Padres Expected to Trade Key Position Player This Offseason, Per Insider

The San Diego Padres have plenty of areas to improve upon after 2026 but as many reasons to be excited about 2027.

Other than the normal bright spots like superstars Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado, the end of the 2026 regular season brought the emergence of rookie catcher Ethan Salas.

After tearing it up in Double-A, it took the 20-year-old Salas just 24 games at the Triple-A level to earn his promotion to MLB, doing so with a .326 batting average, a .949 OPS and 24 RBIs in that span.

Starting with his first MLB hit being a triple (becoming the first and youngest to do so since Machado in 2012), Salas displayed his great offensive skills while showing off the talent he possessed defensively.

Thus, one of catchers Luis Campusano or Freddy Fermin will likely become a roster casualty as a result of Salas' success.

Padres insider Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that one of the two backstops have already received interest from opposing teams and will likely be traded before next season.

"The Padres have received feelers from other teams about both Fermin and Campusano, and word has been since before the season ended that the team intends to trade one of them," Acee wrote.

The skills that Fermin possesses defensively, which included throwing runners out at an elite rate (97th percentile) and his blocks above average ranking in the 93rd percentile, more than made up for his offensive struggle over the first half of 2026 (which he made up for with a solid second half at the plate).

As for Campusano, aside from his ability to also throw runners out at an elite clip (90th percentile), he had below-average framing and pop time stats. He did, however, make up for this with a more consistent bat than Fermin, and the Padres also view him as a potential DH option.

President of baseball operations AJ Preller recently spoke at the general manager meetings in Las Vegas on a hypothetical future where both backstops remain on the roster to help San Diego win and mentor Salas, someone who is far from guaranteed the everyday catcher role in 2027.

“The three that ended the year on the big-league roster, we like the way that’s set up for us,” Preller said. “We think their games complement each other. Ethan is going to have to come in and continue to earn, improve, and show that he’s ready to take on more. … It’s a good situation.

"We’ve talked about it. We don’t have to make that decision now. The three catchers [and] having some depth. We’ve been hit on already by other teams [that] need catching depth and know we have three really good ones. We’ll see how it plays out in the next couple months.”

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