Oscar Mercado

Outfielder Óscar Mercado opted out of his minor league contract with the Padres, reports MLBTR’s Steve Adams (X link). San Diego did not call him up, so the 29-year-old heads back to free agency.

Mercado signed with the Friars over the winter. He mashed in Spring Training but didn’t break camp and has spent the season with Triple-A El Paso. Mercado’s production in the Pacific Coast League has been below average. He’s hitting .226/.307/.425 in a very favorable league for hitters. His .231 average on balls in play certainly hasn’t done him any favors, as Mercado’s 9.1% walk percentage and 16% strikeout rate are both solid.

A former second-round pick, Mercado appeared in the majors each season between 2019-23. He looked like a potential everyday center fielder as a rookie in Cleveland, though his production dropped off sharply from there. Since the start of 2020, he owns a .206/.262/.334 slash in nearly 500 big league plate appearances.

Mercado is still capable of playing all three outfield positions. He logged a decent amount of action in both center and right field this season. He’s an above-average runner who swiped 12 bases in 16 tries for El Paso. His camp will presumably pursue another minor league contract with a team seeking non-roster outfield depth.

Outfielder Oscar Mercado has exercised an opt-out in his minor league contract with the Padres and elected free agency, MLBTR has learned. He’s now free to sign with any other club.

The 28-year-old Mercado logged 32 big league plate appearances with the Cardinals earlier this season and hit .290/.313/.387 in that small sample. He’s spent the bulk of the year in Triple-A between the Cardinals and Padres organizations, batting a combined .308/.379/.544 with a dozen homers, 17 doubles, three triples and 25 steals (in 29 attempts). Mercado has walked in 8.8% of his Triple-A plate appearances, against a 20.1% strikeout rate.

Mercado grabbed a few down-ballot Rookie of the Year votes in 2019 (when Yordan Alvarez unanimously won the award), and understandably so. In 482 appearances during his rookie year in Cleveland, he turned in a .269/.318/.443 batting line with 15 homers and 15 steals. That strong debut campaign looked like it set the stage for Mercado to roam the outfield in Cleveland for years to come, but his bat fell off in 2020 and has yet to recover. In 491 Major League plate appearances since that rookie effort, Mercado has batted .206/.262/.334.

Even as Mercado has struggled at the plate in the big leagues, he’s produced in the minors. Beyond this year’s big production in Triple-A, he also slashed .281/.363/.449 (117 wRC+) there with the Guardians’ top affiliate in 2022. The right-handed-hitting Mercado is also a sound defensive player as well, playing all three outfield spots and drawing above-average grades during his big league tenure — particularly in center field (10 Defensive Runs Saved, 7 Outs Above Average in 951 innings). Statcast credited him with 74th percentile sprint speed in his brief MLB look earlier this year, and he’s generally efficient on the bases, succeeding in more than 78% of his MLB stolen base attempts and 86% of his tries in the minors this year.

On the whole, Mercado’s been a below-average hitter in the Majors, but he’s a speedy and efficient runner who can handle all three outfield spots and hold his own against lefties — evidenced by a respectable .254/.309/.406 batting line against southpaws. He’d make a sensible depth add for a postseason contender looking to stockpile outfield depth before the Sept. 1 deadline for playoff eligibility. With rosters set to expand to 28 players next month, he’d be the type of speed-and-defense player who could be added to deepen a team’s bench.

In a move that recently eluded MLBTR, the Padres signed outfielder Óscar Mercado to a minor league deal, as relayed by Chris Hilburn-Trenkle of Baseball America. Mercado has already appeared in five games with Triple-A El Paso.

The 28-year-old Mercado once looked to be establishing himself as an everyday regular at the big league level, especially during a strong 2019 season. He hit 15 home runs for Cleveland that year and produced a batting line of .269/.318/.443. That offense was actually slightly below league average in that juiced ball season, translating to a wRC+ of 98. But he also provided strong outfield defense, including in center field, and stole 15 bases. Since that was just his age-24 season, it seemed fair to expect he might be able to continue developing from that platform.

Unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case, as he’s hit just .206/.262/.334 in 491 plate appearances since that season, which amounts to a wRC+ of 64. He’s bounced from Cleveland to Philadelphia, then back to Cleveland, exhausting his options in the process. He signed a minor league deal with St. Louis this winter and was selected to the big leagues in mid-May, serving in a part-time bench role. He was on the roster for over six weeks but only received 32 plate appearances in 20 games.

For the Padres, they have a regular outfield of Juan Soto, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Trent Grisham but have cycled through a few depth pieces this year, such as José Azocar, Brandon Dixon, David Dahl and Adam Engel. There’s little harm in them bringing Mercado aboard to get a close-up look at him. His speed and defense give him a solid floor and he could still carve out a role by getting his offensive production in the vicinity of average. If he cracks the roster at any point, he’s out of options but has yet to reach arbitration and could potentially be cheaply retained for subsequent seasons.