So lets take a quick look at the newest additions to the Padres family starting with Yonder Alonso. Alonso bats left and throws right, which freaks me out. I'd prefer for my players, pitchers or not, to not have the chance to get drilled in their throwing arm when they are up to bat. Anyway, based off the limited number of games he has played in during his two seasons he looks like he will be a good addition to the team. He is batting .299 in 127 plate appearances striking out 24% of the time and walking 7% of the time. He doesn't have any stolen bases or attempts which disappoints me but he is a young guy and with the help of Dave Roberts maybe that will change. Next we have Yasmani Grandal. Grandal is a switch hitting catcher, which I like aside from the exposing of his throwing arm, who quickly moved through the minor league system. So far in his career he has an average of .303. I like the sound of that, though we have seen before that minor league numbers don't always translate. The other prospect we received is minor league pitcher Brad Boxberger. He spent last season between AA and AAA with an ERA of 2.03 collecting 11 saves in the 62 innings he appeared in.
Finally, lets compare the stats for Mat and Volquez. Last season Mat's ERA was 2.24 points lower than Volquez's was which doesn't make me any kind of happy that we lost Mat. However, Volquez only started twenty games last season compared to Mat's thirty-one. In his career, Mat has had one complete game whereas Volquez, in his seven seasons, hasn't had any. During Mat's three years he has only pitched about 67 less innings than Volquez has in his career which tells me that Volquez doesn't often go deep into games. Oh yeah, this really makes me feel good about the trade especially since we all know that the Padres have serious issues scoring and rely heavily on our pitching. Looking at the numbers Mat is the better pitcher which is clearly a reason Cincinnati wanted him. I would love for Volquez's ERA and everything else to be better but the one thing I am okay with is he does have more experience which should mean he will be able to control himself better when an outing gets out of control, though I kind of loved that Mat would get so pissed off with himself when things weren't going his way.
This trade was definitely a good one for the Padres but on a personal level for many of us this trade sucks. I do not appreciate the Padres trading away players we all like and neither do the rest of the fans and if you pay any attention to Twitter this recent trade of Mat Latos has seemingly hit us the hardest. Sure we all loved cheering for #TeamLatos but what hurts the most is that we are not only losing Mat but we are losing, his wife, Dallas, as well. If you don't follow her on Twitter you need to, I'm talking to you Reds fans. Well, I am beginning to get sick of saying this but, we wish you two the best of luck in Cincinnati and hope you return to the Padres soon.
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