The latest regarding right-hander James Shields, whom the Padres sent (along with cash) to the White Sox on Saturday for shortstop prospect Fernando Tatis Jr. and righty Erik Johnson:
- Before agreeing to take Tatis and Johnson, the Padres asked the White Sox for their two best prospects, shortstop Tim Anderson and righty Carson Fulmer, per ESPN’s Jim Bowden (Twitter link).
- In an effort to get a quality return for Shields, the Padres reached out to “every team in contention,” including the Tigers, reports Tony Paul of The Detroit News. Tigers executives listened to the Padres’ pitch, but they ultimately balked at their asking price, enabling division-rival Chicago to land the 34-year-old. Shields would have upgraded a Tigers rotation that has gotten particularly disastrous performances from Mike Pelfrey and the now-demoted Anibal Sanchez this year, though it’s unclear what they would have had to give up for him.
- Padres general manager A.J. Preller doesn’t regret signing Shields to a lucrative long-term contract in 2015 and losing a first-round pick in the process, he told reporters Saturday (via Kirk Kenney of the San Diego Union-Tribune). “We wanted to get some excitement and see if we could put a contending club on the field,” said Preller, whose Padres have gone 97-122 since signing Shields. “It was more of a situation where it was, ‘Hey, let’s see if we can take a shot and compete and contend and win,’ knowing that if that didn’t work out at a point down the road knowing we had the ability to pump the brakes and go in a different direction.”
- The White Sox will pay Shields $5MM this year and, if he doesn’t opt out of his contract at season’s end, $10MM in both 2017 and 2018. They’ll also be responsible for a $2MM buyout on his 2019 club option, according to Dan Hayes of CSN Chicago (Twitter link).
The scary thing about Preller is he doesn’t seem to admit mistakes ever, you should feel very badly for spending 30 million for a guy you just signed to play on another team, it was a huge mistake at least own up to it and get better from it.
Do you really care if he owns up to it? Is this a confessional? Wouldn’t making the trade be the start of him getting better from it?
I guess when it is someone elses 30 million dollars you just blew, you don’t need to show any regret. He will continue to make the same foolish risks if he does not reflect and admit things did not work mistakes were made, as opposed to the I REGRET NOTHING route.
What Preller admits to ownership will never get to the public media, as long as ownership backs him. Ownership had to know that there were no guarantees with the route they chose to take, but they elected to let him try anyway. If nothing else, it woke up the fan base.
Preller is Latin for mediocre
Everyone at the top deserves partial blame in the very least, Not sure why a first time GM was given so much rope with no checks and balances in place. Maybe they bought into the Kool-Aid the Media was putting out when Preller began making moves. Ownership expected Shields to show more concern after being shelled, but they don’t hold Preller to the same expectation.
B/c he hasn’t made a public admission, you think he doesn’t know it was a bad mood? C’mon man! I’m sure the people that signs his checks have gotten an apology.
I wouldn’t be so sure. After following almost 20 years of Mark Shapiro in Cleveland, I’m convinced some of these wonder boys think they’re invincible and never admit mistakes. Maybe it takes that kind of attitude to operate at that level. What did surprise me about Shapiro was that the owner never did hold him accountable. He kept getting promoted.
I agree Preller deserves the blame, but I can’t fault him for saying he regrets anything. What GM does that? Maybe a few a years down the road he might, but not while some of those he acquired are still on the team.
That said, what disturbs me is his explanation for some of the deals. “‘Hey, let’s see if we can take a shot and compete and contend and win,…” sounds like; lets throw everything against the wall and see if anything sticks. It doesn’t some like much analysis took place as much as seeing something they could and doing it only because they could. It’s like tweety-bird chess; “ooh there’s a move”.
Niekro makes a lot of sense
Well,you also don’t see him taking credit for guys like Pomeranz and Jay etc.
Should he admit he shouldn’t have “gone for it” and at the same time talk about his good moves?
Regardless of if he apologized or not, with the ownership or others. At least by trading shields he’s starting to make an effort to try to clean up the mess.
Nothing for Preller to apologize for. Shields was NOT the Padres problem. They have a poor record the last two years but James has a WINNING W-L record for a horrible offensive team. Ownership wanted to make a run and Preller had to try and put something together to be in the hunt. It didn’t work. BTW…Kemp has not been the Padres problem, either. He drove in 100 runs last year and is on target for a 30+, 100+ RBI season this year for a team that has been just bad at getting guys on base for him to drive in. SD’s problem is their farm system—and has been for many years.
Well Lance the Padres farm system would look a lot better if they had the 13th pick in the draft last year instead of losing it on the Shields signing and of course if they still had Trea Turner and the others AJ traded
One Fan, Maybe Turner will be good, who knows? But Turner wouldn ‘t have made the Pads a better team right now. Wil Meyers, the guy SD got for Turner is having a decent season for the Pads. Shields gave the Padres instant help. High draft picks are overrated anyway. There are two far more important factors and that is: 1. Scouting 2. Development and San Diego has been horrible at both since Reagan was POTUS. The last time the Pads drafted a player who you could say had a good MLB career was Andy Benes in 1988. Only one, Dave Winfield is in the Hall of Fame. Nobody the Padres drafted in the first round in the last ten years is doing all that well. Preller has been on the job less than two years and was very successful running the minor leagues for Texas, who have one of the deepest and most successful scouting/development systems going right now. The Rangers sucked pretty bad the first part of this century. Their record the last 5 years has been pretty darn good.
Will Shields stop the white sox from dropping into 4th place? NO!
The Tigers did the absolute right thing in NOT getting involved with the Padres for Shields. They have a few young pitchers to try: Norris, Boyd, and Greene. That’s where the future lies with them and they need to know what they have, before they give up assets for past their prime pitchers, with their own set of question marks.
Agreed. The youngsters you mentioned along with Fulmer could be mainstays in the rotation for the future along with JV and Zimmermann. It would be foolish for AA to trade any of them at this point. With Pelfrey possibly having turned the corner (never thought he would) and Sanchez being banished to the bullpen, the rotation seems to be getting on track now. Shields is past his prime, his velocity is down and would be useless in Detroit…..let him be useless in Chicago. lol
Pelfrey is what he is. Yesterday was his best start of the year. Don’t expect it to become his norm. He should become their 8MM long man. His Batting Average Against was ONLY .338 going into yesterday, making every player batting against him into an instant batting champion. I almost choked when Rod Allen talked about him pitching “decently”.
It’s obvious SD needs a new pitching coach. Cashner looks average, Ross DL and Shields not performing up to his ability.
Why is it The “Pitching Coach”? He hasn’t thrown a single pitch, if I’m not mistaken. When does the blame fall on the Players??
I agree that the players are ultimately responsible for their performance, but organizational philosophy/coaching can certainly play a role in player performance. The Pirates and the Orioles are two great examples–one has a reputation for reviving careers with simple tweaks, while the other is notorious for demanding pitchers throw a certain way, only to see those pitchers have great success after leaving the organization.
One pitcher is the player.. many pitchers all failing points to an issue with the system used, which falls on the pitching coach. Same with hitters. However, throwing all of that out, the bottom line is it is easier to get rid of one guy to shake things up (a coach) vs all the players.
Yet vargas was pitching well before injury, friedrich has been decent, and pomeranz has been an ace this year despite being switched to the bullpen cause he couldnt make it as a starter early in his career.
The rotation has been decimated all year between ross, erlin going down, now vargas.
The reason cashner looks average is hes lost movement on his stuff. Hes got a power arm but its more straight in recent years. Also, last year cashners struggles were attributed to bad defense. He led the league in unearned runs due to errors by the defense or was top 5 in that category. When you don’t trust your defense he was pitching for the strike out vs. Pitching to get a guy out.
Even though balsley(?) has revived the career of ross and looking like he has revived pomeranzs
Anderson AND fulmer? No way, not even if San Diego ate all the money
My guess is they tried first for Anderson, were told no, and then tried for Fulmer. Both would be insane
Agreed. Hahn has done a marvelous job IMO getting good talent in exchange for what appear to be middling prospects (I think the biggest name he has given up was Thompson), but also I’m not sure what else SD thought they would get for a middling guy with only about 1/2 year left on his contract (general feeling is he will opt out at the end of the year). Giving up Johnson and Tatis is a good deal. Even if both pan out, and they were likely not going to do anything with the Sox. In any case as long as the Sox have the manager they have I fear it will not matter who is on the club.
what general feeling has shields opting out?
Yeah it seems like Preller has a reputation for asking for a kings ransom before working his way down from there. I think he tried to ask for Turner back from the Nationals last year.
Shields won’t opt out. He knows he is not worth what he is being paid. What a sweet deal thanks to preller. AJ Smith…Another Jackass Preller. San Diego…america’s finest weather but miserable sports teams!!!