Ahh, the Padres….errr Prospects continue to lose and basically the season is over. Let’s face reality now and very soon there will be more changes on the entire organization including ownership. The real question is, will the new ownership inherit the baseball operations of the San Diego Padres ? Well, I will inject a few of my thoughts on this and it all depends on who eventually wins the ownership bid. But, here is my two cents worth.

• Padres’ General Manager Josh Byrnes. To be truthfully honest, Byrnes hasn’t done a bad job at all despite that one awful trade of Ernesto Frieri to the Los Angeles Angels. Which I also put blame on Mgr. Buddy Black and I will elaborate later. You have to take into consideration that Byrnes was heavily involved in 2011 draft for the Padres, and that draft turned out to be a very good one. This past year draft (2012) was a very good one if Josh can sign the majority of the players. In trades, Josh did a fantastic job with the Mat Latos trade with the Reds. As far as free agents/waiver wire acquisitions, despite being hammered with tremendous amount of injuries to the pitching staff, Josh continues to be pro-active in the waiver wire and has shown the knack of picking up a good arm here and there. I believe if the O’Malley/Mickelson Group wins the bid, Josh is safe along with the entire Baseball Operations. Now, if Tull/Gwynn Group wins the bid, I feel they might be cleaning house which in my mind would be a huge mistake.
• Padres’ Manager Buddy Black. Ever since Buddy was hired by Sandy Alderson, I was always in Buddy’s corner. Black is what the Padres needed back then, and I felt throughout the years Buddy did a great job with the cards of hands dealt to him. But this year, I’ve seen some inconsistencies in Buddy’s managerial moves. Here are a few for example. Why wasn’t Ernesto Frieri ever considered for temporary closer role when Huston Street went down ? How could Ernesto be a closer for the Angels and not the Padres is beyond my imagination. I thought Buddy Black was a pitching coach before a Manager with the Padres, and so Black’s forte should be pitching. Example two, last year the Padres sent struggling OF Will Venable to the minors with an average below .200. What about this year with C Nick Hundley ? It’s already June, three months into the season and Hundley is still batting under .170. In both cases, it appears that Buddy is too passive and not pulling the triggers when Buddy has nothing to lose, the season is lost. If O’Malley/Mickelson Group wins the bid, I see Buddy being shown the door as the casualty of this mess. If Tull/Gywnn Group wins the bid, Buddy stays on since the SDSU association is very tight with Black and Gwynn.

Which Ownership Group would be best fit for the Padres.

In my honest opinion, the best and only best fit for Padres Ownership is the O’Malley/Mickelson Group. Why ? First of all, you can not beat this Ownership group when they have two outstanding things going for them.

1. A well proven baseball ownership and operations personnel in the O’Malley’s. They are currently running a minor league franchise with great success. How could you argue against this ?
2. A well known and deep pockets San Diego Athelete in Golfer Phil Mickelson. It has been known that Mickelson has been a great follower of the Padres and is from San Diego who has very deep pockets. That fact Mickelson income for this year is slated at 61 million dollars and that’s more then the entire Padres roster.

The other ownership groups do not measure up to those specifics I just outlined above. Therefore, any other group that does win the bid besides the O’Malley/Mickelson, I feel will be a disaster for the Padres Organization. I know many people like the Tull/Gywnn Ownership group. But I ask you one question, has SDSU baseball team won anything as of late ? Any major accomplishments in College Baseball World Series? Enough said. Track records speaks very loud and clear, in the world we live in, everyone deals with numbers and data that are associated with those numbers from health industry to stock market to real estate trends and god forbid even the commodities sector. The latter, is where I am really looking forward to the S&P 500 and pension fund investors to migrate and flock into the small commodities sector soon. So back to baseball, the O’Malley/Mickelson group has a great track record, it is plain and simple. If O’Malley/Mickelson group does not win the bid, I will be looking for a different team to support as well.

Time to clean the kitchen

Knowing the season is lost there are a few players on the roster that should be given consideration as trade bait. I would say the following:

1. P Huston Street
2. C Nick Hundley
3. 3B Chase Headley
4. OF Will Venable
5. OF Carlos Quentin
6. OF Chris Denorfia
7. INF Jose Guzman

The most likely scenario, THREE out of the SEVEN above will probably be wearing a different uniform come the end of July. It’s the by product of the environment and it has to happen, otherwise the organization is sending the wrong message to everyone including their own players.

As many of my loyal readers probably have noticed by now the lack of regular posts made by me. Sole reason is, I hate to consistently report the obvious and given the state of affairs with the San Diego Padres organization not much to report on. So with that being said, I tend to stay away and observe from afar to see who eventually wins the bid for the Padres. Here’s a classic blues music video by Walter Trout titled “Reason I’m Gone”, befitting why I haven’t been attending the games in person or posting regularly here. No reason to be around AAA franchise where I paid big bucks to see a Major League team.