The Padres need Fernando Tatis Jr. to return to MVP form
Mandatory Credit: Denis Poroy-Imagn Images
To reach their ultimate goal, the San Diego Padres need an MVP-caliber year from Fernando Tatis Jr. in 2025 and beyond.Â
The San Diego Padres came within one win of advancing in the playoffs last season.
Sadly, the offense went cold at an inopportune moment. Those two losses to the Dodgers will sting for a while.
The offensive unit stayed consistent the entire season (for the most part), so the collapse was shocking, to say the least. The coming season still brings excitement for the Padres despite the results in 2024. San Diego is built to win now, and anything short of a World Series victory will be deemed a failure.
In order for the San Diego Padres to reach their lofty goal of a championship, they need more production from outfielder Fernando Tatis Jr.
To put it bluntly- he must be better than what he’s shown in recent years. He must be an MVP candidate.
Tatis is one of the better players in the league at the moment. But the Padres need him to be the best. The talent and ability are there for the young outfielder, but he has failed to put it all together for one complete season. We see it in flashes, but injuries and off-field stuff have complicated his production.
It is frustrating to watch. We all know he is capable of so much more.
Obviously, Tatis will always struggle to overcome the PED suspension from the 2022 season. He tarnished his name, and it will be difficult for him ever to overcome the stigma attached.
The sad fact is that some around the league will always view Fernando Tatis Jr. as a cheater. There is no undoing this. It is permanent. Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Alex Rodriguez were all first-ballot Hall-Of-Famers, except for the fact each has ties to PEDs. Now, each man will wait to be enshrined. Their wait may last a lifetime as the media is taking a hard stance on the issue.
Fernando Tatis Jr. is capable of doing special things on the baseball diamond. We all remember the Matrix-type moves avoiding tags on the basepaths or the tagging up from third base on infield pop-ups and scoring. Tatis does things on the field that you’ve never seen before. He routinely displays magical tendencies with ease that leave his teammates in awe. Tatis is the definition of a five-tool player. He is a star.
For the Padres, Fernando Tatis Jr. must remain consistent.
The book on him is clear. Up and in with the fastball and breaking stuff away off the plate. When he is on, Tatis doesn’t chase these pitches off the plate. He doesn’t even flinch at them. However, more often than not, we saw the slugger flail at pitches that were clearly balls off the plate. In some at-bats, a pitcher would not even need to throw a strike to the young slugger to get him out.
When reviewing the numbers from Tatis before and after his PED suspension year of 2022, there are some glaring things. From 2019 to 2021, Tatis recorded a .958 OPS. In his two seasons since that faithful 2022 season, Tatis has put up a .796 OPS. That is a substantial drop-off in production.
In looking at his monthly breakdown for each season prior to 2022, Tatis consistently recorded a .800 OPS or higher (12 out of the 13 months he played). In the last two seasons, he has only eclipsed a .800 or higher OPS in three of the ten months. Thankfully for Padres fans, Tatis ended the 2024 season with two productive months, putting up a 1.062 month in June and a .868 in September once he returned from injury.
That brings us to another thing- his durability. There have been consistent injuries from Tatis that have limited his time on the field. In 2023, he played 140 games, which was far and away his highest amount of games played in a season; The Padres NEED at least 140 games from this slugger. At his age, he should be in the lineup each and every day. There is no excuse for that.
The purpose of the post isn’t to tear down Fernando Tatis Jr. The meaning is to show that he is capable of much, much more.
Victor Rodriguez, the Padres hitting coach, must continue to drill Tatis. In order for the Padres to reach that promised land, Tatis needs to continue to develop and get better.
He needs to be an MVP.
James was born and raised in America’s Finest City. He is a passionate baseball fan with even more passion towards his hometown Padres. Editor-In-Chief of EastVillageTimes.com. Always striving to bring you the highest quality in San Diego Sports News. Original content, with original ideas, that’s our motto. Enjoy.