The longtime TNT broadcaster, and soon-to-be ESPN broadcaster, had plenty to say about the Lakers on Wednesday during an appearance on “The Dan Patrick Show,” two days after they fell behind 3-1 against the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round of the NBA playoffs.
To put it simply, Barkley wasn’t surprised. He also had some words for how his future employers at ESPN treat the team:
“The Lakers, I told you two months ago, six weeks ago, the Lakers aren’t a good team. They got two really, really good players, but not a good team. ESPN just swings on them like everything tastes like chicken, but the Lakers are not a good team. They’re going to lose either this round or next round, but more likely this round. They’re not very good.”
Asked to expand on the Lakers’ future with Luka Dončić and LeBron James, Barkley didn’t sound optimistic about the team’s current roster, which was assembled somewhat haphazardly via the trade that brought Dončić to Los Angeles.
Charles Barkley has seen enough from the Lakers, and their ESPN coverage. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images)
“The Lakers are not going to be a contender with the team they have now. Your best player can’t be 40. That makes no sense whatsoever. Your best player can’t be 40. And JJ was wrong the other night to play those guys the entire second half because, No. 1, it’s probably going to affect them tonight. It definitely affected them down the stretch the other night. Both of those guys missed lay-ups and they made some mental mistakes with the ball.
“This is not the Lakers’ year. And people think I hate on the Lakers. I told you. I said, ‘The Lakers aren’t a good team.’ But ESPN was just swinging on them like they were damn King Kong.”
The Lakers are certainly in an interesting spot despite benefiting from perhaps the most shocking trade in NBA history. Getting a 25-year-old All-NBA player like Dončić is a gift, but as the Dallas Mavericks showed, his presence alone doesn’t get the job done.
It’s worth remembering Los Angeles also tried to pair Dončić with a big man who fit his talents with the Mark Williams trade, but then the team spiked the deal after seeing the Charlotte Hornets center’s medicals. Jaxson Hayes, the team’s current starting center, played four minutes in Game 4, while Alex Len, the only other traditional big man on the roster, was a DNP.
Just as Patrick was preparing to change the subject, Barkley interjected with an additional point about how ESPN has covered Giannis Antetokounmpo’s future with the Milwaukee Bucks and contrasted it to the environment during his playing days:
“Dan, you know, the clowns at ESPN, they always make me laugh,” he told Patrick. “Dan, you know, I’m going to be a straight shooter. It’s interesting how they were discussing Giannis [Antetokounmpo] this week, like, ‘Should Giannis want to leave?’ I clearly don’t remember when I played, I don’t remember saying, ‘We need to get Charles Barkley some help in Philadelphia, or Phoenix, or Karl Malone in Utah. Patrick Ewing some help in New York.’ I remember the guys in the media kissing my ass and Karl’s ass, and Patrick’s ass. ‘Well, Giannis should want to leave Milwaukee now, because he can’t win the championship.’ I wonder where all the guys were when I played, asking me to get some help.
“I mean, they were kissing. They were like loving the Lakers, loving the Celtics, loving Michael [Jordan], loving the Pistons. But I don’t remember all these kiss-asses back in the day, saying, ‘You know, we need to get Charles Barkley some help, because he can’t win a championship in Philly or Phoenix.’ It makes me laugh. They’re like, ‘Giannis gotta leave Milwaukee.’ You know, that already started. Like, wow. Y’all more concerned about us other great players back in our day, but y’all of a sudden now y’all like, ‘Giannis has got to leave Milwaukee now. Is his championship window closed?’ I’m like, ‘Man, thanks for helping me out when I went out there with nobody.”
You have to figure ESPN knew this going in, but you can never expect Charles Barkley to speak with a filter.
Tony Gonsolin pitches against the Marlins in the first inning. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
The Dodgers repeatedly have proved they cast a wide net when constructing a starting rotation, seemingly with no financial constraints. Japan, South Korea, Latin America, via trades or free-agent signings, they’ll go anywhere and do anything to ensure that each game they can hand the ball to a seasoned, well-compensated pitcher.
Yet inexplicably, the best-laid plans continually fail, and they are forced to hand said ball to unproven rookies. Witness Tuesday with Jack Dreyer and Matt Sauer adding their names to a fleetingly familiar group that includes Bobby Miller, Landon Knack, Justin Wrobleski and Ben Casparius.
Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow, huge signings the last two offseasons, are on the injured list. The Dodgers already have used 22 pitchers with the calendar lipping into May. Granted, that includes comedic stints by position players Miguel Rojas and Kiké Hernández, but that only proves how empty the cupboard can get.
How refreshing it was Wednesday to turn to a homegrown solution, albeit one who has endured his own litany of injuries. Tony Gonsolin, a 2016 Dodgers draft pick out of St. Mary’s College, pitched for the first time since August 2023 and shone in a 12-7 win over the Miami Marlins at Dodger Stadium, their fifth victory in a row.
Gonsolin, fully recovered from 2023 Tommy John surgery and a sprained ankle in March, mostly sailed through six innings, striking out nine while walking none, throwing 58 strikes in 77 pitches. The only batter he couldn’t fool was left-handed Kyle Stowers, who crushed a two-run homer in the fourth, a run-scoring double in the sixth and a single. Stowers added another homer off Yoendrys Gomez in the ninth inning.
To everyone else, Gonsolin was masterful. His four-seam fastball sat at 94 mph, his slider at 88, and the bottom dropped out of his his devastating splitter a lot like it did in 2022 when Gonsolin went 16-1 with a 2.14 earned-run average, started the All-Star Game and achieved fame for his love of cats.
Dodger Stadium organist Dieter Ruehle has a long memory, playing a “meow” sound effect after each strikeout Wednesday. Gonsolin displayed his uncanny ability to finish with a W next to his name in the box score, the victory improving his lifetime record to a sparkling 35-11.
“It feels good to be back on the mound for sure,” he said. “Just to go out there and do my job and have fun. I thought I had a lot of fun today. I think that was the ultimate goal.”
He thoroughly enjoyed watching his teammates put crooked numbers on the scoreboard.
“Just knowing that they’re gonna go out there and put together quality at-bats and score runs,” he said. “And it’s gonna be really hard to keep this offense down.”
Max Muncy steps on first after hitting his first home run of the season. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Manager Dave Roberts was understandably thrilled to get a healthy Gonsolin on the mound.
“He has a different brain,” Roberts said. “I think he’s just very confident in who he is now as a person, as a ballplayer, the moment isn’t gonna get too big for him. It wasn’t like this first outing in however long. He just took it in stride and really looked good today.
“There was no let-up. He pitched fantastic.”
Gonsolin and another homegrown starter the Dodgers grabbed in the 2016 draft, Dustin May, should be key rotation pieces during a brutal stretch of 19 games in 20 days that begins Friday with a 10-game trip to Atlanta, Miami and Arizona. May has gone at least five innings in each of his five starts, getting roughed up in only one while posting a 3.95 ERA.
Coming off an 18-hit barrage in a win over Miami on Tuesday, the Dodgers cooled only slightly, settling for 17 in the series finale. Yet they found solace early when slumping Max Muncy hit his first home run on the last day of April to give them a 1-0 lead in the second inning.
“I’ve still got to clean some things up and be better in certain situations,” Muncy said. “It’s a work in progress. We keep rewatching my at-bats and rewatching my swings and the back body has been good, it’s just getting the ball to go forward.”
Forward, ho, the Dodgers adding three runs in the third and four in the sixth with Mookie Betts driving in four on a single and a triple. Freddie Freeman followed Betts’ triple in the sixth with his fifth home run. Muncy tripled in the seventh on a charitably scored fly ball to right field that Stowers misplayed, and scored on a single by Hernández.
The onslaught continued in the eighth with the Dodgers tacking on three more runs highlighted by a triple from Shohei Ohtani, doubles by Rojas and Teoscar Hernández and a single by Kiké Hernández. The Marlins scored four in the ninth against Gómez but it couldn’t take away from the optimism the Dodgers took with them on their flight to Atlanta.
“It was a real good, feel-good victory,” Roberts said.
LOS ANGELES — Miami Marlins rookie outfielder Griffin Conine will miss the rest of the season following surgery on his left shoulder.
Conine jammed his shoulder into the ground on a head-first slide into second in an 11-10 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies last Saturday. The 27-year left the game and was placed on the 60-day injured list the following day.
An MRI Monday confirmed a dislocated shoulder, which was repaired Tuesday in Los Angeles by Dodgers head team physician Dr. Neal ElAttrache.
Through 20 games, Conine was batting .281 with a .790 on-base-plus-slugging percentage, one home run, seven doubles and seven RBIs. He made his big league debut last August and hit .268 with a .777 OPS, three homers and 12 RBIs in 30 games.
“Yeah, Griffin was playing so well, and a key cog for us, an important piece,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said on Wednesday. “Surgery was successful, and everything should be on track for Griffin to get through his rehab and be a full-go come spring training.”
Conine’s father, Jeff, played on the Marlins’ World Series champions in 1997 and 2003 and is known as Mr. Marlin.
Javier Sanoja, Kyle Stowers, Eric Wagaman and Ronny Simon have started in left field in Conine’s absence.
“I think we’ll continue to rotate guys through there,” McCullough said. “It’s nice to have some versatile pieces that can go out there and play. You can start the game in one setup, and depending how the game goes, guys can come in.”
It’s just two games, but the pair of contests between the Padres and Giants this week in San Diego represent the earliest intradivision clash in what projects to be one of the most compelling storylines of the 2025 season: the battle for the NL West.
This is a division that featured the four best records in MLB three weeks into the season, an astonishing reality even considering the modest early sample. That fun fact is no longer intact, as the D-backs have slipped back toward .500, but the Snakes — NL champs in 2023 and winners of 89 games last year — are still clearly a team to take seriously. With Arizona, the defending World Series champion Dodgers, a wildly talented Padres club and a seemingly rejuvenated Giants franchise, it’s rare to see this much firepower in one division.
And with these four teams all vying for spots in the postseason, each divisional game carries more weight. At the same time, the introduction of the balanced schedule in 2023 means there are fewer opportunities in the regular season for these rivals to prove themselves against one another; these days, teams play 13 games against each of their divisional opponents instead of the former 19. This year, there were barely any intradivision NL West games in the first month of the season. Sure, the Dodgers and Padres have already collected three wins apiece against the potentially historically horrible Rockies — and racking up wins against Colorado will be crucial for all four squads as they look to keep pace — but otherwise, nearly all of the matchups among these playoff hopefuls are still in front of us.
Consider this week’s brief soirée between San Diego and San Francisco an appetizer for what promises to be a full menu of high-stakes games as the summer unfolds. The first month has given us plenty of reason to be optimistic about these four NL West contenders. But no team is perfect, and we’ve already seen cracks in each club’s armor that could prove to be their undoing over the long haul.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at why each team is so good and why they might have reason to worry.
Los Angeles Dodgers
Why they’re so good: Unmatched lineup depth
It turns out having a trio of future Hall of Famers atop your lineup is a solid strategy. Yet it hasn’t just been three MVPs doing all the heavy lifting offensively in the early going. Tommy Edman continues to excel in his first full year in Dodger blue, and 24-year-old center fielder Andy Pages — the only position player on the roster under the age of 30 — has been the team’s hottest hitter for several weeks.
When players such as Edman and Pages are raking in support of the expected production from the higher-profile stars such as Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Will Smith and Teoscar Hernandez, it becomes far easier to not worry about Max Muncy having one home run or Michael Conforto having a .574 OPS or Mookie Betts slugging only .385. With this much talent crammed into the lineup, the Dodgers can more than compensate for whoever happens to be enduring a slump. That’s their superpower as currently constructed.
Why they should worry: Can they survive all the pitching injuries for the second consecutive year?
Here we go again. Yes, we just watched the Dodgers win the World Series after navigating an unprecedented wave of injuries on the mound, but it’s worth recalling that most of those major injuries didn’t occur until later in the season. Yoshinobu Yamamoto didn’t hit the IL until mid-June. Tyler Glasnow was healthy and awesome until his elbow started barking in August. Gavin Stone gave the team 25 stellar starts before his season-ending shoulder surgery in September.
This year, we’re barely one month in, and multiple key arms have already hit the shelf, with both Glasnow and marquee free-agent addition Blake Snell dealing with shoulder issues. It was fun to fantasize in the offseason about how loaded the rotation looked on paper, with Snell and the mega-talented Roki Sasaki joining Glasnow and Yamamoto in advance of Ohtani’s return to the mound (not to mention rehabbing franchise legend Clayton Kershaw), but these early injuries have quickly raised the question of when and whether this hypothetical super rotation will actually come to be.
With Glasnow’s and Snell’s status uncertain and Ohtani nowhere close to returning, there is substantial pressure on Sasaki and Yamamoto to not just perform at a high level but also sustain a sizable workload, even though neither has proven capable of doing so in recent seasons. Dustin May and Tony Gonsolin must do the same, despite having come back from significant surgeries, and Kershaw’s return — which didn’t seem like an urgent matter a few weeks ago — now feels considerably more crucial. The spotlight also burns brighter on the depth looming in Triple-A, guys such as Bobby Miller, Justin Wrobleski and Landon Knack.
President of baseball operations Andrew Friedman explained over the winter that the purpose of acquiring all this pitching talent was to avoid having to go shopping for expensive pitching at the trade deadline, but at this point, it’s difficult to imagine L.A. not having to make a deal for an arm or two come July.
San Diego Padres
Why they’re so good: Elite top talent
The top half of this Padres roster is as good as any team’s across the league. San Diego boasts two of the best all-around outfielders in the sport in Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill, two ultra-productive veteran hitters in Manny Machado and Luis Arraez, three starters with swing-and-miss stuff in Dylan Cease, Michael King and Nick Pivetta, and a super-stacked bullpen headlined by an elite closer in Robert Suarez.
When all of these top players are healthy and performing at their best, this is an exceptionally difficult roster to navigate on both sides of the ball. Containing the Padres’ offense is a chore, and scoring runs against their pitching staff is a challenge.
Why they should worry: Can a roster this top-heavy succeed over 162 games and beyond?
The problem with San Diego — one that started to be exposed recently with injuries to Merrill, Arraez and Jake Cronenworth — is a severe lack of competent depth beyond the superstars. Unlike the Dodgers or D-backs, or even the Giants on the pitching side, this is simply not a team with a wealth of big-league-quality options waiting in the wings in Triple-A. The series of blockbuster trades executed by president of baseball operations AJ Preller has left the upper levels of the San Diego farm system relatively barren, with the bulk of the top prospects occupying the lower rungs of the minors, too far away to help in 2025.
All those swaps combined with heavy investment in the current stars has also left minimal financial flexibility to address the bottom of the roster, which has led the Padres to lean on an unusually large number of fringe veterans as regular contributors: guys such as Jose Iglesias, Tyler Wade, Martín Maldonado, Jason Heyward, Gavin Sheets and Connor Joe. Some of these free-agent signings have gone better than others, but the broad result is the Padres too often rolling out lineups in which the bottom half is extremely exploitable.
A similar dynamic is taking place on the mound in the wake of injuries to Yu Darvish and Joe Musgrove, as there aren’t any viable alternatives lurking in the minors to replace the struggling Randy Vasquez and Kyle Hart. It’s possible that the high-end talent on this roster, if healthy, will be good enough to overcome the lack of depth in the long run, but this precarious style of roster construction makes each current injury — and any future ones — especially ominous for these Padres.
In a division this stacked, it’s going to be a battle all season long.
Grant Thoma/Yahoo Sports
San Francisco Giants
Why they’re so good: Clutch hitting and a standout bullpen
The Giants have combined an excellent bullpen with enough timely hitting to rack up a ton of wins in April, with a remarkable five of their nine home victories coming in walk-off fashion. The spectacular breakout of center fielder Jung Hoo Lee has elevated San Francisco on both sides of the ball, giving the Giants another core position player to build around, alongside Matt Chapman and Willy Adames in the infield.
On the mound, Logan Webb continues to gobble up innings as efficiently as any starter in the NL, and an impressive variety of relievers — from hard-throwers in Camilo Doval and Randy Rodriguez to the funky deliveries of Ryan Walker and Tyler Rogers — have kept opposing bats off-balance in the late innings while the offense has consistently come up with a big hit when required.
Why they should worry: Is this offense actually good?
The Giants certainly still have some questions to answer on the mound beyond Webb, but I’m more focused on the lineup’s long-term viability. While Lee’s ascension has been both incredibly encouraging and wonderfully entertaining, it’s also one of the only promising starts to the year among San Francisco’s bats. Adames has been disappointing thus far, struggling to adjust to the hitter-unfriendly confines of Oracle Park. Heliot Ramos hasn’t homered since the first week of the season. Matt Chapman is drawing a ton of walks but hitting a career-low .206. Wilmer Flores has driven in a bunch of runs (28!), but nothing about his batted-ball data suggests he is suddenly a star-level slugger enjoying a late-career breakout.
And while the Giants rank in the middle of the pack in terms of wRC+ and runs per game, several underlying metrics suggest a far less potent offense: This team ranks 29th in hard-hit rate and 26th in xwOBA. Maybe San Francisco can continue to survive with sensationally precise sequencing that results in a steady stream of well-timed rallies and late-inning comebacks, but I’d feel a lot better about this group’s chances of contending if the lineup can demonstrate a more sustainable flavor of production.
Arizona Diamondbacks
Why they’re so good: An unstoppable offense
The D-backs led MLB in runs per game last year, but Christian Walker and Joc Pederson were massive contributors to that. With both gone in free agency, it felt reasonable to expect the Snakes’ lineup to take some kind of step back in 2025. Instead, the D-backs have barely skipped a beat and are once again one of the most formidable offenses in MLB.
Trade acquisition Josh Naylor has replaced Walker’s production brilliantly and continues to mash at an All-Star level. Pavin Smith has emerged as a legitimate force against right-handed pitching just as Pederson was a year ago. Corbin Carroll looks better than ever, which is quite the statement considering the exceptional standard he set in his first two big-league seasons. Fresh off signing a long-term extension in spring training, shortstop Geraldo Perdomo is having his best offensive season yet. Eugenio Suarez is tied for the league lead in homers with 10.
And perhaps most impressive of all, this Snakes offense has stayed humming even with Ketel Marte having played only eight games due to a hamstring strain that still has him on the shelf. All of which is to say: Arizona’s calling card remains its fantastic position-player group, which should keep this team competitive all season.
Why they should worry: How much do we trust this pitching staff?
When the D-backs surprisingly scooped up Corbin Burnes in free agency, it looked like they had acquired an ace to top what already looked to be a fairly formidable rotation. But that has not been the case thus far, with only 26-year-old Brandon Pfaadt performing at or above expectations, while Zac Gallen, Merrill Kelly, Eduardo Rodriguez and even Burnes have appeared frighteningly hittable in April.
It might be easy to overlook the disappointing rotation when the offense is scoring boatloads of runs and the new-look bullpen, featuring AJ Puk, fireballer Justin Martinez and a resurgent Shelby Miller, is handling high-leverage situations with aplomb. But now Puk is on the IL, which raises the stakes for Martinez and Miller to continue delivering at an elite level, especially if the starters scuffle.
For as good as this lineup appears to be, we watched this same recipe of high-octane offense plus shaky run prevention fall just short in 2024. And in this tremendously competitive division, there’s even less margin for error for such a combo to work in 2025.
It’s just two games, but the pair of contests between the Padres and Giants this week in San Diego represent the earliest intradivision clash in what projects to be one of the most compelling storylines of the 2025 season: the battle for the NL West.
This is a division that featured the four best records in MLB three weeks into the season, an astonishing reality even considering the modest early sample. That fun fact is no longer intact, as the D-backs have slipped back toward .500, but the Snakes — NL champs in 2023 and winners of 89 games last year — are still clearly a team to take seriously. With Arizona, the defending World Series champion Dodgers, a wildly talented Padres club and a seemingly rejuvenated Giants franchise, it’s rare to see this much firepower in one division.
And with these four teams all vying for spots in the postseason, each divisional game carries more weight. At the same time, the introduction of the balanced schedule in 2023 means there are fewer opportunities in the regular season for these rivals to prove themselves against one another; these days, teams play 13 games against each of their divisional opponents instead of the former 19. This year, there were barely any intradivision NL West games in the first month of the season. Sure, the Dodgers and Padres have already collected three wins apiece against the potentially historically horrible Rockies — and racking up wins against Colorado will be crucial for all four squads as they look to keep pace — but otherwise, nearly all of the matchups among these playoff hopefuls are still in front of us.
Consider this week’s brief soirée between San Diego and San Francisco an appetizer for what promises to be a full menu of high-stakes games as the summer unfolds. The first month has given us plenty of reason to be optimistic about these four NL West contenders. But no team is perfect, and we’ve already seen cracks in each club’s armor that could prove to be their undoing over the long haul.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at why each team is so good and why they might have reason to worry.
Los Angeles Dodgers
Why they’re so good: Unmatched lineup depth
It turns out having a trio of future Hall of Famers atop your lineup is a solid strategy. Yet it hasn’t just been three MVPs doing all the heavy lifting offensively in the early going. Tommy Edman continues to excel in his first full year in Dodger blue, and 24-year-old center fielder Andy Pages — the only position player on the roster under the age of 30 — has been the team’s hottest hitter for several weeks.
When players such as Edman and Pages are raking in support of the expected production from the higher-profile stars such as Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Will Smith and Teoscar Hernandez, it becomes far easier to not worry about Max Muncy having one home run or Michael Conforto having a .574 OPS or Mookie Betts slugging only .385. With this much talent crammed into the lineup, the Dodgers can more than compensate for whoever happens to be enduring a slump. That’s their superpower as currently constructed.
Why they should worry: Can they survive all the pitching injuries for the second consecutive year?
Here we go again. Yes, we just watched the Dodgers win the World Series after navigating an unprecedented wave of injuries on the mound, but it’s worth recalling that most of those major injuries didn’t occur until later in the season. Yoshinobu Yamamoto didn’t hit the IL until mid-June. Tyler Glasnow was healthy and awesome until his elbow started barking in August. Gavin Stone gave the team 25 stellar starts before his season-ending shoulder surgery in September.
This year, we’re barely one month in, and multiple key arms have already hit the shelf, with both Glasnow and marquee free-agent addition Blake Snell dealing with shoulder issues. It was fun to fantasize in the offseason about how loaded the rotation looked on paper, with Snell and the mega-talented Roki Sasaki joining Glasnow and Yamamoto in advance of Ohtani’s return to the mound (not to mention rehabbing franchise legend Clayton Kershaw), but these early injuries have quickly raised the question of when and whether this hypothetical super rotation will actually come to be.
With Glasnow’s and Snell’s status uncertain and Ohtani nowhere close to returning, there is substantial pressure on Sasaki and Yamamoto to not just perform at a high level but also sustain a sizable workload, even though neither has proven capable of doing so in recent seasons. Dustin May and Tony Gonsolin must do the same, despite having come back from significant surgeries, and Kershaw’s return — which didn’t seem like an urgent matter a few weeks ago — now feels considerably more crucial. The spotlight also burns brighter on the depth looming in Triple-A, guys such as Bobby Miller, Justin Wrobleski and Landon Knack.
President of baseball operations Andrew Friedman explained over the winter that the purpose of acquiring all this pitching talent was to avoid having to go shopping for expensive pitching at the trade deadline, but at this point, it’s difficult to imagine L.A. not having to make a deal for an arm or two come July.
San Diego Padres
Why they’re so good: Elite top talent
The top half of this Padres roster is as good as any team’s across the league. San Diego boasts two of the best all-around outfielders in the sport in Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill, two ultra-productive veteran hitters in Manny Machado and Luis Arraez, three starters with swing-and-miss stuff in Dylan Cease, Michael King and Nick Pivetta, and a super-stacked bullpen headlined by an elite closer in Robert Suarez.
When all of these top players are healthy and performing at their best, this is an exceptionally difficult roster to navigate on both sides of the ball. Containing the Padres’ offense is a chore, and scoring runs against their pitching staff is a challenge.
Why they should worry: Can a roster this top-heavy succeed over 162 games and beyond?
The problem with San Diego — one that started to be exposed recently with injuries to Merrill, Arraez and Jake Cronenworth — is a severe lack of competent depth beyond the superstars. Unlike the Dodgers or D-backs, or even the Giants on the pitching side, this is simply not a team with a wealth of big-league-quality options waiting in the wings in Triple-A. The series of blockbuster trades executed by president of baseball operations AJ Preller has left the upper levels of the San Diego farm system relatively barren, with the bulk of the top prospects occupying the lower rungs of the minors, too far away to help in 2025.
All those swaps combined with heavy investment in the current stars has also left minimal financial flexibility to address the bottom of the roster, which has led the Padres to lean on an unusually large number of fringe veterans as regular contributors: guys such as Jose Iglesias, Tyler Wade, Martín Maldonado, Jason Heyward, Gavin Sheets and Connor Joe. Some of these free-agent signings have gone better than others, but the broad result is the Padres too often rolling out lineups in which the bottom half is extremely exploitable.
A similar dynamic is taking place on the mound in the wake of injuries to Yu Darvish and Joe Musgrove, as there aren’t any viable alternatives lurking in the minors to replace the struggling Randy Vasquez and Kyle Hart. It’s possible that the high-end talent on this roster, if healthy, will be good enough to overcome the lack of depth in the long run, but this precarious style of roster construction makes each current injury — and any future ones — especially ominous for these Padres.
In a division this stacked, it’s going to be a battle all season long.
Grant Thoma/Yahoo Sports
San Francisco Giants
Why they’re so good: Clutch hitting and a standout bullpen
The Giants have combined an excellent bullpen with enough timely hitting to rack up a ton of wins in April, with a remarkable five of their nine home victories coming in walk-off fashion. The spectacular breakout of center fielder Jung Hoo Lee has elevated San Francisco on both sides of the ball, giving the Giants another core position player to build around, alongside Matt Chapman and Willy Adames in the infield.
On the mound, Logan Webb continues to gobble up innings as efficiently as any starter in the NL, and an impressive variety of relievers — from hard-throwers in Camilo Doval and Randy Rodriguez to the funky deliveries of Ryan Walker and Tyler Rogers — have kept opposing bats off-balance in the late innings while the offense has consistently come up with a big hit when required.
Why they should worry: Is this offense actually good?
The Giants certainly still have some questions to answer on the mound beyond Webb, but I’m more focused on the lineup’s long-term viability. While Lee’s ascension has been both incredibly encouraging and wonderfully entertaining, it’s also one of the only promising starts to the year among San Francisco’s bats. Adames has been disappointing thus far, struggling to adjust to the hitter-unfriendly confines of Oracle Park. Heliot Ramos hasn’t homered since the first week of the season. Matt Chapman is drawing a ton of walks but hitting a career-low .206. Wilmer Flores has driven in a bunch of runs (28!), but nothing about his batted-ball data suggests he is suddenly a star-level slugger enjoying a late-career breakout.
And while the Giants rank in the middle of the pack in terms of wRC+ and runs per game, several underlying metrics suggest a far less potent offense: This team ranks 29th in hard-hit rate and 26th in xwOBA. Maybe San Francisco can continue to survive with sensationally precise sequencing that results in a steady stream of well-timed rallies and late-inning comebacks, but I’d feel a lot better about this group’s chances of contending if the lineup can demonstrate a more sustainable flavor of production.
Arizona Diamondbacks
Why they’re so good: An unstoppable offense
The D-backs led MLB in runs per game last year, but Christian Walker and Joc Pederson were massive contributors to that. With both gone in free agency, it felt reasonable to expect the Snakes’ lineup to take some kind of step back in 2025. Instead, the D-backs have barely skipped a beat and are once again one of the most formidable offenses in MLB.
Trade acquisition Josh Naylor has replaced Walker’s production brilliantly and continues to mash at an All-Star level. Pavin Smith has emerged as a legitimate force against right-handed pitching just as Pederson was a year ago. Corbin Carroll looks better than ever, which is quite the statement considering the exceptional standard he set in his first two big-league seasons. Fresh off signing a long-term extension in spring training, shortstop Geraldo Perdomo is having his best offensive season yet. Eugenio Suarez is tied for the league lead in homers with 10.
And perhaps most impressive of all, this Snakes offense has stayed humming even with Ketel Marte having played only eight games due to a hamstring strain that still has him on the shelf. All of which is to say: Arizona’s calling card remains its fantastic position-player group, which should keep this team competitive all season.
Why they should worry: How much do we trust this pitching staff?
When the D-backs surprisingly scooped up Corbin Burnes in free agency, it looked like they had acquired an ace to top what already looked to be a fairly formidable rotation. But that has not been the case thus far, with only 26-year-old Brandon Pfaadt performing at or above expectations, while Zac Gallen, Merrill Kelly, Eduardo Rodriguez and even Burnes have appeared frighteningly hittable in April.
It might be easy to overlook the disappointing rotation when the offense is scoring boatloads of runs and the new-look bullpen, featuring AJ Puk, fireballer Justin Martinez and a resurgent Shelby Miller, is handling high-leverage situations with aplomb. But now Puk is on the IL, which raises the stakes for Martinez and Miller to continue delivering at an elite level, especially if the starters scuffle.
For as good as this lineup appears to be, we watched this same recipe of high-octane offense plus shaky run prevention fall just short in 2024. And in this tremendously competitive division, there’s even less margin for error for such a combo to work in 2025.
On this episode of The Big Number, Tom Haberstroh and Dan Devine break down the New York Knicks’ offensive struggles. Could they actually blow this series to the Detroit Pistons?
Plus, Tom and Dan have unearthed the numbers that prove this is one of the most exciting NBA postseasons of ALL-TIME, and the 1st round is still going!
The duo also recap the Milwaukee Bucks blowing a 7-point lead with 40 seconds left on Tuesday night to end their season, and perhaps the Giannis Era in Milwaukee. How did things get so bad for the Bucks that they may have no choice but to entertain offers for their generational superstar? It’s here on this installment of The Big Number.
(1:05) – What makes this first round so competitive
(16:05) – Cade Cunningham’s early dominance
(18:55) – Knicks’ concerning pace of play
(24:35) – Jalen Duren making plays for Detroit
(28:25) – Knicks offensive struggles without Brunson
(32:20) – Should Bucks trade Giannis?
(46:55) – Cavs-Pacers thoughts & predictions
Milwaukee Bucks v Indiana Pacers – Game Five INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA – APRIL 29: Giannis Antetokounmpo #34 of the Milwaukee Bucks reacts in the first quarter against the Indiana Pacers of Game 5 of the 2025 NBA Playoffs at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on April 29, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images)
On this episode of The Big Number, Tom Haberstroh and Dan Devine break down the New York Knicks’ offensive struggles. Could they actually blow this series to the Detroit Pistons?
Plus, Tom and Dan have unearthed the numbers that prove this is one of the most exciting NBA postseasons of ALL-TIME, and the 1st round is still going!
The duo also recap the Milwaukee Bucks blowing a 7-point lead with 40 seconds left on Tuesday night to end their season, and perhaps the Giannis Era in Milwaukee. How did things get so bad for the Bucks that they may have no choice but to entertain offers for their generational superstar? It’s here on this installment of The Big Number.
(1:05) – What makes this first round so competitive
(16:05) – Cade Cunningham’s early dominance
(18:55) – Knicks’ concerning pace of play
(24:35) – Jalen Duren making plays for Detroit
(28:25) – Knicks offensive struggles without Brunson
(32:20) – Should Bucks trade Giannis?
(46:55) – Cavs-Pacers thoughts & predictions
Milwaukee Bucks v Indiana Pacers – Game Five INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA – APRIL 29: Giannis Antetokounmpo #34 of the Milwaukee Bucks reacts in the first quarter against the Indiana Pacers of Game 5 of the 2025 NBA Playoffs at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on April 29, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images)
