Shortly after the 2024 regular season concluded, the Padres were hit with a brutal blow when Joe Musgrove underwent Tommy John surgery, wiping out his 2025 campaign before the offseason even began. That left the Padres with major question marks at the back of their rotation behind Dylan Cease, Michael King, and Yu Darvish. While the late-winter addition of Nick Pivetta into the fold helped stabilize things, that still left one spot open in the club’s rotation headed into Spring Training. Darvish is now battling elbow inflammation himself, though the Padres haven’t ruled him out for the beginning of the season.
Knuckleballer Matt Waldron appeared to be the favorite for the final rotation job after he made 26 solid starts for the Padres last year, but he’s out of commission due to an oblique injury and expected to begin the season on the injured list. With Waldron out of the mix for the Opening Day rotation, that leaves left-hander Kyle Hart as well as righties Randy Vasquez and Stephen Kolek in the mix for the club’s fifth starter spot. Hart, 32, was brought into the organization last month on a one-year deal worth $1.5MM guaranteed. The southpaw has just 11 MLB innings under his belt, where he got blown up to the tune of a 15.55 ERA with the Red Sox during the 2020 season. After toiling in the minor leagues for years in an attempt to get back to the majors, Hart tried his hand in the Korea Baseball Organization last year.
The results were extremely impressive. Hart’s first and only year overseas saw him pitch to a sterling 2.69 ERA in 157 innings of work across 26 starts. He struck out an excellent 28.8% of his opponents while maintaining a strong 6.0% walk rate. That dominant work in Korea was somewhat reminiscent of the success right-hander Erick Fedde found in KBO play during the 2023 season, when he pitched to a 2.00 ERA in 180 1/3 innings and struck out 29.5% of his opponents. Hart’s numbers don’t quite match up with those of Fedde, but given Fedde’s excellent 2024 season where he posted a 3.30 ERA in 31 starts for the White Sox and Cardinals, even a significant step back from Fedde’s major league production would still make Hart a solid starting option in the majors.
It might seem reasonable, then, to assume that Hart is the favorite for the job. Things may not be that simple, however, as Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune wrote over the weekend that Hart may be falling out of the race for the fifth starter job due to an illness that has limited him to just two appearances this spring. Acee noted that the Padres have been impressed by what they’ve seen from him so far, but much like Waldron, it’s possible that he simply won’t have time to build up enough to be the club’s fifth starter out of the gate this year. That could open the door for Vasquez or Kolek to jump in and take the job despite résumés that pale in comparison to Hart’s platform campaign.
Vasquez, 26, made 20 starts for the Padres last year. The results left something to be desired, as his 4.87 ERA and 4.70 FIP were both well below league average. With that being said, Vasquez improved throughout the 2024 campaign. After surrendering ten homers in his first nine starts last year, he settled into a rhythm in late June and posted a respectable 4.23 ERA with an even better 3.94 FIP in 55 1/3 innings of work over his final 11 starts. While Vasquez’s ceiling isn’t especially high, it’s not hard to imagine him being a perfectly viable fifth starter this year, particularly if his improved ability to keep the ball in the park throughout the second half last year proves to be sustainable.
Kolek, meanwhile, is something of a wild card in the mix. Drafted in the 11th round by the Dodgers back in 2018, the right-hander was traded to the Mariners in 2021 but did not make his big league debut until last year as a Rule 5 pick of the Padres. San Diego used him out of the bullpen, where he posted lackluster numbers despite strong peripherals. Kolek’s fantastic 55.9% ground ball rate and impressive 5.7% walk rate were overshadowed by a strikeout rate of just 18.5%, a massive .359 BABIP, and a lackluster 64.3% strand rate that left him with a 5.21 ERA despite a 3.57 FIP and a 3.41 SIERA.
Still, the right-hander showed enough that he not only stuck with the Padres all season, but club brass also decided to convert him back to a starting job despite him not pitching out of the rotation since 2022 at the Double-A level. His spring results have been impressive to this point, with a 1.00 ERA in 9 innings of work and five strikeouts against just one walk, but Kolek’s pedestrian results last year and lack of a track record as a starter in the majors or even at Triple-A could give San Diego pause about committing to him as a starter to open the season.
If Darvish avoids the injured list, who would you assign to the fifth spot in the Padres rotation to open the season? Would you give the nod to Hart despite his minimal work during Spring Training? Would you stick with the reliable Vasquez despite his relatively low ceiling? Or would you take a chance on a reliever conversion in Kolek? Have your say in the poll below:
Padres still have a better Rotation than the NYY
Yankees still have a good rotation even without cole
Vasquez #4, Hart #5. Best of luck to Darvish.
Padres like most teams pitching will come down to health. If healthy this is a good rotation. 2-3 injuries and it could get rough.
Like all teams
A better question would be who can they find to play LF and Catcher.
Better question would be why you continue to be a troll?
C could be rough. I think they can cobble together 2 wins in LF, though.
Phil Nevin can split time at both positions
Hart had a 2 inning rain out gem and then 59 pitches over 3 IP Sunday. The results weren’t great, but reports said the hits were seeing-eye style and the HR was wind aided and would only have been out of HOU from 30 MLB stadiums. Seems like Korea is translating pretty good here. Stretching to full length in a couple of weeks shouldn’t be hard!
Kole has looked good but I give the nod to Hart.
No Darvish, no bueno.
If they lose Dharvish they might as well cash out. Rotation isn’t looking great to begin with. Can’t count out anybody from surprising everyone with a good to above average season but if Dharvish is going out with a TJ, that’s three starters you’ll need a surprise from.
.. because they don’t have a great first 6 in their lineup, 2 cy young candidates, and a few young SPs with very high ceilings?
Yes how could they win without Darvish..
They may not have won the offseason but Padres have plenty of enviable talent and certainly can win, even if not favored over the Tax Evaders.
29 teams won’t win the WS this year, and most of us fans still want to see them play.
I forgot about Pivetta, Pivetta looks great half of his starts, he could push that to 3/4. I like the kid Kolek, ground ball rate is nice, low walks, good movement on the sweeper, but he gets hit when he is in the zone, he ain’t blowing anybodies whig off. Hart could surprise, could bomb too.
I like the Padres, I like their lineup, don’t know why they went with Jason Heyward over Tirso Ornelas, I thought Ornelas could have been a breakout player for them.
A Cease trade would bring them back a nice return, Boston makes a lot of sense, I thought they were trying to trade Triston Casas, package in Priester or Fitts, would be a nice trade. I don’t think Boston really needs to add another starter but they are built to win this year, they might be interested. How about Yoshida and Crawford, I like Yoshida more than everybody else, and Crawford could put up numbers comparable to Cease in my opinion, could be a big year for him. A trade like that makes sense.
Horrible offer lmao. Yoshida is a hugely negative asset
Why would they trade Cease when they already don’t know what to do with rotation spots 4 and 5? If they trade Cease, King and and Arraez better go too because they’re sunk for 2025.
And Suarez
If anyone will take him then sure.
They played a good chunck of last season without him what are you talking about?
I dont know, I love Arreaz with Tatis and Machado, they should score some runs, but add a controllable bat like Triston Casas and downgrade the rotation somewhat, Casas would be a sweet add for the Padres. I don’t think he’s obtainable, but I like Casas, that would be a nice trade. It’s late, dreaming a bit I guess, the Dharvish news was a bummer.
A super-smart team would look at Hart’s Korea stats, see he’s got a higher chance to be a star, and pick him now—even if he hasn’t pitched much this spring—because the reward could be huge for his cheap contract.
If Darvish is fine, they could still keep Vasquez as a backup or put Kolek back in the bullpen, but Hart’s the smart bet to start because he’s shown he can dominate, just not in the U.S. yet.
I just saw Kolek pitch tonight against the Giants in Scottsdale. Not much to see – a mediocre Giants lineup touched him up a bit. I think that I’d give Hart the slot.
That was the Giants opening day lineup for the most part.
Yes. A mediocre lineup.
What a disaster this is turning out to be they’re sunk
explain……
Hart has not looked good in camp. He may still get the job, but both Vasquez and Kolek have looked better.
Realize that what you have seen on TV or in the box scores of games not available on MLB.tv is far from everything these players do in camp.
But none of them have dazzled
I’m going with the idea that if the first 4 stay healthy (I know question on Yu) enough to make 27-30 starts each, then the 5th spot won’t keep them out of the WC. Similar to the back up C role – doesn’t define the year – or the 4th OFer, etc. always helpful to have higher end talent 1-26 and beyond but not necessarily a requirement in todays system.
Yu has thrown catch twice since he was held out of his start. He may be ready on opening day.
I would go with Kolek. Vasquez can’t get lefties out and needs AAA and can become the depth SP to fit in for injuries. Waldren can ramp up in AAA as well after coming off the IL.
They hope Kolek is the next Michael King. Similar stuff, similar conversion from reliever to starter. They hope Hart is the next Nic Martinez. Vazquez needs to develop a put away pitch. Seems hitters are able to hang around until he makes a mistake
“Meanwhile” has to start the sentence, not come in the middle between commas.
“It might seem reasonable, then, to assume that Hart is the favorite for the job” is a poorly written sentence. “Then” adds nothing of substance and only disrupts the syntax.