arch-rivals to the north. 

Even as the franchise is up for sale and just resolved an intrafamily legal dispute, the Padres reached a multiyear contract extension with GM A.J. Preller. With the Padres since 2014, Preller is the second-longest-tenured GM in MLB, trailing only the Yankees’ Brian Cashman, and he had been entering the final year of his contract.

“A.J. is the architect of the team, and without his roster-building over the duration, we wouldn’t be where we are today,” Padres chair John Seidler said.

Wheeling and Dealing

Even before that deal was done, though, Preller was beginning a flurry of moves to further retool the club, even with spring training already underway. Among the club’s latest transactions:

• The signing of outfielder Nick Castellanos after he was cut by the Phillies. An All-Star in 2021 and 2023, Castellanos fell out of favor in Philadelphia for a variety of defense and clubhouse-related reasons. San Diego acquired him and is responsible for only the MLB minimum salary of $780,000, while the Phillies will pay the rest of the $20 million remaining on his contract. Padres third baseman Manny Machado lauded the signing, saying, “I mean, you talk about getting a $20-million player for pennies on the dollar. I think that kind of deserves an extension for A.J.”
• The signing of free-agent pitchers Germán Márquez and Griffin Canning. Both are reclamation projects, as Márquez just underwent a difficult season with the Rockies after missing two years recovering from Tommy John surgery, while Canning is recovering from a torn Achilles tendon. Both, however, are low-cost signings and are in play for the back-end of the starting rotation on a playoff contender.

The club did not have a flashy offseason signing along the lines of the Dodgers’ acquisition of Kyle Tucker, but San Diego still has a $259.6 million luxury-tax payroll for 2026, sixth highest in MLB, and is paying out the No. 7, 9, and 18 contracts in the league to Machado, outfielder Fernando Tatis Jr., and shortstop Xander Bogaerts.

The Padres have finished second in the NL West division to the Dodgers four times in the last six seasons, and also lost to Los Angeles three times in the playoffs since 2020. San Diego also finished second in attendance last season to the Dodgers, posting a club-record-draw of 3.4 million at Petco Park.

Many of these measures far outstrip San Diego’s No. 30 U.S. media market ranking and its relative geographic isolation, but it’s the Dodgers that remain in the Padres’ sights.

“I fucking love it,” Machado said of the Dodgers’ spending. “Every team should be doing it. That shit is fucking great for the game.”