The Padres should buy—not stand pat

There were three options for the San Diego Padres at the MLB trade deadline going into this past weekend:

• Sell
• Stand pat
• Buy

I can almost guarantee that selling isn’t on the table any longer. The Padres are only two wins away from getting back to .500 after sweeping one of the best teams in all of baseball.

Chairman Peter Seidler and President of Baseball Operations AJ Preller went all-in this season and they aren’t about to give up now, especially when their team is playing better than .600 baseball this month.

So stand pat or buy? Being a buyer is what should happen.

If they’re not going to sell, then why not buy? Standing pat doesn’t improve a roster that has holes in it. It’s not like the Padres were a perfect team that just underwhelmed in the first 100 games of the season.

They’re a talented team that has underwhelmed and needs to play great baseball the rest of the way to have a chance at getting into the postseason. And acquiring a left-handed bat and at least one arm would make it easier to play great baseball through the end of the regular season.

Once August 1 at 3 pm comes, Preller can’t make any more trades. What happens if a starting pitcher goes down? That would be a major problem if no move is made prior to the deadline because it’s been proven this year that there’s a lack of depth in Triple-A to replace an injured starter.

If Jake Cronenworth or Ha-Seong Kim go down do the Padres want Matt Carpenter and Alfonso Rivas getting at-bats every day at first base? I hope not.

The 2022 Houston Astros made moves on the margins to set up their World Series run (Trey Mancini, Christian Vazquez, Will Smith). So did the Atlanta Braves in 2021 (Eddie Rosario, Adam Duvall, Joc Pederson). Same goes for the 2019 Washington Nationals (Daniel Hudson, Hunter Strickland).

Are the Padres good enough to not follow in past World Series winners’ footsteps at the deadline? I doubt it.