Padres Trade RUMORS Escalating...

July 31st, 2025. Let's flash it back. A.J. Preller made a deal at the deadline to send two of our pitchers to Kansas City for Freddie Fermin, Ryan Berger, and Stephen Kolick. Both went that way to try and fix our catching position. Fifteen months later, the Padres seem to be in the exact opposite position. They no longer necessarily need a catcher, and they badly need some. pitching. Seven starters from last year's staff are free agents, among them Michael King and Nick Pavetta. And this week at the GM meetings in Las Vegas, it seems according to reports that people are hitting up AJ Preller about our catchers and their availability for trade. So let's talk about that on this episode of Padres Digest. What's going on, everybody? Christian Pedersen back with another episode of the show that is remaining ever optimistic and stoked about our new graphics. Teams seem to be calling about Freddy Fermin and Luis Campusano. Preller did not hide this. He has been quoted about saying that it is an area that they have been hit up for by multiple teams, that he needs multiple starters to keep going for our rotation. So one of the guys who we might not necessarily need between those two could be on the move. Which one goes? Do both go? Do both come back for opening day? Do we go with three catchers, four catchers? Do we go with nothing but catchers? Let's talk about it. Adrian Preller has not come out and said that he wants to move on from anybody specifically. He said that, quote, we feel like we can win in the playoffs at that position. Craig Stammen. Last season, Craig Stammen leaned on the multiple catcher system, switching from Fermin as the defensive option to Campusano as the offensive option. The third catcher, though, entered late into the conversation was Ethan Salas, the rookie phenom. He's 20. In case you somehow missed his debut last season, it was angelic. He came up in September, ended up hitting .256 over his first 16 big league games. he is the youngest since Pudge to be behind the dish at the major league level he ended up being the youngest ever to catch a postseason game his numbers before the call up he was hitting close to 300 in the minors with a 374 on base percentage walked in 12% of his trips to the plate 12% of his trips to the plate struck out in just 14% of them. That's over 400 at-bats. The glove still has work to do, but he has long been touted as being high defensive upside. Preller called it a competition-type situation for Salas and said that nobody is going to be guaranteed anything. But in all reality, that feels like... You know, trying to light a fire under people and trying to keep things competitive and not tip his hand. And let's talk, though, about seriously, if Ethan Salas wins this, even if it's not winning it by opening day, just say in the big picture, it feels reasonable to say that Ethan Salas wins this and makes one of those two guys redundant. The question is, though. What do you do there? Because they couldn't be more different. Freddie Fermin is a Gold Glove finalist. He is a defensive specialist and a guy who, other than two magical home runs to save two different games in the middle of the season, is not offensive. Campuzano, one of the better hitting catchers in all of baseball, but not somebody that is aggressively trusted behind the plate. Campuzano, let's talk about his numbers. He hit 265 last season in 71 games. Just shy of 258 plate appearances, 8 home runs, 30 RBIs. So if you look into the more advanced numbers, he is on the upper side of the WRC plus, yada, yada, yada type stuff that teams can situationally really bite their teeth into, saying that he hard hit balls this amount of percentages. And he. This is all coming off of bouncing back from a 2025 season where he just played in 10 big league games to be that Stammen had much more confidence in him than Mike Schilt. Preller has come out and said he has, quote, flashes and that his year was consistent. For me, he's the glove, as we mentioned, when the Padres went and got him. He was hitting .255. Now it's just it fell off the face of the earth to .203 this season. His OPS, not much better. Really, if you go down into any of the metrics, you can be like, okay, he hits balls hard at a certain rate, but it's just, you don't have an offensive option. But behind the plate, it flips. He is an absolutely phenomenal defensive catcher. He started and played more games last season, 95 games at catcher compared to Campuzano's 56. He didn't allow a single passed ball, Gold Glove finalist this year. He is somebody who you can measure his defensive runs saved. They were tied for sixth in all of baseball. Statcast kind of paints the same way I was saying with Campuzano being as a better offensive option. You look at framing, pop time, blocking, throwing, etc., etc., etc. et cetera, et cetera. Freddie Fermin is better at all of it than the average catcher, if not considered elite at all of it. In looking at these meetings in Las Vegas, a team that needs offense could call for Campy. A team that needs defense could call for Firmin. And that feels like that opens up to not just an opportunity of saying, hey, we've got two of the same thing, and only one team's going to go after them. There could be two trades to help replenish and bring in some arms. And to me, as much as I like both of those guys, this is not a video about, oh, I don't trust or like either one of them. We need pitching. And this could be a really easy way to bring in some bulk arms that still allow us to spin big at the very top of the rotation, but help in the relief pitching and starting. Michael King, Nick Pavetta, Walker Buehler, Robbie Ray, Casey Mize, Lucas Giolito, Griffin Canning, all of them free agents. Preller has even though said also of Joe Musgrove that we're not starting the off season, like he's definitely our opening day roster. So our opening day starter. We don't even know if the guys who are on the roster right now as starting pitchers are all entirely locked in. I've got other videos on that, so make sure you check that out. Because it is technically Randy Vasquez, J.P. Sears, Brito, Jagger, Haynes, Musgrove, Darvish. Technically, I guess we could start this season right now and have a rotation, but I would certainly feel more optimistic if we had some other additional help. And also, we signed another guy yesterday, but that's not the end of it. Skubal is a deal, though, that could cost real money. The catchers are cheap, and so it's not necessarily going to clear us cap, but that's where I say, you know, cheap in, cheap out. With the money that is projected at one-something for his contract and for me at two-something for what they are both going to get in arbitration is It's reasonable, but that to me, I think, makes them very enticing trade pieces. And plus, they're under control for several more years. They line up to have the right kind of contracts that I think there are teams out there that would be very interested in these guys. So let's look then at a little bit of the market for what exists out there, looking back at what Preller got for, or what he gave for Firmin, a pair of pitchers who were right on that borderline of guys that had been kind of up into the majors for a little bit, making their debuts young. ...cheap arms in a situation where Firmin was the backup catcher and platooning with Salvador Perez. So if you look across at what is available out there for, or what is the market for teams that might need guys who are... platoon situations that could be a defensive option and one that could be an offensive option that might have some controllable young maybe non-superstar role my eyes on that but i'll take anybody right now that gives us an upside but looking at some teams around there that might have some interest in those kinds of deals i think that there are two that i've found that could fit really nicely that i'd be interested in talking about first one being for me and the Yankees. Back on October 12th, Joel Sherman listed the Padres catcher as amongst the options that the Yankees could be interested in. For me, that's where I'm saying he fits as a, they have a good starting catcher offensive option, but for me, could be that perfect back in, backstop, backup, defensive back guy. I don't know why I'm saying back so much there. The gold glove finalist could be someone that if Brian Cashman calls up Preller. I think Preller could say, hey, no, we don't want some low-A teenager, many years out prospect. This could be something where the Yankees have a decent amount of guys who are at that triple-A, high double-A promotable level that give me, basically, I'm asking for the prices, Stephen Kovlick and Ryan Berger. I don't think that that's unreasonable to flip basically for mean for what you got him for. On the Campisano side, I want to talk about the Phillies. JT Realmuto re-signed with them, but He's aging and he is slowing down. He's going to be 36 before next season. And as much as they love him and he is their guy, he also hit .205 this last season. His on-base percentage went down. Dave Dombrowski has been public in saying that his goal is to try and reduce the number of games that Rio Muto catches. So Campy could be, I think, that perfect platoon at... The DH catcher have some opportunities to come in there. The Phillies, to me, still feel like they have that. Try and win now window open of we've got Schwarber, we've got Harper, we've got all these guys. So enticing them with, hey, trade us some of your younger arms and we'll add one more bat to your juggernaut lineup or whatever could be a perfect situation. So while there's no perfect fit or answer to this, I think in looking at all of this, my TLDR summary is let's go all in it on the window that we have right now and that being a That being a chance to go in on a young generational catcher in Ethan Salas. And I'm not saying just arbitrarily trade them for the sake of clearing the deck to give Salas all the starts. But if you're saying that we could flip those guys for three, four. Four and a half, five arms and bulk some opportunities to actually have some depth on the pitching side and that our problem is the same problem we've always had where our backup catcher is not that great because we've got to go down into the minors now and get somebody else. That to me feels like less of a worry than the starting pitching, given that it seems like the argument that we have every single year with ourselves is our starting pitching has fallen apart. I want arms. Let's load up on some arms, even if that means having to say goodbye to some guys that we really like. Let me know what you think. Like, subscribe, comment, share, follow, all those other YouTube-y buttons. Until next time, talk to you soon. And as always, go Padres.