4:52pm: Hosmer’s now on the 10-day injured list, San Diego announced. The team recalled outfielder Abraham Almonte to fill Hosmer’s roster spot.
3:14pm: Padres first baseman Eric Hosmer suffered a fractured left index finger on a bunt attempt against the Rockies on Monday, disrupting what has been his best season in San Diego. Fortunately for him and the Padres, though, there’s hope Hosmer will be able to return by the last week of the regular season, Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.
When the Padres signed Hosmer to an eight-year, $144MM contract entering 2018, their hope was that the former Royal would be a consistently valuable contributor on a perennial playoff team. Both Hosmer and the Padres fell flat in the first two years of the contract, but their fortunes have turned around this season. With the 30-year-old Hosmer riding a newfound fly ball-oriented approach to a line of .288/.344/.542 (good for a career-high 137 wRC+) with eight home runs in 128 plate appearances, the Padres are 26-17 and in possession of the National League’s No. 1 wild-card spot.
While losing this version of Hosmer is less than ideal for the Padres, they did make contingency plans at first base before the Aug. 31 trade deadline, acquiring Mitch Moreland from the Red Sox. Moreland looks as if he’ll see the bulk of the work at the position until Hosmer’s back. Although Moreland has also seen time as a DH since joining the Padres, it appears they’ll have to shuffle multiple players into that spot for at least the next couple weeks.
I’m really hoping they just platoon Moreland and Profar. Please don’t bring in Alonso.
Profar?
Yes profar he plays utility IF and corner OF.
Nola is more than capable of handling first too. They are carrying three catchers as is
Moreland is hitting .279/.374/.605 with a .979 ops, and 8hrs as well.
They’ll be fine, no need to panic. Mitchie does fine as a fielder as well.
I think he’ll hit closer to .200-.250 for the remainder of the season after a strong start in Boston but I’d still be content with .200+ for two weeks. He’s hitting .100 right now.
Moreland is a first half hitter. He is bound to decline, has so every year. He will hit closer to .250. He’s best as a platoon, nothing more.
Luckily for the Padres, the entire season this year is the second half…
The only good thing Alonso contributed to the Padres is the fact that his sister is married to Manny. She was a major factor in Machado signing long term with us.
She had ZERO to do with it!! She’s from Miami and stays in Miami 99% of time. Don’t spread false BS to sound important
…AND Alonso was not a member of the Padres at the time.
Yonder’s sister had zero to do with Manny signing with SD. It was all because of $.
Alonso was with the White Sox then for that reason.
Is he headed to the IL?
Yonder Alonso or Justin Smoak who just got released.
Not really awe inspiring choices.
I’d get Smoak given the fact he’s a switch hitter and hope a change of scenery will give him a shot in the arm.
Moreland + Could slide Cronenworth over again and put Profar/Garcia at 2B.
micker716, I was thinking the same. Jake Cronenworth did a fine job filling in for Hos earlier in the season. Profar and Garcia can handle 2B. Let’s hope Tommy Pham comes back soon. GO PADRES
The acquisition of Moreland is now looking like a brilliant move.
He is still only a platoon player at best, will hit around .250.
Be interested to see how padres rebound. This is the first speed bump they have faced this season. As you all know speed bumps are common in sports, it’s how you overcome them that makes you a great team.
I wouldn’t say they haven’t faced any speed bumps prior to this. They did already lose their all-star closer to a season ending injury and they’ve had periodic injuries to the bullpen too that at one point resulted in a pretty bleak late inning situation where they were constantly blowing leads.
Tommy Pham, who was supposed to be one of their best hitters this year, is theoretically also down for the season. He is reportedly attempting to come back earlier than the usual 6 weeks for a hamate injury, which could actually help with Hosmer being out of the lineup because he could DH while Moreland is playing 1B. .
Not to mention all the time Hosmer missed at the beginning of the season with his stomach issues.
I don’t know the exact timeline but Pham should be back soon I don’t think he’s gonna have a strong season finish though, most players trying to come back early from hand injuries never recover relative power numbers so you can count out a “good” batting average
Always a risk that he won’t be 100% and he was having a tough year to begin with so he’s not a sure bet by any means.
To certain extent though the production is all relative. If he can come back as a DH and put up better numbers than Jorge Ona/Greg Garcia or whoever has to go into the starting lineup while Hosmer is down, then its still an overall improvement for the lineup.
@cnichols to be honest they haven’t had any player go through an extended slump or injury outside of 2 players. All I’m saying is that sure, they are playing great baseball but I’ll be interested to see this continue into the postseason.
Outside of tatis none of the players on there squad have shown to perform level consistently. Not saying they can’t but more than half the team are rookies or sophomores with a few vets on the squad. Haven’t faced too much adversity like say the dodgers, whom have been plagued with injuries and star players going through slumps (bellinger, buehler, muncy, turner, wood, stripling (before trade))
Padres are clicking on all cylinders all hitting at career highs but have little to no depth outside of the guys starting. This is our first look at padres without this could potentially strain that lineup as hosmer was playing at a very high level.
They did lose Yates which to me is a huge loss in postseason. Right now they just out score people but also allow a ton of runs which doesn’t happen in postseason. Relying on Rosenthal is a scary proposition imo.
imindless. In a short season and the playoffs, it is the team that is hot. It is not a marathon.
Relying on Clayton Kershaw to show up in the playoffs is a scary proposition, imo.
It is always that way in the playoffs. The hottest team over that short stretch wins it all. We saw that last year.
Outside of clev I’d be truly concerned that rotation is really suspect. Richards is terrible, paddack also terrible. Relying on a guy who’s never posted a season like this in Davies and a sophomore pitcher in lamet. I like our chances over you guys. Even with playoff kershaw, he’s always been solid through 5 innings in playoffs it’s forcing him to go 8 with a patchwork bullpen that hurts him. We shored that up this year so I expect short outings from pitchers in playoffs.
Great response.
First speed bump? You don’t know anything about this team. They lost 3 of their top relievers by the 3rd week.
Hos needs to learn how to hold a bat when bunting. Pathetic.
It didn’t look like he was holding the bat correctly, but in his defense I’m not even sure he was offering at the pitch. To me it looked like it was coming inside and as he was trying to pull the bunt back the ball just caught his bat and hand resulting in the foul bunt and strike 3.
I think one of the Padres broadcasters thought he was offering at it and the other thought he was pulling it back, so reasonable minds could differ. If he was offering then yes, thats unfortunately not the right way to hold the bat there.
After watching it 20 times, it definitely looks like he’s offering at it. He’s adjusting to try and still bunt it, as the ball moves in, determined to get it down. He never tried to spin off or retract his arm. Its unfortunate especially with how well he’s been playing and how well the Pads are doing. But not wrapping your fingers on a bunt attempt is little league 101.
Not to mention all the time Hosmer missed at the beginning of the season with his stomach issues.
Dfa almonte !
PED using pos
I would prefer Greg Allen but I’m just hoping they don’t actually play Almonte much this time.
If Almonte is going to temporarily be the last man on the roster and just provide bench depth for a week then thats whatever, but last time they called him up they started him a couple times and it made absolutely no sense to me.
Clowns. Yonder’s sister definitely had something to do with Manny signing with SD. She loved the city when her brother was here, she expressed her love to SD for Manny. I have lots of inside connections to this franchise, and that rhetoric has been repeated numerous times. I even heard AJ at a season ticket holder event say Manny’s wife was big in the signing.
Well I am actually Yonder Alonso and Manny told me he signed with SD because they offered him the most $ and that’s it.
I’ll provide proof of my claim when you do.