1-Man’s Opinion on Sports-Thursday “PADRES–STOP CHEERING”
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“PADRES WIN–SO WHAT”
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Thank God, the Oakland Athletics and Colorado Rockies were on the Padres schedule at this time of the year.
Xander Bogaerts, who has been red-hot, stated it best in the clubhouse at 4pm on Wednesday…”Really sad-Really sucks”.
The Padres have a 7-game winning streak, finally, but it doesn’t mean anything.
The Padres now have a massive credibility problem within their clubhouse, the aftermath of two scathing articles, quoting a combined 32-current players, former players, ex staffers, and involving anonymous executives, condemning the culture in that clubhouse at Petco Park. This week showed the value of true sports journalism, in the UT and on the Athletic Website.
Clubhouse culture-missing. That’s the sum total of what was written. The sub headline should read ‘I got your money-you get yours’, the conversation from rich-underachieving players with San Diego on their uniform, and lots of money in their bank accounts.
Bottom line, it’s across the board condemnation of the style of General Manager AJ Preller and his methodology of signing and overpaying for most every player he has acquired.
Whether that is trades, draft picks, or in the international free agent market.
So now Preller’s 253M-payroll will be like you and me, watching the playoffs and the World Series on TV, viewers not participants.
The depths of the criticism is staggering, involving the GM, his staffs, his manager, and the rich players in the clubhouse.
With apologies to Padres broadcasters, Don Orsillo, Mark Grant, Jess Agler and Tony Gwynn-Junior, please stop making these recent wins sound like something special. They didn’t win bleep. They built this against the teams with the worst records in the American and National Leagues. A 7-game winning streak against two teams that combined to lose 106-and-96 games respectively.
Added to the equation now is the illness problems that have returned to owner Peter Seidler, facing health issues, and now how to handle the dysfunction that has taken his team from fan’s favorite to fan’s disenchantment.
The substandard Cardinals close out the home schedule starting Friday, then a 6-game road trip to face the losing White Sox and the fading Giants.
And just ahead, decisions on struggling slugger Juan Soto, impending free agents Blake Snell and Josh Hader, the status of potential opt-out pitchers Michael Wacha and Seth Lugo. All that plus the reality they have to deal with the ever demanding agent Scott Boras.
Sorry, the winning streak doesn’t mean anything. So stop cheering this team. It’s really a shame when the best part of Padres baseball are the broadcasts from Don and Mud, or Jess-Junior.
This sucks, this really sucks. The Padres need to own this, and apologize to the fans about this.
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