With the Padres in a rebuilding phase, and not winning many games, I thought a fun thing to do would be to do a simulation of how the Padres’ future will turn out, using the recently released ‘Out Of The Park Baseball ’18’ simulation game.

Out Of The Park (aka OOTP) is a long running series of baseball simulation games, and its 2016 iteration of the game, OOTP 17, won Metacritic.com’s PC game of the year award.

These simulations should be taken with a grain of salt and by no means are reality.

It was created in 1998 and recently was granted (2016) licenses by Major League Baseball and minor league baseball. With that, popularity of the game has hit an all-time high.

It is fun seeing the Padres’ full squad, minor leagues and all, in the game.

Again, this is just for fun. You might get upset seeing some of the simulated trades made by A.J. Preller. Just try to go with it and let your imagination guide you through this piece.

After simulating five years into the future, I will check back on some of the current Padres players, to see how they’re doing in the simulated world.

2017:

Opening Day (in game) had a couple changes from what happened in real life. First of all, Cory Spangenberg made the team while Luis Sardinas was sent packing to Triple-A. Another change is that Clayton Richard wound up in the bullpen, and Luis Perdomo was the opening day starter. The rest of the differences were all very minor (Luis Torrens isn’t viewed as Rule-5 pick in the quick start game, so he was sent to High Single-A).

After I simulated through the year, I was hit by many, many surprises. First and foremost, this scrappy ball club ended up with a record of 81-81. There is always hope in Friar Town. Secondly, there were a slew of deals that may be tough for Padres fans to hear about, as they are incredibly short-term deals, and yielded marginal returns in terms of players. The biggest trade was sending Wil Myers to the Detroit Tigers for J.D. Martinez and two low-quality prospects. Just a horrible move by Preller, and it didn’t even work out in the end, as Martinez is a free agent after 2017, and Myers is controllable for many more years.

Also, Brandon Maurer and Cal Quantrill were traded for Justin Smoak, of all players. Let’s move on, please. There was an inter-divisional trade with the Giants, as the Padres sent Ryan Buchter and Anderson Espinoza to the Bay Area for Eduardo Nunez. Jarred Cosart led the pitching staff in 2017, with 185 innings of 3.55 ERA ball, while Christian Friedrich was no slouch either, recording a 3.32 ERA over 135 innings. On the offensive side, Yangervis Solarte hit .290 with 17 home runs to lead the team in both categories (not counting Myers’ 26 home runs before getting traded). Another thing to mention…the Padres picked SP Alex Faedo with the number-three pick in the amateur draft.

2018:

Two big trades occurred in the off-season. First, and I personally like this trade, Austin Hedges was sent to the Chicago White Sox for Carlos Rodon and Dan Jennings. While Hedges is great, Rodon has ace-like potential, and Jennings is no slump either. But to fill the catcher void, Preller sent minor leaguer, Rafael Ortega, and Alex Faedo (who just got drafted #3 in 2017) to the Mets for Kevin Plawecki. Kind of an iffy deal, especially since he’s such a downgrade from Hedges, but it was certainly better than having Hector Sanchez start. Other major acquisitions were Brett Anderson, Tyson Ross, Mike Moustakas, Shin-Soo Choo, and Eugenio Suarez. Luis Urias also earned the opening day gig as a second baseman, which is good news, but his addition moved Solarte to left field, which sounds like bad news, at least for Padres pitchers.

The 2018 season was not as lucky for the Padres, as they finished 68-94, dead last in the N.L. West. They also dealt the struggling, but promising, Luis Perdomo to the Yankees for Chris Carter and a good outfield prospect. Some standouts on the year were Travis Jankowski, who put up 4.9 WAR to go with a .308/.385/.462 slash line while providing excellent defense. Allen Cordoba, who gave the Friars 4.8 WAR with a .297 batting average was also a solid contributor.

2019:

Only one big trade happened this off-season, as Brad Hand and a minor league second baseman were sent packing to the Dodgers for Yasiel Puig. Puig is still a decent bat and a good defender, and Hand has fallen off a little bit, so not a bad trade for the Friars. The Padres also signed Nick Castellanos to a three-year deal after coming off a negative WAR campaign with the Tigers. A somewhat questionable decision, but he came cheap, so it’s justifiable. Luis Torrens is finally the opening day starter, after a year of Kevin Plawecki. Fernando Perez took over at first base, and Christian Bethancourt became the closer after Bobby Wahl suffered a month-long injury.

The 2019 season turned out the same way as the 2017 season, finishing 81-81, but only good for fourth in the N.L. West. There were no major deals at the deadline, however there were some players who broke out and/or had a resurgence. Allen Cordoba picked up where he started off last season, and put up another 4.8 WAR, to go with .299/.368/.403 and 43 extra base hits. Yangervis Solarte, while his WAR wasn’t that high at 2.6, still put up a great offensive campaign, slashing .300/.353/.496 with 22 home runs, while splitting his time between first base, second base, and left field. Carlos Rodon went 14-12 with a 2.95 ERA, while striking out 9.2 batters per nine and only walking 2.6 per nine. Also, Jarred Cosart threw a one-hitter against the Diamondbacks

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Kent Williams

Kent is high school student, and is the youngest writer at East Village Times. He plays baseball, and runs cross country. He is also a Life Scout currently working towards the rank of Eagle. He was born in San Diego, and been a Padres fan ever since.