As the 2025 regular season continues, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world today:
1. Padres scrambling in center?
The Padres’ lineup took a major hit when Jackson Merrill went on the injured list with a hamstring strain earlier this week, but that injury looms even larger now that outfielder Brandon Lockridge is suffering from a hamstring issue of his own. Lockridge hasn’t hit much (58 wRC+) in a part-time role this year, but he figured to get expanded opportunities as the club’s center fielder while Merrill is out of action. As noted by Jeff Sanders of the San Diego Union-Tribune, Lockridge appears to have avoided significant damage but is day-to-day due to inflammation in his hamstring.
If Lockridge is unable to play, the Padres’ options in center are shaky at best. Jason Heyward has plenty of experience but only played seven innings there in 2024 and is now in his age-35 season. Oscar Gonzalez and Tyler Wade have both made token appearances in center over their MLB careers, but a 40-man roster move to bring up a non-roster player like Tim Locastro may be in order if Lockridge ends up missing time. One other option could be sliding Fernando Tatis Jr. over to center field. He has just 12 games of experience at the position but has expressed interest in playing there more frequently in the past.
2. Series Preview: Cubs @ Padres
Speaking of the Padres, they’re entering a series that could wind up serving as a preview of a playoff matchup if the two participating teams continue their hot starts to the season. The Cubs have won four consecutive series and are 11-7 overall, and they’re arriving in San Diego to face a Padres club that’s 13-3 so far this year. Two of those three losses came in Chicago just last week, but the Padres are undefeated in 10 home games to this point in the season. The series kicks off at 6:40pm local time this evening, with right-hander Dylan Cease set to take the mound against the team that drafted him opposite Jameson Taillon. After today’s game, the sides will have two rematches from last week’s series with Randy Vasquez and Nick Pivetta both toeing the rubber for the Padres opposite Shota Imanaga and Matthew Boyd.
3. Pitchers’ duel in St. Louis:
The Cardinals are hosting the Astros at 6:45pm CT to kick off this week’s three-game series, and both teams are sending their aces to the mound for today’s contest. Veteran right-hander Sonny Gray has had a bit of a difficult start to his age-35 season, with a 4.50 ERA over his first three starts, but he looked more like himself his last time out against the Pirates when he shut down Pittsburgh’s offense with five innings of three-hit ball. Southpaw Framber Valdez, meanwhile, has looked as good as ever as he kicks off his final year before free agency. He’s posted a 2.50 ERA and struck out 29.6% of opponents over his first three starts, including six scoreless innings where he struck out eight Mariners and held Seattle to just two hits his last time out.
Colin Rea did a nice job holding down the fort against the Dodgers yesterday. Considering the circumstances of being an emergency opener, he did his job. That said, the Padres are on fire it’s going to be a tough team to face.
Then made it back to weekend update on sat
Yeah, but we beat the Rockies who have one guy who can hit (Kyle Farmer). The Rox looked horrible this weekend.
Still it’s a good sign seeing the padres bulldoze the rockies like everyone else does instead of inexplicably struggling.
Easy reason. No more Charlie Blackmon!
Cubs deserve credit for being 11-7 with that brutal travel and tough schedule to start their season,
May should be an easier time, but you’re right Cubs are doing pretty good against all these good teams in April.
Cubs April schedule is, last season record wise, the toughest month of ANY month for ANY team all season….followed by May—the easiest month of ANY month for ANY team all season. Very quirky how that came out.
I was hoping for about 15-16 at the end of April and not that far back from any team in the division. That would be a little bit of a let down now—but still a brutal two weeks ahead.
Best time of year to play tough teams in the beginning of the year before most good teams get their footing.
Best time of day to dine at Subway is in the beginning of the day before most good customers get their footlong.
@Acoss1331
Just watch out. Sometimes, teams bring their A-game against top teams and then reign it in against weaker teams and that’s when we see the Ls pile up. Expect at least a blowout or series loss against one or both of the Pirates & ChiSox. Just ask the Red Sox this weekend…
Know what they say April Showers bring Tyler Flowers, time to start banking wins to avert the June Swoon
Enjoy the Golden Showers that Reinsdorf installed this season at Rate.
Also at Mar E Lago
I love how every Cub win goes straight up your tailpipe sideways.
Crazy to me that they have the Dodgers again this week. Their BP is a little suspect, but they look scary in the early goings.
True, but after that Dodgers series at Wrigley next week they don’t play each other again until mid October. Same story with the Padres and Diamondbacks after this week for the Cubs.
@mike127
How do you know the Dodgers even make it to October? 😀
For that matter, how do you know the Cubs make it there either. Nothing is written in stone yet, except for the Rockies being mathematically eliminated already.
Isn’t it usually the Brewers and the Dodgers in the first round
TOR level arm has been out for a week and Chicago is Steele standing at 11-7. Way to Cubbies!
Toronto level arm? 🙂
Gausman yaas. Or as Mets fans say, yaaaas Queens. Manoah? Not so much.
Oops. T-O-R as in Top of Rotation.
@C Yards Jeff
Sorry, I knew what you meant. Just poking fun.
Big shoutout to Fever Pitch Guy and his Red Sox team that dropped 2 of 3 games to the lowly ChiSox. I guess the Red Sox will not be considered “tough competition” on April 22nd after their win total has NOT been fattened. Good luck against the tough Rays…
mlbtraderumors.com/2025/04/mlb-mailbag-ptbnl-brewe…
Old York: It’s easy to look past a team like the White Sox. I’m not saying that’s what the Red Sox did, but I hardly think the White Sox won those two on talent alone. I had a feeling Crochet might throw a no-hitter yesterday and he almost did. He’s got it in him to do it hopefully this year. That would be two ex-Sox (Cease) pitchers to do it.
They needed their gazillion dollar pitcher to get past a Rule 5 guy and eke out a late win to avoid the zweep
The White Sox didn’t beat the Red Sox 2 out of three, the Red Sox lost game 1 all on their own with sloppy defense, poor pitching, and ice cold offense. Crochet and Story saved the series from being a total disaster yesterday
Tatis to CF makes the most sense to me. Internally their closest option might be Wall @ AAA. Wouldn’t rule out a trade either at this point. Very unfortunate how the injuries lined up with Merrill and Lockridge, but fortunately nothing long-term.
I speedread and overlooked Locastro. He’s down at Padres ACL.. is he rehabbing an injury?
straight: I think Tatis is a good enough athlete that he would do fine in CF. I’m not that familiar with the SD roster, so who would play RF?
Heyward would make the most sense to me. Gonzalez can cover LF. Cubs are throwing Boyd and Imanaga next series so Padres won’t get the platoon advantage for Heyward, but I’m not seeing a lot of help on the farm.
I doubt they move Tatis to CF. I think they’ll just play Tyler Wade there since he was just added back to the 40 man and is a good enough athlete to cover the position with his plus speed. They had him play a full game in Center in AAA this year before his call up.
Not worth risking playing Tatis out of position for a couple of games.
I don’t see what risk is there. No more risk in CF than RF, right? He’s their best OF defender. Wade is fast and cover in a pinch; he doesn’t have OF instincts. I wouldn’t want to see him starting there for any length of time.
I agree Wade is a real option as well as Heyward
I’ll take Wade if Merrill is coming back in the early side if IL window and if Lockridge is truly day to day (like the rest of us!) Less disruption in team.
I’m guessing it’s Heyward in cf, Tatis isnt completely healthy (shoulder and bruised hip) and might not even play every game this series
Still not seeing the risk. If he can play RF, I’m sure his body can handle CF.
Heyward makes more sense and is far more expendable than Tatis to risk injury putting him there
What injury risk? It’s the same positional expectations with different sight lines. Hell I’d argue there’s more of an injury risk in the corners tracking down foul balls going out of play.
More ground to cover, greater chance at having to dive for balls.
Padres. Depth. Hmmmmmmmmm.
MLB Fan:
Just to confirm, The Padres are down 2 starting pitchers since the beginning of the season, missed Merrill the last 6 games, Cronenworth the last 3 games, are leading the toughest division in baseball?
And you’re questioning the depth of the team???
Hmmmmmm….someone hasn’t been paying attention.
They’re weathering the storm but for depth to be the reason it would have to be the guys filling in making meaningful contributions. That said I hope the padres win the division
Wire to Wire: Your take is depth players need to contribute to maintain success? Uhhhhh…..yep! Thank you captain obvious.
Yeah.. I don’t think the padres are still winning due to depth.
Jed Hoyer record as GM is .486 in 5 yrs. He’s doing it wrong.
But he save Ricket moolah so not too shabhy
If the AL Playoffs started today, the Angels and Tigers would get byes.
Padres could call up Ornelas who’s already on the 40man
Move Tatis Jr to CF Ornelas in RF
LF Heyward/Gonzalez
RF Ornelas/ Iglesias
Machado Bogaerts cronenworth arraez on the INF
Padres are trying to push Ornelas defensively this year, but he’s primarily been a LF/DH type. I would keep Heyward in RF and platoon Ornelas and Gonzalez in LF.
Agreed @Straight. That’s exactly what I’m thinking. Doesn’t seem like the Pads want to move Tatis over short term though. I’m guessing Ornelas comes up, and Hayward plays center for the next few games.
Heyward has barely played 300 innings in CF since 2022 and isn’t the defender he used to be. He’s still above-average in RF. I don’t think it’s a huge ask for Tatis to cover CF for a week.
The reasons I think it’s a no brainer to keep Tatis in RF:
1) Playing guys out of position does not lower injury risk.
2) There isn’t a stud available that the only way to get him in the lineup includes moving Tatis to CF.
3) It’s a couple of games.
Yes, Tatis could play CF and when he was initially moved to the outfield that seemed like the consensus want by the fan base. Grisham was using a whiffle bat after all. That said RF in San Diego requires a legit athlete with the deep gaps. Tatis winning the Platinum glove there basically comes down to not screwing with a good thing, which should have been point #4 above.
But playing games out of position doesn’t necessarily increase injury risk. We’re talking about the difference between the two most difficult OF positions and Tatis has the arm for CF. Their two best defensive OFers on the 26-man are Tatis and Heyward and Heyward can’t cover CF at an average level any more.. how else would you arrange them?
Since Merrill is eligible to come off the IL on Friday and we haven’t heard otherwise I would likely just start Wade in CF if Lockridge is also out for these next couple of games.
I want Tatis to play in as many games as possible and I do think playing him in his non usual position does increase the chance of an injury. Moving him to CF so we can get a what, an 80 OPS+ bat in RF seems like the definition of pointless.
Either Wade or Heyward could handle the CF for a [U]couple of games[/U].
According to the announcers of the nationally televised Dodgers Cubs game last night (David Cone especially) the Padres ( best record in baseball) will inevitably spiral out of contention and be trading everyone at TD to dump salary. So it doesn’t matter apparently who plays cf this week.
I still don’t see what CF has to offer that RF doesn’t have to deal with. The injury risk argument doesn’t hold water to me.
Getting Tatis in CF is to get the best defensive alignment possible, and I think the team, for all it’s talk and early results of challenging for the division, would want to leave no stone unturned. If it’s Heyward in CF, well, I can live with it. As far as Heyward’s bat, he and Tatis are going to be playing the OF everyday (unless Shildt does something silly like Gonzalez in CF for the platoon), so might as well get the best bang for your buck.
Much respect to the padres but they looked completely overmatched vs cubs last time out
It was not a good series at all for the Padres. That said they still had 27 hits to the Cubs 20 hits over the three games.
Lankster:
I would hold off on the WS parade for the Cubs just yet. It’s still April. Think both Padres and Cubs have been playing well.
Let’s see what this 3-game set results in.
Padres have trouble against lefties so far early this year (same way it started out last year too).
Padres need 2 out of 3 to nullify the season series advantage come playoff time.
Didn’t say nothin about WS or anything about the cubs being better. Just going off the eye test as I was able to watch that whole series
I didn’t get that impression, it’s not like the cubs swept them. Pivetta and Hart imploded in their starts and SD somehow won a game where their starter didn’t even finish the first inning.
Shota admittedly shoved in the Cubs home opener, but this time around the rotations line up so it’s Cease against Taillon instead of Hart. Chicago has to deal with the ace on the road instead of the #5 at home so it’ll be interesting to see how that plays out.
Padres are looking shaky at best in the SP department, Lockridge and Merrill will be back soon enough, Ornelas and Iglesias can plug the gap out there, Sheets can play a little OF. Every dent in the armor that is the Padres offense has them one day closer to making the big trades. Question is, do you go with the no surrender, never say die trades (De Vries and Salas) or the retreat and regroup trades (King and Cease). Both strategies have a positive expectation, both can fall flat. Interesting spot the Padres are in.
A team that just shut out their opponent all 3 games of the series and leads mlb with 6 shutouts in their first 16 games is looking shaky at best about their starting pitching??
That’s about as solid of a take as wondering if the team with the best record in baseball will be buying or selling at the deadline.
You heard it here first.
They might add another SP, since payroll is already well over 1st tier of CBT
I’ve been begging for the King extension for over a year now. Just bite the bullet and maybe lower this year’s hit to get under by giving him what he will get in FA. Where do we start? 6/130? Already thinking that is too low?
Fried just got 8/218 after his age-30 season. Fried had more injury concern and also a larger body of work, I’m thinking King’s camp is targeting at least 7/185.
King’s in the driver’s seat. If he keeps pitching at AS level I doubt 6/130 will do it. If he spirals, he’s got a $3.75M buyout guaranteed next year. So many long term deals now are also impacted by potential lockout 2027. There could be massive reshuffling of rosters between now and then.
I would jump at 6/130m right now plus throw in lots of goodies so he could earn more. An additional 5m/yr for every 30 GS and give him the opportunity to turn that last year into a player option if he reaches certain milestones.
He’s got to be a pretty big fan of the Padres for all they have done for his career. He’s sung Ruben Niebla’s praises numerous times and that makes sense.
I hope they’re working on a deal with him now. Great arm to front the rotation going forward.