The Padres are set to select the contract of catcher Elias Diaz tomorrow, according to a report from Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Acee writes that Diaz will take the active roster spot created for a position player by tomorrow’s roster expansion, while left-hander Wandy Peralta will be activated from the 15-day Injured List to take the spot created for a pitcher. Lefty Tom Cosgrove will also be recalled from the minor leagues, though a corresponding move will be necessary to add him to the active roster. A corresponding move to make room on the 40-man roster will be necessary to accommodate Diaz.
Diaz, 33, joined the Padres on a minor league deal earlier this week after being released by the Rockies earlier this month. That release brought to an end a five-season stretch in Colorado that saw Diaz slash a solid .253/.305/.403 in 462 games with the club. That slash line was good for a wRC+ of just 80 due to the inflated offensive environment at Coors Field, but even that diminished figure is still well within the acceptable range for a glove-first catcher. Diaz proved to be a solid if unspectacular regular for the club behind the plate, even earning an All-Star appearance last year.
After a solid start to the 2024 campaign, the Rockies reportedly entertained trade offers for Diaz’s services, but the club’s plans to deal the veteran in his final year before free agency were thrown off course when he suffered a calf strain that caused him to miss three weeks in June. After returning, Diaz’s offense took a nosedive with a .194/.239/.239 slash line in 18 games in the run-up to the deadline. That seemingly scared off suitors to the point where the Rockies weren’t able to get a deal done, and it left them to try placing Diaz on waivers in mid-August in an attempt to find a suitor willing to absorb what remained of his salary. His offensive production had only improved marginally when the calendar flipped to August, however, and the club eventually released Diaz to allow him the opportunity to try and catch on with a contender elsewhere.
He’s now done just that with the Padres, and will have the opportunity to share catching duties with the club’s existing tandem of Luis Campusano and Kyle Higashioka down the stretch. Higashioka is in the midst of a career year at the plate with an excellent .230/.276/.520 slash line and 16 homers in just 215 trips to the plate, while Campusano has endured a bit of a down season with a slash line of just .233/.283/.372 in 87 games. Diaz should offer the club a solid defensive option behind the plate who, if he can regain his early season form, could offer an on-base ability that both of their current catchers lack.
As for Peralta, the veteran lefty has pitched to somewhat middling results in the first year of a complex four-year deal he signed with the Padres this winter. In 34 innings, the 32-year-old hurler has posted a 4.50 ERA despite a 5.70 FIP and a strikeout rate of just 13.6%. He’ll join fellow lefties Tanner Scott, Yuki Matsui, and Adrian Morejon in the club’s bullpen down the stretch, where the club will surely hope for Peralta to recapture the form that allowed him to post a 3.01 ERA in 200 appearances with the Giants and Yankees over the past four seasons.
Can he be a 5th SP?
One guy has a career year hitting .230, and the other a down season hitting .233? That doesn’t make much sense.
Sounds like neither one having a great year to me.
If you look past the batting average to the entire slash line it makes perfect sense.
But let me put it like this anyway…
Higashioka is certainly not the most consistent with the bat at the plate as seen by his BA and OBP, but when he does make contact it generally packs a punch (.520 SLG).
What he lacks in consistency he makes up for with the pure value that his power produces when he does make contact.
Translation: they both suck just Campusano sucks more because he has 70 more plate appearances
This one
“One guy has a career year hitting .230, and the other a down season hitting .233? That doesn’t make much sense.”
It makes perfect sense. YOU don’t understand it.
1) Batting average is a very faulty stat. It doesn’t measure either of the two most important parts of hitting – getting on base or hitting for power.
Batting average says Higashioka and Campusano have been nearly identical. Do you think that’s the case?
2) A “career” or “down” year are relative to their past performance.
Campuano had a 133 wRC+ last year. This year it’s 86. A down year
Higashioka’s previous career high in wRC+ was 102. It’s 119 thus far in 2024 – a career year
Hope that helps
I laugh at people who say batting average doesn’t mean anything. Usually stat boys who love the new stats and think they have to denigrate the old ones to make their stats more important. They ALL help tell a story.
The whole purpose is to get hits. Hits = runs. Just as slugging percentage doesn’t always equate to being a good run producer. If you are hitting solo shots or doubles with no one on base, it doesn’t help score runs.
I watched one of the better OBP guys in MLB history for many years, by the way. Now there was someone who was effective most of his career.
Hitting homers and doubles do help you score runs. One of them scores a run without any help. A walk or a single don’t help you score as many runs as a homer or a double. Especially for a slow catcher.
The avg catcher doesn’t hit all that well for batting avg. higgy has been great for the padres.
The writer said, I quote, “career year” and “excellence” not just an average catcher. In that vein, I maintain that stat line isn’t that. If it was sufficient for them, why are the Padres bringing in another catcher? You don’t seek another guy if you think your guy is great, and you certainly don’t carry three catchers under most circumstances. They obviously want to try someone new.
This one
“The whole purpose is to get hits. Hits = runs.”
Wrong. Maybe you should learn about baseball before you try to denigrate others.
The whole point is (to make money) to score more runs than the other team. Walks and extra base hits (both of which batting average ignore) help teams score runs.
“If you are hitting solo shots or doubles with no one on base, it doesn’t help score runs.”
Of course it does. Watch a game. Doubles, you know, get runners into scoring position. And, also, home runs, you know score runs.
A single with no runner on doesn’t score a run. A home run sure does, though.
Again, watch a game. Or at least read the rules.
“I watched one of the better OBP guys in MLB history for many years, by the way. Now there was someone who was effective most of his career.”
You know what DOESN’T measure OBP? Batting average.
Batting average correlates very weakly with run scoring. OBP and SLG are in between and WOBA/wRC+ is the best.
If you want to talk about how good a hitter is, use wOBA.
Batting average is about as important as b% or BB%.
Typical arrogance, but not unexpected. You denigrate by accusing others of denigrating. I’ve seen and played more baseball than you’ve probably been alive.
Reading is a skill. You might want to read and comprehend everything instead of picking things piecemeal. Either that or go into politics. They love that there.
I was commenting originally on the writer’s way of putting things, and the stat boys have to defend all their new stats and denigrate others. As I said before, they ALL tell a story.
A guy with a high slugging percentage but only knocking in 38 runs with his 20 homers for example, is not a big run producer. I’d much rather have the guy in my lineup knocking in 80 runs on 15 homers. Chicks might dig the long ball but I’d rather score more runs than the other guy. That’s how you win.
Finally, you do understand how OBP is calculated, right? The components of batting average kind of plays a big factor.
This OnE- Higgy has 200 at bats, about half as many as a regular everyday player. He has 16 homers and 43 RBI’s. If he played every day those numbers and got 500-600 at bats you can do the math.
Higgy has been an excellent run producer. Your comments were just bad.
You might want to ask why he isn’t playing every day. There is usually a reason.
I wish you had been my agent back in the day.
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“Finally, you do understand how OBP is calculated, right? The components of batting average kind of plays a big factor.”
Yes. You do understand how wOBA is calculated, right? It includes everything batting average includes, everything OBP includes, and everything that SLG includes.
Because of that, it correlates higher with scoring runs than any of those stats.
Also, and I’m sure you’re not going to understand the math, but, here is is
blogs.fangraphs.com/triple-slash-line-conundrum-vo…
Here are the straight correlations (r-squared):
Batting average .355
OBP .668
SLG .840
And “if you were making a prediction of how many runs a team would score and had only their OBP and SLG handy, you’d do fairly well. But if I whispered that team’s batting average in your ear, you could improve your prediction very slightly. The higher the number I whispered in your ear, the lower you’d revise your estimate. It wouldn’t be by much – there’s almost no useful predictive power in batting average – but to the extent that you moved your estimate, it’d be in an unintuitive direction. If you know a team’s OBP and SLG, batting average gives you very little additional predictive power, essentially noise in a weird direction.”
Let’s say that again. A HIGHER batting average leads to FEWER runs scored if OBP and SLG are equal.
Batting average is not a useful stat for measuring offense.
wOBA is king
OBP and SLG are good
Batting average tells you very little. Don’t use it
The proof is in the math
“I’ve seen and played more baseball than you’ve probably been alive.”
I already guessed that you were old. Your big reveal wasn’t that exciting.
This one
“I was commenting originally on the writer’s way of putting things”
The writer put things entirely appropriately
Again
Higashioka is absolutely having a career year. His wRC+ is his career high by a substantial margin.
If you think that is not correct, please show it
Also, his wRC+ is “excellent” (the writer did not, as you claimed, use the word “excellence”). If you think that Higashioka’s wRC+ this year is not excellent (this year, especially for a catcher), provide your evidence.
No, that the Padres signed another catcher IS NOT evidence.
Those stats refer to what has already happened. The writer is referring to what has already happened. Signing another catcher is about the future, not the past. There is little evidence that Higashioka can continue those excellent numbers and continue his career year.
This one
“You might want to ask why he isn’t playing every day. There is usually a reason.”
Sure
That in no way means that offensive numbers this year haven’t been excellent or that he’s not having a career year
Both of those things can be (and are) true while the team can still be looking to upgrade the position.
Higashioka is unlikely to continue this excellent production given that he’s having a career year to this point.
He isn’t playing everyday because he is a catcher.
They added a catcher because Campusano has been struggling on both offense and defense.
You must not understand… Having a career year means it’s significantly better than his previous career high, having a down year means it is worse than his previous years, both statements are true even thought they have identical BA.
Also the difference being campusano hits.233 with most being singles and he never walks, compared to Higgy who hits a ton of doubles and homers and walks much more, hence the .520 slg compared to a paltry .320 slg
Hope this helps
He’s a cat her and they split them to give them rest, you dolt
I was wondering what he didn’t get. It was pretty simple to get. The fact that he couldn’t grasp that having a down year or a career year would be relative to past performances is beyond me.
That’s not Yu , Tatis ,Kim ! Peralta and cosgrove were terrible . Cosgrove was good last year fell off cliff this year . Diaz can help the catching situation
18 games in 18 days has screwed the padres pen to go along with the starters not going deep. It forced them to tax Reynolds and send him down yesterday. I’d much rather Reynolds up over cosgrove. Guess we will see him in 15 days unless someone goes on the IL.
“take teh spot”
Alright everyone take your bets, will they option camp or higashioka? I think camp goes because Kyle has been hot for a while
Or will they carry 3 catchers? With Diaz serving as a DH against left handed pitchers?
You do realize the current dh can hit righties and lefties
Arraez needs DH time when Kim gets back
Rosters expand tomorrow, so they won’t send anyone down. And we’ve got much better bats for DH. Simply depth piece and/or replacement for Campy.
Not true. The article states the addition of Diaz as well as activating Peralta and recalling Cosgrove “though a corresponding move will be necessary to add him to the active roster” so someone does need to be sent down to facilitate all three on the roster
Has to be a pitcher due to rule of how many pitchers can be carried so it will be Alex Jacob who was called up and used up for a few days in Saturdays game.
Yeah it will be either Jacob who they burned up yesterday and can’t pitch for another 2-3 days or my guess is they will option Vasquez.
Which would mean Darvish will be ready to take the ball the next time they need Vasquez.
They should be able to give Jacob 3 straight days off with two games and then a day off. Especially with the addition of two new arms.
Diaz will take the extra spot on the roster. Good timing with not knowing how long higgy will be sick. Good chance the padres get back darvish, tatis and Kim next week.
Hopefully they find a way to bring Reynolds back up soon. That dude is nasty.
Simm,
It could be Vasquez but without knowing for sure on Yu, I think they keep him this round. Even could go to pen to finish 2024. Not sure when AAA ends but usually prior to MLB so you want him pitching in case you need him on emergency at end of the month.
If you look at SD BP right now (pre-roster expansion) the only guy missing next year is Scott. Jacob, Reynolds, Wandy, Cosgrove, Omar Cruz – lots of guys to fill 1 spot.
I like the Cosgrove call up just to see what he has hopefully fixed to see if you want to offer a contract or not (40 man considerations when Rule 5 comes around).
Hopefully, Higgy is back today.
The offense will see a huge boost when Tatis returns. 5 days off helps BP and SP.
Any team that gets into playoffs under new format has a good chance to win it all so long as no injuries pop up.
Cease/King/joe/yu – this isn’t 2021 (collapse) or the 2022 playoff rotation (likely at least negatively impacted the Phillies series).
Welcome to September boys. I’d like to see a strong performance from Cease today. Indoors at the Trop so conditions won’t be an excuse this time.
Brew- cease definitely needs one. He has been shakey since the no hitter. Though between the rain delay which screwed him, the heat in St. Louis he hasn’t been in great situations.
Long- I don’t think Vasquez will be in the pen. We will find out today if they option him. Reports are he is the most likely to be sent down. Darvish threw 66 pitches in a controlled environment. I could see them ramping him up like they did Musgrove on the fly. They could give him a rehab start. They could skip Vasquez next start with finally having a day off Tuesday.
Higgy can’t be optioned without his consent which he would never ever give.
Higgy was also scratched from Saturday start. Big no injury they carry all 3. With 5 off days in sept, Higgy will catch the vast majority of games remaining – unless inured. Sunday after a night game is about all that he won’t catch.
Careful, Travis Wood, he’s been watching and playing baseball longer than we’ve all been alive!
Which makes his inability to understand simple baseball concept even more concerning