Four early season hot takes for the San Diego Padres
(MLB.com)
After a slow first week, the Padres rattled off five straight series wins to begin April and finished with an 18-6 record for the month. Based on this still small but relevant sample of Padres baseball, the East Village Times staff made four bold predictions for the rest of the season.
Bold: EVT’s Chris Spiering says Fernando Tatis Jr. will fail to eclipse 20 home runs
It is no secret that Tatis has yet to hit his first home run of the year. He is still making contact and getting on base at his career average rates. He is swinging at a slightly higher rate compared to last year, but seems to have maintained his improved walk rate thus far. His speed, defense, athleticism, and strength are all as good as they have ever looked on the field and in the underlying metrics.
So, why has Tatis failed to deposit a ball over the fence yet this year? The answer lies in the one number that correlates most significantly with home runs – he has failed to pull the ball in the air. For all the red that lights up Tatis’s baseball savant page (including a league leading 63.6% hard-hit rate), the one blue box is the 5.7% Pull Air rate. This is enough to put him in the bottom 5% of all qualified MLB hitters and 6.3% lower than last year’s career low mark.
This is a problem that has plagued Tatis every year since his incredible 2021. That year, he was in the top 50 in pulling the ball in the air, which, when combined with his power, led him to a monster 42 home run season in just 130 games. Since then, he has failed to eclipse a league-average mark in that pulled air percentage, leading him to continually fall short of the home run numbers that his talent makes him capable of.
This is no longer a situation that is simply a tweak away from being solved, but rather a consistent yearly pattern that is only trending in the wrong direction. Tatis is not just getting unlucky; his approach needs a genuine overhaul that allows him to attack the ball out in front. First-year hitting coach Steven Sousa Jr. may have his work cut out for him in trying to get Tatis back to the player the Padres need.
Bolder: EVT’s Jacob Larose says Luis Campusano will take the starting catcher job by the end of 2026
As one of the longest tenured members of the Padres organization, Luis Campusano is taking advantage of finally getting some secure playing time. With no real catching depth to choose from, the Padres have placed the backup catcher role solely into Campusano’s hands, splitting time with Freddy Fermin. Fermin came into the season as the definitive starting catcher, but early-season results indicate that may not remain the case for the entire year.
Campusano has always been solid with the bat. He consistently tore up the minors, including a league-leading 1.031 OPS last year in AAA El Paso. However, his glove behind the dish has left previous Padres managers wary of giving him playing time once he inevitably hit his way to the MLB, leaving him in a form of baseball purgatory. Now, with a role secured and the pressure behind him, Campusano is thriving. His offseason work on improving his blocking, framing, and throwing out runners has paid huge dividends, pushing him from a well-below-average defender to a plus contributor. While he has gotten a little lucky at the plate so far, his offensive contributions have still been very real. His .356 xwOBA puts him above most catchers in the league in the early going. He is finally swinging the bat with confidence at the MLB level.
If this change does happen, it will not be because Freddy Fermin lost the job, but rather that Campusano earned it. Fermin’s batted ball luck has been the opposite of Campusano’s, so the offensive gap is not quite as big as the .509 difference in OPS suggests. Fermin has been swinging a little more aggressively than in years past, but his contributions at the plate will likely remain the same over the course of the season. He earned the starting role with his arm and mind, having one of the best pop times in baseball and having earned the trust of all his pitchers.
Fermin still has the defensive advantage at the most important position to have it, but as Campusano closes the gap behind the plate, the offensive advantage the latter offers may be too much for manager Craig Stammen to ignore.
Boldest: EVT’s Billy Goodwin says the Padres’ playoff rotation order will be Griffin Canning, Randy Vasquez, and Michael King.
Griffin Canning has yet to make his Padres debut, but he has a real chance to be the most impactful arm in this 2026 Padres rotation. A former top Angels prospect, the right-hander has struggled with injuries and inconsistency early in his career, including an achilles injury that has kept him sidelined to start this year. A back issue kept him sidelined for all of 2022, and he has not been the same pitcher since.
There is, however, reason to hope that Canning will become a quality contributor to the Padres’ rotation. Canning still possesses really good breaking pitches, including a new sweeper he added last year with the Mets. He is a strong supinator who has lost his early career fastball traits, but a healthier back should allow him to regain a more competitive shape, especially after working with Rueben Niebla. His groundball rate increased from 41.3% to 51.6% in 2025 en route to a career best 3.77 ERA. He has always found a way to generate whiffs, so if he can maintain the improved groundball rate, he will make some noise for the Padres down the stretch.
Canning’s command has been questionable during his unofficial spring training in El Paso this month, but he appears to be fully healthy based on his pitch shapes and velocity. His most recent start went very well, allowing no runs on three hits in five innings. Time will tell, but Canning has a chance to take advantage of a shaky rotation and earn the trust of Stammen to take the bump in game one of a Padres playoff series.
As for Vasquez and King, not much needs to be said about how these guys have performed early in the season. Both are deserving of key starts, but ultimately, this will come down to keeping these pitchers healthy on normal rest. Time will tell with the injuries to Musgrove and Pivetta, so this hot take is really just predicated on Canning producing.
Outlandish: EVT’s Brian Ferreira says the Padres will win the NL West
The boldness of this claim is not an indictment of the Padres but rather an acknowledgment of the blue team up north being an insurmountable hill to climb. Yet, there remains hope. The Dodgers are not playing to win the regular season, but rather they look to set themselves up for the postseason in hopes of a three-peat. Their deep pitching staff allows them to cruise to a postseason berth despite multiple trips to the IL for their star arms. The volume of talent on the Dodgers roster may be unprecedented, but they are not perfect.
The Padres finished three games behind the World Series champs in 2025. They have a better lineup and a new manager who has led them to the fifth-best record in baseball thus far. The bullpen is nails, and the rotation still possesses multiple former all-stars. They likely could have been favored to win a couple of other divisions in baseball, yet they opened the season at +900 to win the National League West, and their odds have not improved despite their hot start.
This division will come down to who wins their 13-game regular-season series. The Dodgers won the series 9-4 last year, enough to cost the Padres the division despite matching them the rest of the season. The Padres have frequently struggled against the Dodgers during the regular season in recent years, but a refreshed culture and mindset in the clubhouse may be enough to conquer their division foes.
Baseball is a funny sport, and there is never a shortage of surprises. Each of these predictions would have been even more bewildering just one month ago. Yet, each EVT member is confident that these “hot takes” will come to fruition, regardless of how it affects the Padres.
Jacob grew up with Padres season tickets and walls plastered with Khalil Greene memorabilia. He has dedicated all of his young professional career towards becoming baseball’s next AJ Preller, having already worked with minor league and college teams in different roles. He is always scouring the Baseball Savant page to find the next little nugget that might help his hometown Padres (or his fantasy baseball team).