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As of today, the Padres (37-27) are currently third in the NL West behind both the Giants (38-23, 2.5 games behind) and the Dodgers (36-25, .5 games behind) They’re also currently tied for third in the majors with 37 wins alongside the White Sox, Red Sox, and Athletics. Only the Giants and Rays (39-24) have more victories on the year.
In ESPN’s most-recent set of power rankings, the Padres came in at fourth behind only the Rays, White Sox, and Giants. Immediately after them are the Dodgers in fifth and the Red Six in sixth.
While the power rankings were put together by a group of MLB analysts from ESPN, Alden Gonzalez got the opportunity to discuss why the Padres remain at #4 in their latest rankings:
“Among the more surprising elements of this season is that the Padres — still maintaining pace among the best teams in the sport — are simply not hitting. Through their first 60 games, the Padres possessed a .697 OPS that stood nine points below the league average. If you took away Fernando Tatis Jr., that OPS dropped to .666. It’s no secret that the Padres have been carried mostly by their pitchers. But their lineup is just as deep as their pitching staff, and their hitters are among the best at controlling the strike zone. Eventually, one would think, the offense will come alive. In other words: The Padres might not have played their best baseball yet.”
Like Gonzalez said above, the Padres are hanging on to the top tier of teams but way of their pitching effort. They’re just narrowly first in the division with 220 runs allowed and only the White Sox (213) and Mets (192) have allowed less.
The absence of Trent Grisham has been felt, for sure, but this team is still way too talented to be floundering the way they have been on offense in recent days. Other guys are certainly dealing with unknown injuries and issues that may not be made known to all of us, but you can say the same thing about every other team in the majors. At some point, either this offense will come back to life or their struggles will continue until their bullpen can’t sustain their performance any longer.
Either way, something has to give.