The Padres May Need To Start Questioning if AJ Preller is the Right Man for the Job in San Diego

After a disappointing season, the Padres may need a new general manager.

This season, every MLB pundit expected the San Diego Padres to compete for a National League pennant while potentially running away with the Western Division title. Now, they are buried in fourth place and fighting an uphill battle for one of the National League Wild Card spots.

The team's struggles have led to finger pointing in the industry. What is going on with not only this edition of the team but with the organization as a whole?

The issues were a topic of discussion with Padres insider Dustin Lin of The Athletic and San Diego sports talk host Darren Smith this week where Smith asked Lin to help identify the throughline for the on again, off again woes for this franchise.

That throughline is general manager AJ Preller.

"We've talked about this in the past in 2021, but how many more chances do you as an owner allow a GM to have after he's been through multiple managers and many more coaches and things just haven't quite seemed to click or be sustainable. The common throughline is the obvious one, it's the GM chair. ... at some point you need to ask yourself, is this GM still the right guy for the job and Peter Seidler seems to be leaning that way."

Preller seems to like the big name free agents and to make headline-catching trades like the one for Juan Soto. However, the Padres need depth and to rebuild their farm system to have consistent winning teams.

Quality depth has been a consistent area of concern for this club in recent years.

At this year’s trade deadline, Preller chose to buy instead of selling both Blake Snell and Josh Hader when the Padres already had little hope of winning the division. When every contending team wanted pitching, he could have gotten many top prospects for each. 

Lin and Smith further discuss Preller and his penchant for running through managers and coaches. Since joining the front office, Preller has dismissed managers Bud Black, Pat Murphy, Andy Green, Jayce Tingler, and now Bob Melvin may end up on the hot seat.

It can't always be the manager's fault, right?

This offseason -- or perhaps even as soon as this September, Padres owner Peter Seidler needs to seriously consider the future of this organization and whether a change may be needed.