Testing the Faith

As a life long Padres fan I have seen this team built up and torn down more than 5 freeway. Moves that test the faith of the fans, trading young stars like Ozzie Smith, Roberto Alomar, Fred McGriff, Gary Sheffield, Jason Bay and most recently Jake Peavy. Letting players the likes of Dave Winfield, Benito Santiago, Steve Finley and Trevor Hoffman walk away. Padres fans have had an interesting mix of owners and philosophies during a short sports life.

With the new ownership group led by Jeff Moorad now calling the shots Padres fans will soon know which road the team will travel. After trading Jake Peavy before the 2009 trade deadline, a message was sent to the fans. What was that message? That’s really up to you, the front office (FO) has been preaching th at its goal is to put the best product on the field. How can a team put the best product on the field when it does not keep its best players? Losing Hoffman and Peavy in the same season was devastating to the Friarhood (padres fans) last season. Assuming those moves were the backlash of John and Becky Moores divorce we as fans have to look at those moves as a reflection of the past, not the future.

Rumors are floating around the Padres that they have a budget in the $40 million range for 2010 and expect to raise that over the next few seasons back into the $70 million range, a llowing the team to be competitive and put a major league quality product back on the field. How do we know if the FO is serious about these numbers? Great news for the Friarhood is, the future is now, in the form of Adrian Gonzalez.

The Friarhood understand the Padres cannot afford to keep AGON at more than $15 million a season. Given that Gonzalez is from San Diego , he has very close ties to the community and the Mexican community south of the border would he stay in San Diego for less? If the answer is no, then this situation is out of the Padres hands and they need to move Gonzalez now while they are able to get a maximum return. If I believed that to be the case this would be the end of this article; however, that is not what I believe.

San Diego Discount

I believe like many others in the past, Adrian would sign for the San Diego discount. The Padres would need to be creative, including a no trade and an escalator in the contract if he were to be dealt. Similar to the escalator in Brian Giles contract that would pay him more if he was traded to another team. If you are asking a player to work for under market value you need to make some exceptions for him.  I don’t see any reason why the Padres couldn’t do that.

With that said, I am writing this article with the mind-set that Adrian Gonzalez can be retained for a reasonable price ($12 -$13 million per year).

Why trading AGON does not make sense

The argument for trading Adrian is an old beaten story, he is our best player and we can improve other positions if we trade him. Former general manager Kevin Towers did an amazing job of that, so much so that when I hear this argument my response is simple, what position are you going to improve? I realize that we do not have all-stars all over the park, but the team has young guys at every position with upside playing in San Diego now or will be at the AA level or higher next season. That is what the FO was selling us at the end of 2009, so why move our own All-Star in AGON for a handful of Prospects (suspects)?

Even if the Padres were to trade AGON for some stud prospects, wouldn’t that put the team in the same position in four to six years? Young studs that the FO can’t possibly sign to a long term deal, so the FO will trade them for more prospects, and the cycle continues. This is the problem, not the solution, by trading Gonzalez the FO is only contributing to that problem. My point being, if this team is serious about putting a competitive product on the field, trading Gonzalez does not make sense.

Why Keep Adrian Gonzalez?

With the exception of Tony Gwynn, Adrian Gonzalez will be one of the best Padres to ever play baseball. Teams are always looking for cornerstone players to BUILD a franchise around, AGON is that player. A player with a great attitude who is involved in the community, plays hard, plays every day and that’s not all.  AGON is an All-Star and now a two time golden glove winner and can simply rake. Players of this caliber don’t grow on trees, the Padres have been fortunate enough to have two of them over the past couple seasons; they already traded one in Peavy.

From a marketing stand point Gonzalez is a dream player. Even though San Diego is a large county (3.5 million people), the market reach isn’t the size of most markets. Other teams that play outside of huge metro areas typically have larger geographical regions to pull from and televise to. The Mariners have the entire Northwest US, the Rockies have the Mountain region, and the Diamondbacks even have the states of Arizona, New Mexico and part of Nevada. A major challenge for the Padres that the 90 minutes north you have another MLB team in the Angels, to the east is El Centro followed by desert and Arizona, to the west is the ocean. That leaves the only alternate market to market to expand the fan base is south, to Mexico. AGON may not be Fernando Mania, but he will be the greatest and most widely recognized Mexican pro baseball player. For a team that has a limited market Gonzalez is THE key to opening up that market to the south.

From a fan stand point, having an Adrian Gonzalez makes it worth paying the price of admission. It may be a home run, it may be a towering double, an amazing double play, a graceful scoop of a ball in the dirt to get the runner. AGON does it all (with the exception of running).

Conclusion

This new ownership is going to make a move this year that will let the Friarhood know which direction the team will be taking. Speaking as a member of the Friarhood, I am crossing my fingers that trade talk turns into extension conversation. That will let me know the team is committed to building and winning now. If the team continues to engage in trade talks in regards to Gonzalez it will let the fans know that all the “talk” of last season was lip service and we can expect the same churning and burning of quality young players as the Padres continue to be a AAAA team for teams like the Red Sox and Yankees.

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