Tom Krasovic: Padres spend enough to make the playoffs, but can they win it all? History says it'll be tough.

Tom Krasovic, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Dec 4, 2024

Published in Baseball

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SAN DIEGO — It would be a shame for the Padres and their fans if the World Series trophy became too expensive to obtain.

As Major League Baseball’s offseason heats up, two headwinds bring up the complicated topic of baseball finances with regard to the Padres.

One, the still-unfolding fallout from Peter Seidler’s death last year.

Two, Major League Baseball’s economic system that caters to bigger media-market clubs, who seem to be becoming both more voracious and smarter by the day.

It would be a bummer if Seidler’s death closed a World Series window in San Diego. I don’t think it has or will, while acknowledging that Eric Kutsenda, Seidler’s successor and a longtime friend and business partner of the late Padres chairman, may be similar to Seidler in his stewardship.

There’s just no disputing that Seidler was ultra-aggressive in his approach to baseball competition. “Go big or go home” seemed to be his late-tenure mindset.

Seidler’s final four Padres payrolls landed squarely in the top quarter of MLB’s 30 teams. That remains an astounding fact in light of the franchise’s bottom-five standing among MLB’s media markets.

Keep these top-10 numbers in mind: San Diego finished sixth, seventh, fifth and third in payroll between 2020 and 2023, according to numbers obtained by Ronald Blum of The Associated Press.

The Padres weren’t able to reward Seidler’s big plays by winning a World Series trophy. Neither could they earn the franchise’s third National League pennant.

But under MLB’s current labor pact and the one before, which was adopted months before Seidler became a part-owner of the Padres in August 2012, a not insignificant correlation has played out between payroll size and winning the trophy.

During Seidler’s first nine full years with the Padres, World Series champions finished an average of seventh in payroll. Under the current collective bargaining agreement, which runs through 2026, champions have finished an average of sixth.

So, Seidler’s late-tenure spending put the Padres into a pretty good sweet spot.

The Padres were 15th in payroll entering the 2024 season. Presumably, Kutsenda — who succeeded Seidler in November 2023 — had a big say in that payroll. (Also, Kutsenda had to deal with financial circumstances that differed from before.)

Let’s assume the 2025 payroll will land about 15th, too. Is that good enough to win the trophy?

The pertinent history isn’t greatly encouraging.

Of the 12 World Series champions under the Seidler-era collective bargaining agreements, only the 2017 Houston Astros finished with a payroll lower than 14th. It may be fair to attach an asterisk to those Astros, given that MLB deemed them sign-stealing cheaters.

Better inspiration, Padres fans, comes from the 2013 Kansas City Royals and 2021 Atlanta Braves, who finished 13th and 14th in MLB payroll, respectively.

Under MLB’s current labor pact, the sample size is small, the results are not very Padres-friendly. The World Series-champion Astros, Texas Rangers and Los Angeles Dodgers finished ninth, sixth and third in payroll.

There’s reason to be optimistic here. Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller showed the past 12 months he can thrive with a mid-tier payroll. The ’24 Padres won 93 games, the second-highest total in franchise history. Oddly enough, the Padres’ best win-loss record of the Petco Park era, prior to last season, was the 90-victory miracle achieved by the 2010 Padres, whose $38.6 million payroll sat last in MLB.

Last season, several of Preller’s acquisitions outperformed their salaries by a lot. They included homegrown center fielder Jackson Merrill, 21, pitchers Dylan Cease, 28, and Michael King, 28, and outfielder Jurickson Profar, 31.

Representing potential enormous surplus value for future Padres teams, Preller’s farm system boasts two prospects in shortstop Leodalis De Vries and catcher Ethan Salas, each 18, who appear on top-100 lists compiled by former MLB scouts.

And MLB Network reports that the Padres stand even with the Dodgers as co-favorites to land Roki Sasaki, a low-cost Japanese ace and surely Preller’s top offseason target.

The bottom line here is this: the Padres have it better than many of the other smaller-market clubs, a fact that former Padres and Pittsburgh Pirates president Dick Freeman often stated; but their bid for the trophy would be a lot more realistic under the NFL’s economic system and perhaps if Kutsenda shares some of Seidler’s zeal to fund a champion.

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