As promised in yesterday’s article, here is part 2 of the 2 part Padres preview. Before you start reading, please view part 1 if you have not viewed it yet.

Part 2: San Diego’s “NOW”

One may look at the roster of players and say “these aren’t household names”, but if you peel back the surface and look into it deeper, you’ll understand what gets me excited. All these players have TONS of potential and simply haven’t peaked yet–at least for our hitters. The current starters look like this.

NOTE: This isn’t in any order and is not a project batting lineup. You’ll see that later.

1B: Yonder Alonso
2B: Logan Forsythe
3B: Chase Headley
SS: Everth Cabrera
LF: Carlos Quentin
CF: Cameron Maybin
RF: Will Venable
C: Nick Hundley

Looking at this roster, the youth is very apparent with many players yet to–or are close to–their primes. Headley is obviously the star of this team, partner this with the great speed of Maybin, Venable and Cabrera and the power of Quentin and Alonso (with Headley’s power obviously as well as his ability to drive in runs) and of course Hundley and Forsythe who can have their moments. This lineup looks pretty good and how do you make it better? A few things:

#1. This is a pitcher’s park, make it more hitter friendly! CHECK! The field dimensions have shrunk as right center field went to 391 feet and the left center field gap is now 390.

#2. Acquire some power, or at least strengthen your current players. CHECK! Aside from the smaller dimensions, the Padres did acquire an Australian Baseball Triple Crown Winner by the name of Adam Buschini. Who hit 14 home runs in 96 games (which translates into about 23-24 home runs in a 162 game season) along with .354 batting average. Another note is Yasmani Grandal, who is suspended for the first 50 games due to PED’s. He had some good power, but who knows now after the PED’s. And the last piece is develop Gyorko, as he has 30 home runs in the minors and could be more powerful second basemen than Forsythe.

Let’s look at pitching, here is my projected starting rotation. 
1. Clayton Richard
2. Edison Volquez
3. Eric Stults
4. Jason Marquis
5. Tyson Ross

While the top 3 are pretty decent to me, the bottom 2 in the rotation aren’t that well. But again, how do we improve? Well the Padres do have other options for starting pitching to fall back on. Garcia, Bass, Kelly, and news has it. The Padres are shopping for a starting pitcher. Wieland is another option as well.

The bullpen will be pretty good as well. Joe Thatcher, Brad Boxberger, Tommy Layne, Dale Thayer, Luke Gregerson, and Huston Street all have fairly good arms, or have potential. This is a few of the arms in the bullpen, it’ll be interesting to see how Bud Black will mix it all up.

So combine all of this and soak it all in. Add the smaller dimensions with the a 1/3rd of the lineup having above average power (Headley, Quentin and Alonso) along with players that can excel on the bases and stretch singles into doubles and doubles into triples (Maybin, Venable, Cabrera) And with some positives in Forsythe and Hundley. And if we can get some good run support to support what looks like to be a good lineup for the Padres. The last two spots in the rotation may not be exposed that well, which could translate into more wins.

Part 3: San Diego’s Local Talent

Local talent is a key to any team on any level because your scouts are usually on top of that player before anyone else can get a hold of him. The Padres do have a VERY strong college team in the USD Toreros baseball program which is usually always ranked in the NCAA. You’ve also got Tony Gwynn coaching SDSU baseball stars. Partner this with some good, local high schools that have some good baseball talent such as Vista High School which is located in San Diego County, as well as Mater Dei High School.

Here is now my projected lineup card for opening day.

SS: Everth Cabrera
RF: Will Venable
3B: Chase Headley
LF: Carlos Quentin
CF: Cameron Maybin
1B: Yonder Alonso
2B: Logan Forsythe
C: Nick Hundley
P: Clayton Richard

As you can see, I think they should establish speed early and get on base. Then you have to good hitters/power hitters to drive them in. After that, you’ve got more speed and more power with Maybin and Alonso. Forsythe and Hundley can always work there way up as I think they both have a pretty good future.

My Padres season predictions:
They will start hot, I say they win 10-12 in their first 15 games. Come all-star break, I see this team being in 3rd place in the NL West about 8-11 games back and at about 45-49 wins at the break. This team has a tendency to be hot out of the all-star break, but I think the division is stronger and thus making it harder to win those key division games. With 67 games left, I see the Padres winning around 35-38 of them finishing slightly above .500. I believe the Padres will go 83-79 finishing 8.5 games out of first.

Finally, my division winners go as followed:

AL East: Toronto Blue Jays
AL Central: Detroit Tigers
AL West: Los Angeles Angels
WC 1: Baltimore Orioles
WC 2: Oakland A’s

NL East: Atlanta Braves
NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals
NL West: Los Angeles Dodgers
WC 1: Washington Nationals
WC 2: Cincinnati Reds

Wild Cards:
Nationals over Reds, Orioles over A’s.

Division:
Nationals over Braves: 3-2
Dodgers over Cardinals: 3-2
Tigers over Orioles: 3-2
Blue Jays over Angels: 3-2

NLCS/ALCS:
NLCS: Nationals over Dodgers: 4-2
ALCS: Blue Jays over Tigers: 4-3

World Series:
In a 6 game series, my prediction for the World Series winner is. The Washington Nationals.

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