SAN DIEGO — It can be a trap to offer extensions and long-term deals to managers and coaches.

The Padres have generally had the opposite issue.

They have had as much coaching-staff turnover as any team in the major leagues over the past half-dozen years and have moved on from their manager every other year since 2019.

Technically, they are at another crossroads now.

Among the coaches whose contracts expire at the end of the month is pitching coach Ruben Niebla, who has over the course of three seasons overseen the modernization and sophistication of the organization’s pitching program. Both sides have expressed the desire for Niebla to remain. Waiting beyond next week to lock him up could mean the Diamondbacks or any number of other teams searching for a pitching coach woo him away.

Manager Mike Shildt is under contract through next year, but not signing him to an extension now would leave the Padres vulnerable to having to pay him a steep salary over many years or risk losing him after 2025. The team does plan to work toward an extension, which industry sources say would likely run through at least 2027 and provide a substantial raise from an annual salary estimated to be around $1 million, among the eight or nine lowest in the major leagues.

Hitting coach Victor Rodriguez is also under contract for another season, though some in the organization have said an extension is possible for the man who helped institute a hitting philosophy change. The Padres led the major leagues in batting average for the first time this season and set a team record for home runs at Petco Park.

There are other coaches whose deals are up, including some who were on one-year contracts. Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller said this week the team is “looking to bring that group back.”

No coach or manager is irreplaceable. Players are the ones who play the game. Coaches and managers are the ones who get blamed — and get fired, which is why it is sometimes a money trap to ply them with guaranteed long-term deals.

However, there is an argument to be made that Shildt and Niebla, who hold what are arguably the two most important and nuanced spots on the staff, have demonstrated capabilities and built relationships that would be extremely difficult for the Padres to replicate at this time.

Both men declined to comment on their status. But there is ample evidence to suggest they are worth the investment.

Certainly, any argument for Shildt receiving a hefty raise and further security begins with the 93 victories the Padres had in 2024, second most in team history behind the 98 games won by the 1998 team.

Shildt’s teams have won at least 90 games in each of his first three seasons in which it was possible to do so. Among the 14 men to have ever accomplished that feat, he is the only one to do it with two franchises.

His role in this year’s Padres team winning as much as it did after losing as much as it did with a significantly higher payroll the year before, however, is the key factor when considering his value.

Shildt inherited a team beset by a lack of focus and clubhouse leadership structure.

Hired late — two days before Thanksgiving — Shildt immediately embarked on a tour of the United States and Caribbean. His visits with Padres players had the primary focus of instilling a new leadership mold, which laid the foundation for a culture change.

That culture fostered a team dynamic that many veterans, including Manny Machado, said they had never before experienced.

The credo of togetherness espoused by Shildt should not be discounted, players said, when assessing the Padres’ cohesive and consistent play — and for smoothing over or preventing many potential problems, such as when playing time became scarce and lineup and position changes were implemented.

And it absolutely cannot be discounted that Preller has finally found a partner as manager.

It is too simple to say Shildt is Jayce Tingler with actual managerial chops. But the comparison does speak to what Preller has been searching for — and what he thought he was getting when he hired his hard-working friend before the 2020 season. Shildt has Tingler’s commitment to Preller’s vision and work ethic plus the strategic know-how that Tingler did not have in his first managerial job.

Shildt came in preaching “alignment” within the power structure and down the chain of command. He declared he was “equally yoked” with Preller and went about showing it was true. Shildt spent two seasons in the Padres organization before being hired and was the first manager to come under Preller’s employ with eyes wide open about his boss’ relentless pace and nearly constant brainstorming. Shildt and Preller didn’t always agree, but their ultimate alignment on issues is unparalleled in Preller’s tenure.

The idea that this harmony could be easily replicated is likely fantasy.

As for Niebla, he holds a position that also requires many relational tentacles, including as a direct conduit to Shildt and Preller. No coach huddles with the president of baseball operations more than Niebla.

Given the importance of the pitching staff and his being the coordinator of that group, Niebla — and bullpen coach Ben Fritz, whose contract is also up — is as embedded in the team’s daily preparation as any member of the coaching staff. Niebla has also been a driving force in the Padres’ increased embracing of certain technologies, including biometric analysis of pitchers’ deliveries. And there is hardly a pitcher to have come through San Diego in his three seasons that has not had their repertoire added to by Niebla.

And a significant number of pitchers have worked under Niebla.

Far more impressive than the fact his starting pitchers have collectively had the fourth-lowest ERA in the major leagues since 2022 is that the fact that Niebla has helped advance that success with Yu Darvish and Joe Musgrove as the only pitchers to have been in the rotation all three seasons. And both those veterans have missed significant time.

The Padres are one of two MLB teams to have had 11 different pitchers make at least 20 starts in at least one of the past three seasons. And where Padres starters had a 3.80 ERA, the other team (the Royals) ranked 22nd with a 4.43 ERA.

Under Niebla, the Padres have had three different pitchers save at least 28 games. No other team has done that in the past three seasons.

Last year was arguably the finest job done by Niebla and Fritz (plus Triple-A pitching coach Scott Mitchell, who executes Niebla’s prescriptions when pitchers are sent down to work on certain things).

The Padres got 930 1/3 innings from pitchers with an ERA under 4.00 in 2023, but 728 1/3 of those innings were gone by the start of ’24. The Padres still finished with a 3.86 ERA, just 0.13 points off last season.

Again, no coach or manager is irreplaceable. But for the Padres, who have had an abundance of both depart through a revolving door, there is a solid case to be made for continuity.

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