Life without Tatis (again)
As the Padres try to keep pace with the best teams in the NL, they'll face another stretch of playing without their best player.
Maybe the most amazing part of Fernando Tatis Jr.’s incredible season, in which he is still the NL MVP front-runner, is that he’s been doing it while injured.
We’ve known since Spring Training that Tatis has a shoulder issue that will require surgery at some point. I recall, back then, a large portion of the fanbase pushing for Tatis to get the surgery then and be done with it. Instead, he’s putting together one of the best MLB seasons a 22-year old has even seen and occasionally missing time when he aggravates the shoulder.
On Friday night, Tatis slid into 3rd base and aggravated the shoulder.
Disappointing? Sure. Sad? Of course. The Padres are floundering a bit and they probably want their best player to try and help them get back on a winning streak. (It’s been almost 2 weeks since they were able to put together back-to-back wins.)
That being said, I’ve decided to try and look at the sunny side this morning. So, here we go, the list of silver linings in Tatis re-injuring his shoulder.
No further damage
Full warning, this tweet could give you whiplash:
I always bristle at the word “surgery”. I know modern medicine, especially what these athletes are getting, is pretty damn reliable. I just hate the idea of changing anything about Tatis and what kind of impact it could have on him. Still, I know he and everyone would rather him have that surgery in November than in August.
The “no further damage” part of this tweet is the part that feels the best to me. That means they didn’t have to change the plans or worry additionally about some long-term injury that could derail his career. It’s the same injury, he just aggravated it.
Nando the rocketship
Fernando Tatis is familiar with the Injured List, at this point. Not only has this shoulder caused him to miss time earlier this season, but he also missed time due to a positive COVID-19 test. Let’s see how he has performed in his first 10 games after returning from the IL:
4/16-4/25: .282/.364/.769
5/19-5/29: .457/.522/.1.114
Two times is a pattern and three is a trend. It seems like, after time off, Tatis comes off the IL ready to crush some damn baseballs. That could be the jolt that the team needs to get hot, and stay hot, for August and September.
A crowded infield
A.J. Preller did his best to address the Padres’ depth/bench issues at the trade deadline. One thing he has done, and continues to do, is fill his roster with utility infielders.
In addition to the starters (Machado, Tatis, Cronenworth, Hosmer), the Padres have the following guys ready to go:
Jurickson Profar ($4.3M)
Adam Frazier ($4.3M)
Ha-Seong Kim ($7.0M)
Jorge Mateo ($571K)
That’s about $16 million paid in guys that can fill the spot left behind by Tatis temporarily. In all honesty, with Hosmer still on the roster, this does make the Adam Frazier addition a little less clunky.
I feel like the Padres will try Cronenworth at SS and Frazier at 2B more than any other configuration, but then there’s this piece of info:
Wow! I know the Padres had a potential star in Kim when they signed him, but to see him turn into that player would be really special for the team and this front office. So far, while those stats are nice, you have to imagine those numbers have been somewhat massaged by the team being careful in picking his matchups.
Now he gets a chance to prove that he’s all caught up and was just looking for a chance to start for a period of time. It is certainly possible that he shows he’s ready to be a starter at this level, which makes the Padres’ infield even more crowded than it already is.
Team effort
The last time Tatis was lost for an extended period of time was when he tested positive for COVID-19. He missed 9 games, and the Padres went 8-1 in those games. They went 7-2 in the 9 games following his return, part of an absolutely hellacious road trip that took them around the country while decimating the San Diego bullpen.
It was the best part of the season for the team, which many expected to crumble. Manny Machado and Trent Grisham, specifically, carried the offense while the pitching outdueled every team they saw (until running out of gas at Wrigley Field).
Basically, when the other players needed to pick up the slack to keep things going, they did. They showed up. They’ll need to do it again if they want to stay anywhere close to the Dodgers and Giants, and keep a good distance between them and any competition for the second Wild Card spot.
Trent Grisham and Tommy Pham have been struggling mightily for weeks now, but maybe they can be a part of an offense that switches into another gear. Maybe this intense pressure to perform without Tatis will help them find that thing that has been missing for most of the season, where the offense shows up for big games and big moments but is otherwise inconsistent.
Maybe, just maybe, this will be a good thing. Perhaps this will wake up the sleeping giant that is the San Diego Padres offense, and Tatis will come back on fire and ready to make some real noise heading into the toughest part of the schedule.