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San Diego Padres
Scouting Report
By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
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The Padres, with centerfielder Finley, hope to turn around
last year's first-to-last
disaster.
(John W.
McDonough)
| When Brigham
Young
righthander Kevin Towers received the phone call in June 1982
informing him that the Padres had drafted him in the first
round, he immediately thought of the Golden Arches.
All he knew about the team was that it was
owned by Ray A. Kroc, founder of the
McDonald's chain. "I thought that I might get a signing
bonus in Big Macs," says Towers, who never made it to
the majors as a player but is now San Diego's general
manager. "Then I thought, San Diego Padres? Who the
heck are those
guys?"
Good question even now. The franchise has had a difficult
time establishing an identity in part because of the long
shadow cast by the Dodgers just up the coast. For the first
20 years after the Padres' debut in '69, they had a
personality as
nondescript as the basic brown that was the basic color of their
uniforms. (The club's first expansion draft pick was even
named Ollie Brown.) They bettered .500 just once in their
first 15 seasons. Other than an anomalous World Series
appearance in
'84, it was only in the '90s that San Diego began to
differentiate
itself,
mainly by being so
unpredictable.
Are the Padres the ambitious spenders who acquired Fred
McGriff in '91 and Gary Sheffield in '92 to pursue a
pennant? Or are they the panic sellers who traded both
players in '93? Are they the dauntless National League West
division champs of '96? Or
are they the first-to-worst flops of '97? "Lately we're
so consistently inconsistent, nobody knows what to make of
us," rightfielder Tony Gwynn says. "It's like
this unending roller-coaster ride where we climb and climb,
and then we drop like a rock and
all you hear are the bloodcurdling
screams."
With another last-place finish in '98, the Padres might be
on their way to assuming a new identity in a different
hometown. A bond issue for a baseball-only stadium in San
Diego will likely appear on the ballot in November, and
voters are already in a
lousy mood after being saddled last year with a
$78 million bill for improvements to Qualcomm Stadium. Owner
John Moores, who says the team lost
$8 million in '97 despite the second-best season attendance in
franchise history, insists that he cannot make a profit
without a new stadium. What's more, the team's lease at
Qualcomm expires after the '99 season. A line is about to
be drawn in the Pacific
sand.
It's interesting that the future of the franchise has been
entrusted in part to yet another guy named Brown.
Righthander Kevin Brown, who arrived in a
Dec. 15 trade with the Marlins, should boost a staff that
combined for a 4.98 ERA, the second worst in the National
League and the worst ever for the Padres. San Diego's
rotation averaged just
5 2/3 innings per start and combined for only five complete
games. Last year Brown averaged more than seven innings per
start and pitched six complete games. For a club that
hasn't had a true ace since Randy Jones in '80, Brown may
be the most important
addition to any team since last season. "All I know is that
I can't be concerned with any of the Padres' problems off
the field," Brown says. "I can't be on the mound
thinking, If I don't throw a strike here, the team might
move."
Even without the stadium issue, there should be a sense of
urgency for a team with just two regulars younger than 30.
By acquiring Brown and adding depth to the bench and
bullpen, in the persons of infielder Andy Sheets and
lefties Mark Langston and Ed
Vosberg, Moores is maintaining a
$45 million payroll, the largest in team history and more than
three times what it was when he bought the club in '94.
It's a last-ditch investment in the club's future in San
Diego.
Recent polls indicate that the stadium vote could swing
either way and that if the proposal doesn't pass by '99,
the Padres will be radically altered. Brown, third baseman
Ken Caminiti, outfielder Steve Finley and first baseman
Wally Joyner are all
potential free agents after the season; the team could be
dismantled much as the '97 Marlins were. Manager Bruce
Bochy jokes about insisting that all his players move to
San Diego to establish residence in time for the November
election.
"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that
if the vote was taken today, the stadium probably wouldn't
get
built," says Gwynn, who won his fourth straight National League
batting title last year. "But if we have a good
season, then maybe we
have a chance to sway enough people. This could be the most
defining season in this franchise's history because if we
don't win, I may be finishing my career with the Northern
Virginia
Padres."
—by Tim Crothers
Scouting Report | By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
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