With so many known unknowns about the 2026 San Diego Padres, I thought now would be a perfect time to chat with Dylan from Letters to A.J. about all of them. We talked about Tatis hitting cleanup, faith in Nick Castellanos, Luis Campusano losing a major-league swing, the range of potential outcomes, the actual impact of ABS, strategies for Craig Stammen to implement, and what a fast sale could mean for this season.

Nick Burke is friends with John Gennaro and a former baseball player at UCSD. As such, the two of them don't always agree when it comes to their favorite baseball team, the San Diego Padres.

In this episode, John lays out all of the reasons he's worried about the 2026 Padres team before the season even begins and Nick adds his own perspective as both a fan and someone who has a better understanding on what is going on inside of a baseball player's head out on the field.

Hey y’all! This morning I decided to go live over on YouTube to talk about the flurry of moves the San Diego Padres have made over the last few days.

I talked about how there are now four players fighting for two starting jobs in the lineup (1B & DH) and as many as six pitchers fighting for the last two sports in the starting rotation, but also about how that doesn’t mean that any of these options are good.

Luckily, all of the options are cheap and they each have their own varying levels of potential to become average to above-average starters on valuable contracts. That’s what makes them lottery tickets!

I also talked at the end about the five players that are likely going to hit free agency after this season, and what a slow start to the season might mean for A.J. Preller and the rest of the Padres front office.

Earlier this morning, I went live on Substack to talk about how and why my San Diego Padres pessimism is maybe turning into some optimism after Sheel Seidler dropped her lawsuit against the other team owners.

After that, I broke down last night’s impressive SDFC win over Pumas and wondered if the team is still searching for a 9 that can facilitate the last third of the offense.

Happy Monday! Well, kinda. I did not like the tenor of…well, anything really….that was coming out of the San Diego Padres FanFest at Petco Park this weekend. From A.J. Preller’s contract extension to the plan at 1B (and backup catcher) to the superstars that couldn’t be bothered to show up to the Yu Darvish situation to Keith Law’s review of the Padres farm system….there’s a lot to be angry about so I decided to be angry about it all.

I’ve been steaming ever since it turned out that Yu Darvish, who reportedly was planning to retire and void the remainder of his contract with the San Diego Padres, was in fact not planning on retiring and not voiding the remainder of his contract with the San Diego Padres (barring a buyout that has not yet been agreed upon).

I think the news getting out there, and then quickly being refuted, portends an even darker future for the team (and its reputation) than what we were already imagining following the announcement of a sale and A.J. Preller still being unsigned past this upcoming season.

I do my best to explain why I think that before talking about the Seahawks-Patriots Super Bowl matchup and the potential trend it will create, which is one that the NFL itself should probably be concerned about.

Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the Substack app.

I’m still testing out a bunch of Substack features, including continuing to play with the live video.

Today, following the news that the Mets had traded for Freddy Peralta, I flipped on the camera & microphone to talk about how bad things have gotten for the Padres this offseason before turning my attention to San Diego FC, San Diego State’s basketball (and football) program, and the painful story of 5-year old Liam Ramos in Minnesota.

It had been long enough since I had yelled into a microphone and I missed doing it. So, I flipped on a live video (partially to test our the Substack system) this morning and loudly worried about the short-term and long-term future of the San Diego Padres for about a half-hour.

Then, and with full warning, I worried about the short-term and long-term future of America and Americans for the last 15-20 minutes.

This is an unplanned and probably disorganized “episode” of a podcast that doesn’t really exist, but it’s also free content for anyone who is craving it.