Minor League Baseball

San Diego Padres A-Ball Affiliate Announces Official Role For Omaha the Bat Dog!

The Lake Elsinore Storm will be fun to watch at the plate, and around the plate, in 2025, because of Omaha the bat dog!

Brady Farkas

A detail view of a San Diego Padres hat on a glove in the dugout in the ninth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field in 2022.
A detail view of a San Diego Padres hat on a glove in the dugout in the ninth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field in 2022. / Isaiah J. Downing-Imagn Images
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Update, Feb. 20: Two weeks ago, we had some fun regarding a story out of the San Diego Padres system. We told you that the Lake Elsinore Storm, an A-Ball affiliate for the Padres, would be introducing a dog named Omaha into the fold this year. Though we weren't quite sure what Omaha's role would be, we thought maybe she would be the team's bat dog.

Turns out, Omaha saw our post and wanted to set the record straight!

To put an end to the speculation as to what my role will be, I will be the bat dog on Weds, Fridays & Saturdays @Storm_Baseball home series.

Below are highlights from my try-out last season.

Feb. 6: The Lake Elsinore Storm, the Single-A affiliate of the San Diego Padres, appear to have introduced a new "bat dog" for the 2025 season: Omaha!

Now, we're doing a little deductive reasoning here as there was no formal announcement that Omaha will serve as the bat dog, but given that there's a contract with his paw print on it, and the popularity of bat dogs around the minors, it feels like a safe bet.

If not, perhaps Omaha will be the team dog or a dog that goes around the stadium. But either way, it's a win for all involved in the Lake Elsinore operation.

Lake Elsinore is the Low-A affiliate of the Padres. The season begins on April 4. Lake Elsinore is the lowest rung on the Padres minor league ladder, with players often beginning their careers there before moving onto Fort Wayne (High-A), San Antonio (Double-A) and El Paso (Triple-A).

The roster for the Storm will start to take shape once the Padres began to trim down the participants in spring training, which begins next week.

The Padres are coming off a season that saw them finish second in the National League West. They beat the Atlanta Braves in the wild-card round of the playoffs before losing to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NLDS. The Dodgers went onto win the World Series and appear to have gotten better this offseason by adding Roki Sasaki, Blake Snell, Kirby Yates and Tanner Scott.

The Padres have yet to make any big moves this offseason.

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Brady Farkas
BRADY FARKAS

Brady Farkas is the senior writer for “Minor League Baseball on SI’’ and the host of “The Payoff Pitch’’ podcast, which can be found on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Brady has spent nearly a decade in sports talk radio and is a graduate of Oswego State University. Follow Brady on Twitter @WDEVRadioBrady.

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