Padres Rumors: Front Office 'Leaning Toward' Juan Soto Trade to Trim Payroll, Giants and Red Sox Among Top Destinations
After a very frustrating season for the San Diego Padres, they now enter an offseason filled with questions. They have to answer for what happened this season, as they will not be making the playoffs after heavy expectations entering the year.
One of those questions has to do with star outfielder Juan Soto, and whether or not the team trades him this winter. There has been plenty of talk lately about San Diego moving on from Soto this offseason because he will be a free agent at the end of next year.
San Diego doesn’t seem like they want to pay him what it would take to re-sign him, so it makes sense for them to get back some assets for the star player. And Bob Nightengale of USA Today is reporting that internally, the Padres may be leaning toward trading him this winter.
“The Padres are internally leaning towards trading All-Star outfielder Juan Soto, which would free up about $30 million – while trying to slash their payroll by about $50 million.”
While he is a good addition to their team, they underperformed this season, and changes need to be made. The Padres have to reevaluate how they built their roster, and that starts with shedding salary.
So, a Soto trade makes sense, and they can replenish some of the pieces that they moved to get him. There would be plenty of teams calling if Soto was put on the trade market, and Nightengale listed a few that could be interested.
“The Giants or the Boston Red Sox could be possible fits while scouts predict that he’ll be a first baseman or DH within two years.”
It would be hard to see the Padres moving Soto in the same division, but weirder things have happened. But he has also been linked with the New York teams in the past as well.
“The Padres won’t get nearly the return that they sent to the Washington Nationals two years ago to acquire Soto, but they should get two top-15 prospects in a team’s farm system, besides freeing themselves an arbitration-record payday for Soto.”
It remains to be seen if the Friars pull the trigger on a Soto trade, but it has been talked about for a while now. Missing the playoffs puts a target on this team's back, and they need to make some changes to the roster, with Soto making sense to be moved. This is just one of many things that the Padres need to figure out this winter, and it should be a very interesting offseason for them.
