Peter Gammons thinks the NL West is great (Insider only), but somehow doesn't mention the Padres. I mean, techinically, we are one of the five teams in the division, and we have spent time at first place. But somehow, no San Diego love.
Speaking of our division, would you be surprised if I told you that the Giants are in first place right now? They aren't, but would you have been surprised? What if I said the Dodgers were in first? Do you know what place San Francisco is in?
Maybe you do, cause you're a better fan than I am, but for me, this season has been weird in that nobody's tailed off yet. Last season, nobody was looking to try and seperate themselves from the pack with wins. This season, nobody's really falling off.
Also in the Gammons article, he mentions the fact that there's a good chance that Zito and Dontrelle could end up in the NL West this season. It's debatable, but I have to believe that the Padres need to end up with one of those guys if they want to stay in the playoffs in the near future. If both those guys end up in our division and we don't have one of them, then we HAVE TO GET MORE YOUNG OFFENSE. I'm tired of the team being "good enough", I want them to be better. I want more than one young star on the team. I want guys like Chan Ho park to be scoring bonus wins for us rather than being number two guys (no offense to The Ho).
Next season, I want our rotation to look like this:
- Peavy
- Zito
- Young
- Hensley
- Carrillo
But the truth is, it probably won't happen, what with the lack of talent that the Padres have in the minor leagues. I've never done any sort of comparison with other clubs, but if everybody tells me that it's true, then it must be. Even if it's not true, the general consensus is what it is, so it kinda screws us up.
Still, this is something we need to look at. Within the next 3 years, the NL West is going to be the toughest, most competitive division in baseball and the Padres need to be ready for it cause who knows when we're gonna get another 2005.