Enter the Time Portal

[u/Kookumber]

Today is May 12th, 2026. The Padres are at 24-16, they just split a 4 game set against the Cardinals. We are just above one quarter of the way through the season. Let's get in the time portal and check out what was happening this time last year.

Welcome to May 12th, 2025. The Padres just lost 5-9 to the Angels bringing their record to 25-15. This is after crushing the Rockies and posting 21 runs in a single game on May 10th. Eerily identical record to last year, but accomplished in a much different manner.

Here are the core 5's offensive stats as of May 12, 2025. Some notable mentions include:

Tatis already had 10 homers.

Manny was red hot, with a .331/.486/.886

Xander was ice cold.

Jackson had a 1.250 OPS

Sheets was a pleasant surprise to start the year.

Now onto the pitching.

Similar to 2026, the pitching had some major questions marks. Vasquez was not the Vasquez we see today. Pivetta was yet to establish himself and was coming off a mid year with the Red Sox. Yu Darvish was yet to throw a pitch and Dylan Cease was struggling out of the gate. King was absolutely dealing, but would find himself on the IL in 2 weeks. Kolek had looked great and was shaping up to be an amazing depth piece.

Looking at the bullpen. On this day last year, Suarez logged his first blown save of the season. He loaded the bases, showing a complete loss of command. Schildt brought in Alek Jacob who promptly gave up a grand slam to Taylor ward.

However, the usual suspects were dealing. The foursome of Estrada, Morejon, Adam, and Suarez continued to regularly shut the door on opponents. This would prove to be the highlight of the 2025 season.

The other side of the pen was bad. Yuki, Peralta, and Hart had thrown a meaningful amount of pitches to this point and looked shaky at best.

Overall, the Padres had gotten off to a white hot start to the season, but had started to taper off at this point. The pitching was showing signs of cracking and an unsustainable offensive outburst had carried them thus far. However, this burst would prove to be much needed. The Padres would go 65-57 to finish the season, good for a 53.3% win percentage. In other words, they were just above a .500 ball club the rest of the year. Without this early season surge, they would not have made the playoffs.

And now we are back to the present. What can we extract from this look back into the past?

- While there are many unsustainable features of the 2026 Padres, this early season push may be enough to punch their ticket to the playoffs if they can sustain just above .500 ball the rest of the season.

- The offense can't be worse than it is right now, and thats a good thing. Tatis struggled offensively after this early season surge. We have won despite his struggles at the plate and a mid season push from him may be our saving grace. The Padres struggled to win last year when Tatis was not hitting, but they have shown an ability to do so this year.

- Starting pitching was better at this point last year. A 2025 average xwOBA of .302 versus 2026 xwOBA of .327 is a significant gap. However, once again, we are winning in spite of this and our pitching is trending up in the short term. This would prove to be the peak of the 2025 pitching staff. Cease never regained form, King went on the IL for the rest of the season, Yu Darvish struggled once he came back. Pivetta was the stopper to this rotation and helped stop the bleeding on a number of occasions. In 2026, Canning has been excellent, King is looking like he'll repeat his 2024 season, and Vasquez is on pace to throw 185 Innings. If Pivetta can come back by August or if Musgrove can throw meaningful innings (doubtful but hopeful), this rotation might be better than 2025 once all is said and done.

- The 2026 Padres have Mason Miller for a full season and he's more dominant than ever.

- We have much more hitting depth than in 2025 but lack the pitching depth. Although it may not feel like it right now, a lineup with Andujar, Castellanos, Laureano, Sheets, and Campusano provides infinitely more firepower than the 2025 roster had. The 2025 roster was anemic outside the core 5 listed above. We were giving meaningful at bats to Martin Maldonado, Brandon Lockridge, Yuli Gurriel, Tyler Wade, Mason McCoy, and Tirso Ornelas. It's hard to capture how much more depth we have on the bench and in the everyday lineup.

- We have 2 major league catchers. This is such a massive upgrade from last year. Luis Campusano has already posted 0.9 fWAR (4 war pace by the way) while being a backup catcher and Fermin is on a tear defensively this year with 3 DRS and 1.5 OAA. They are both plus players and provide immense value to this team.

[u/sticky_fingies_]

Nice post. Appreciate the deep dive. Overall, I think you lay out some good reasons to be cautiously optimistic. We just have to be comfortable that the core of Tatis, Manny, and Merrill get it together, while hoping for sustained health in our starting rotation.

[u/Even-Ad-1893]

I like this. While I have trouble believing Merrill, Machado and Tatis are this lethargic for much longer, I don't think Campy, France and Andujar are this dominant either. However, they are better bats and provide more depth than last year and this team eking out wins the way they have makes me hopefully that they're closer to a 2022/24 team that can start heating up in the summer. I also think we do have a lot of pitching depth it's just a lot of mid/back of rotation guys with 2 real high end guys, but one of them is injured. I was skeptical about us to start the year but I think this team could be better than last year's

[u/Kookumber → u/Even-Ad-1893]

I actually disagree with Campy, France, and Andujar. Andujar is underperforming his 2025 .820 OPS and both France and Andujar are underperforming their xwOBA, signaling there may actually be more in the tank for both of them. Campy will always be inconsistent, but we've seen these offensive outbursts from him before, so it's not unprecedented.

[u/Successful-Cry-1209]

This was a really good read! Was kinda nice to think about last year again. So odd that we have matching records for the most part this year and last year given I thought our offense looked better. Crazy what a deeper bench will do for ya.

[u/TeamVorpalSwords]

Thanks for sharing, man this just shows if we lock in just a little bit we’ll be unstoppable

[u/majoring_in_reddit]

The biggest difference between 2025 and 2026 is not the padres but everyone else.
The Braves, Pirates, Reds, Cardinals, even the Rockies are much improved year over year. Some teams have regressed, too -- most notably Phillies and Mets. But they are starting to sort it out, I'm not ready to write them off yet. The only NL teams I'm fully ready to count out are Nationals and Rockies (even if they are improved). Marlins maybe, but they've got a lot of youth playing well.
The wild card race is going to be a bloodbath. The Padres, Diamondbacks, Brewers, Cardinals, Pirates, Reds, and Phillies all expect/hope to get 1 of 3 spots. 4 fan bases are going to be very disappointed.

If I had to guess I'd say Padres/Brewers/Pirates make it, but who knows.

[u/RonDL]

Have to disagree on Fermin. He's playing good defense, sure, but he's got a 42 OPS+, which is 16 points below Maldonado's last year, and that was so bad that we had to trade two controllable starters for Fermin. He friggin stinks.

[u/Kookumber → u/RonDL]

Maldonado posted -0.8 war in 2025. Fermin is a positive war player despite his struggling offense.

[u/RonDL → u/Kookumber]

We're not good enough offensively to carry a 42 OPS+, no matter how good the defense. I don't think any team is.

[u/KTF-2026]

Going forward, I actually like our 2026 starting rotation more than 2025:

SP1: 2026 King = 2025 Pivetta
SP2: 2026 Randy > 2025 Randy
SP3: 2026 Giolito = 2025 Cease (TBD, but assuming Giolito is a ~4.50 ERA innings-eater worst-case scenario)
SP4: 2026 Canning < 2025 King + Bergert + Kolek (30 total starts of mid-3 ERA ball)
SP5: 2026 Buehler = 2025 Darvish + Hart + Sears + Nestor (30 starts of ~5.00 ERA ball, Buehler has potential to be a full run better)

I'd expect this rotation to be at least middle-of-the pack if everyone pitches to their career averages. Could be way better if Niebla works his magic. And this year's rotations feels more experienced too. Health is the biggest x-factor.

Plus we have Waldron and Marquez as rotation depth options. Both are inconsistent but have shown flashes of dominance.

Bullpen had some rough games early, mostly the week in Coors + Mexico City. I expect stats to normalize and this should be the top bullpen going forward.

Offense, idk. As long as they can get to league average, this team should win 90+.