San Diego Padres 2022 28-Man Roster Projection

It's time to start thinking about who's on the inside, and who will miss the cut to start the season, for the San Diego Padres.

One week from now, the San Diego Padres will be waking up and preparing to play a regular-season baseball game. That means it’s time to talk about what their roster will look like on opening day.

MLB rosters expanded from 25 men to 26 men a couple of years ago and, due to the shortened spring training, they’ll start this season with 28 men on the roster. My guess is that the extra bodies will be pitchers, since there’s no way those guys are completely stretched out yet, but let’s see where we land.

Catchers

Austin Nola
Victor Caratini
Luis Campusano

This is a solid group with a nice balance of offense and defense. Campusano should also get some shots at DH against LHP, when Voit is filling in for Hosmer at 1B.

Jorge Alfaro, despite a hot start to spring training, misses the cut for me. After the team traded for Matt Beaty, he became nothing more than a 4th catcher, and nobody needs a 4th catcher.

Infielders

Jake Cronenworth
Eric Hosmer
Ha-Seong Kim
Manny Machado
Luke Voit
C.J. Abrams

Yes, I am the guy that has spent all offseason saying that C.J. Abrams doesn’t have enough minor-league experience to break camp with the major-league club.

That being said, he’s been too good and I can’t deny that the manager and GM seem confident in saying he’ll be on the Padres roster. Also, until the team adds a backup CF (which would make this projection wrong in several ways), they’ll need Jurickson Profar to be an OF and they’ll need Abrams to be the backup IF.

Outfielders

Trent Grisham
Wil Myers
Jurickson Profar
Matt Beaty

This group can’t look this way for very long. Grisham can’t play every game, and the options they have for giving him a day off are all bad.

I toyed with the idea of putting Jose Azocar here, but there’s been zero buzz about him from Peoria. There’s a better chance of a guy being added to this group via trade, and I have some suggestions if A.J. Preller is reading.

Starting Rotation

Joe Musgrove
Yu Darvish
Blake Snell (LHP)
Mike Clevinger
MacKenzie Gore (LHP)

If I included C.J. Abrams, a player who has been great at spring training but will be forced into a bench role, I had to include MacKenzie Gore in the starting rotation. His performance has been impossible to ignore, and his pedigree tells us there’s a good chance this is real.

Bullpen

Nick Martinez
Dinelson Lamet
Austin Adams
Nabil Crismatt
Luis Garcia
Robert Suarez
Tim Hill (LHP)
Pierce Johnson
Emilio Pagan
Craig Stammen

This is where I struggled the most.

There are some players here that I wouldn’t be surprised if the Padres sent to the minors (Crismatt) or straight up released (Adams). I’m also painfully aware that Pagan has minor-league options, even if it would be a bit uncouth for the Padres to use them on a veteran reliever of his standing.

If it were me, I think I would start this season with Paddack and Weathers in the bullpen instead of in El Paso. That way, while the starters work to get stretched out, Bob Melvin could piggyback starters (Snell goes 3 innings and then Paddack goes 3 innings, or Clevinger goes 3 innings into Weathers going 3 innings, etc.). But I don’t think the Padres are going to do that.