This is a MAJOR Surprise...

This is a huge surprise as the Padres decided not to bring this player back. Who is this player? Was this a good decision or a bad decision? Let's talk about it. Hi, welcome back to another episode of Padres Digest with your host, Andrew. It's a late video today. Happy Halloween. There are people outside my house trick-or-treating, so hopefully nobody knocks on my door while I make this video, because, you know, I'm busy and I don't have any candy. Anyways, happy Halloween, everybody. All right, everybody. So. The scariest thing that you might see today is this. It kind of already spoiled it down there. Besides Juan Peralta opting in, which we'll talk about, but the Padres declined Nick Pavetta's option. He is officially a free agent. I feel like this isn't surprising for some people. I feel like this is really surprising for some people. So we'll talk about all of it in just a sec. Before we get too deep into it, please subscribe as always. Follow us on X, Instagram, Facebook, Padres Digest. So. Let's just jump directly into it. Padres declined Nick Pavetta's $14 million option. I don't know why I turned southern there for a second. So the Padres have declined his $14 million club option for 2027. He will be a free agent at the ripe age of 33 years old. What does that mean? I don't know. I just felt like saying it. So. Let's talk about it a little bit, right? So the San Diego Padres declined their $14 million club option on starting pitching Nick Pavetta, making the right-hander a free agent weeks after he returned from a significant elbow injury. The two sides could still try to negotiate a new deal because they have until the 1st or 2nd, the 2nd of November to make a deal before he's open to the market. But the two sides can still try to negotiate a new deal, although this weekend's decision suggests lingering concerns about the health of Pavetta's arm. So you remember how he was super injured like the entire year he was gone from, I just looked this up, it was like April 12th through September 9th, I think it was. So, you know. He's been gone for a while, right? AC notes in a follow-up post that there are questions about the health of Pavetta's elbow. He added that declining the option was expected and the team and player could still work out a new deal. So it's not like he's gone-gone. Go ahead, Don. Honestly, it might be a good thing because maybe we can get him cheaper than $14 million because it would be kind of weird if he wanted more than $14 million and then we just didn't pick it up. You know what I mean? So maybe that's a good sign. He wants a more team-friendly, wants to stay in San Diego, something. you know better right but under the terms of his original four-year 55 million dollar contract however those options became one team option because Pavetta spent at least 130 consecutive days on the injured list this season with a specified uh elbow injury so yeah I mean he just didn't pitch that much but when he was on the field he was actually pretty good uh we'll talk about what it looked like before and after his injury but a 286 ERA Cool, right? Like, he was big for us in the playoffs, big for us at the end of the season, so no hate from Pavetta, but, yeah, I mean, the injury wasn't great, but, you know, at least he performed after it, you know, he did better than Casey Mize did healthy. Well, I guess he was injured, too. Let's say he did better than Robbie Ray healthy, but, yeah, before I show you other stuff about Pavetta, let's talk about, really quickly, Wandy Peralta also opts in for 4.4 4.45 million in 2027, so cool, right? Left-handed pitcher opted in. His profile, You should know by now his average exit velocity or average velocity is cool. Strikeouts per nine is not great, but that's not really his job. So I'm honestly totally OK with this. I said this on a tweet already, but I like this because he's been sneaky good for the past two seasons. And the thing about Wandy Peralta is when he has a bad streak, everyone piles on him and everyone's like, you suck. You're the worst thing ever. And I hate you. uh but when like he does fine and good and solid like nobody says anything so he's the kind of guy who you bag on when he does bad but don't give a crap when he does good and he's done pretty good for the past two seasons the first season he sucked don't get me wrong but past two seasons he's been fine he's been good right so i'm actually happy for this five million for a solid reliever cool i will take that right so i'm happy about that but let's take another look at Nick Pavetta So, Nick Pavetta missed 147 days with an elbow strain. So, looks like I was correct. Yeah, he threw three pitches to begin at the fourth inning of an April 12 start versus the Rockies and was done until September. And then he had a bit of a rehab setback. He walked off the mound after 13 pitches. He felt something in his elbow. And that's when we were all like, yeah, he's not coming back at all. But 147 days on the I.L. The same injury was one that was similar to the one that sidelined him for a month with the Red Sox in 2024. So, yeah, his 2026 timeline has been kind of, you know, crazy. He left after three pitches, came back, starts versus Milwaukee in the NLDS, and then gets declined. So a very... You know, a mixed bag, I guess, is the best way I can say it. But yeah, at the end of the season, it was probably not perfect, honestly. And just for him to come back and pitch well, just so much respect for the person that he is and the competitor he is. That was AJ Peller via The Athletic. So, Nick Pavetta posted a 2.86 across eight starts. So that's cool, right? If it loads, there we go. So, from Charlie Wright, MLB Trade Rumors. Pavetta was effective when available pitching to a 2.86 ERA backed by a 3.18 expected field independent pitching and a 3.17 SIERA. Hold on, I'm going to remember what that is. S-I-E-R-A. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Okay, skill interactive earned run average was like a super advanced baseball metric that they use. Who cares, right? If you want to look into it, feel free. But you know, that's still good, right? And he tossed 34 and two thirds innings across eight starts. Pavetta added another seven to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, wrong one. So yeah, he's good, right? So, he finished the season with a 2.21 field independent pitching, which is a .286 ERA. And Mark, that looks even better when you consider he gave up six runs over three innings on opening day against the Tigers. I remember that. His 5.7% walk rate was the best of his career, and even on a small sample size of 34 and two-thirds innings, while his 30% strikeout rate was the third best. So, he was actually doing pretty good this season, besides the injury part, right? And his velocity was where it should have been. Yes, he could have been sharper with pitches, but that would have come with more time instead of being rushed slightly to help the Padres make their postseason push. So let's take a look at the numbers, right? Because he doesn't love some good numbers. So results before and after the I.L. So before the I.L., that's from opening day to April 12th, four starts. He had a 4.50 ERA, 16 innings pitched. Most of the ERA comes from the, yeah, six of their eight comes from the opening day game against the Tigers. But yeah, back from the IL though, he had a 1.45 ERA. So four games started, 18 innings pitched, 18 strikeouts, two walks, two home runs, a below one whip, right? But none of his starts this year went past five innings, which is something important to note, right? In the postseason, honestly, not bad, 3.52, so not great, not horrible. He did his job, right? 7.2 innings pitched, he did his job against really good teams. So let's take a look at his pitch mix, right? So he normally throws fastballs. Always, right? Those are his, that's his meatball, his bread and butter is what I meant to say. But before the IL, he threw mostly fastballs. But then after the IL, he came back and threw a little bit less fastballs, more curveballs. You can see his patented, not really patented, but his curveball high dropping into the zone. That's kind of his pitch, right? And then cutters were exactly the same and sweepers were a little bit more. So before the IL, he was throwing more fastballs. But after the IL, maybe due to elbow strain, maybe due to a game plan change, he started throwing in a little bit more off-speed down, right? Fastballs were down 11 points, curveballs up 9 points. So it's something to keep note, right? And then we talk about velocity. So his four-seam velocity before the IL was at a 94.1 miles per hour. After the IL, it was 93.6. So not a huge difference, but a little bit of a difference, right? Top velocity with 96.5 and then top. Before, uh, top before 96 and then top after 95.9. So we'll say 96, right? Best start average, 94.7 to 94.3. And his last regular season starts September 24th at Los Angeles Dodgers, 94.3 above his 94.1 before the IL. So again, not bad. I mean, it's not crazy differences, right? But Nick Pavetta's balls in play against, before the IL, 24 batted balls on an 85.3 miles per hour average exit velocity off the bat. But after, it was 92.3, so 34 batted balls. Hard hit rate went from 29% to 65%. Those are balls that are hit from 95 miles per hour and harder. So seven of 24 versus 22 of 34 and then strikeout rate went way down. So 43% versus 28%. So 20 of 47 batters versus 15 of 53 batters after sample is 20 September 24 plus the two postseason starts. So the numbers definitely do not look the same as they did before the I.L. You could say his stuff was more effective before the I.L., but it's not. It's super different. Like he even had more RPM on some of his pitches after the IL than he did before the IL. So you could take it as a sign that he was rushed back too quickly or he was just out of not out of shape, but like out of like he didn't have the momentum, the rhythm, you know what I mean? Like he was gone for basically the entire season. So definitely the numbers don't look encouraging, but it doesn't mean that he's bad now, per se. Like you said, he was still getting results. You know what I mean? It's not like he was having Robbie Ray, Casey Mize type stats. He was still getting results. But the numbers also show that he might be getting worse. And he is 33 years old. So, you know, take with that as you will. But the Padres rotation is getting thin without Pavetta. So. If we don't sign him, which I feel like we could still, San Diego has a thin rotation. Michael King, Walker Buehler are gone. Pavetta's gone. So that's all we got now is Joe Musgrove, Randy Vasquez, JP Sears, Johnny Brito, and technically Yu Darvish. So that's scary, right? So the case to keep him considering Pavetta's body of work in 2025 and what he did when healthy in 2026, exercising his 14 million club options shouldn't be a question for the Padres. But it was. And the case against. Um, If president of baseball operations, AJ Preller rolls the dice and the right-hander goes down in the first two months of the season, the Padres could end up with a rotation situation like they dealt with in June and July of this year. So his injury, if he gets injured again next year after we pick up the $14 million option, which we didn't, but if we did, it could have hurt us like it did this year. And we had to use Gialito and Canning and Waldron and Edman Marquez. So I guess. Let's just ask this question. Was this the right move? Yes. Right move. The elbow risk is real. B, wrong move. He pitched well when healthy or maybe option C. I don't know. Just sign somebody. I'm personally, I'm in between. It depends. And if we re-sign him and it's below 10 million, cool. I'll take it. Right. But if we move on and find someone else, cool. You know, I love Pavetta. I don't want to see him go. You can't deny the injury risk. That's my two cents. But what do you guys think? And as always, thank you for watching. Please subscribe. Follow us on X, Instagram, Facebook, Padres Digest. Thank you to our channel members. Don't forget to share our awesome bonus features. Have a fantastic, wonderful rest of your day. Happy Halloween. Give me candy. Thank you. Bye.