Padres Manager Reveals Reason for Shocking Nick Castellanos DFA

The San Diego Padres took a chance on several veterans ahead of the 2026 season.

One of them was Nick Castellanos, who president of baseball operations A.J. Preller signed to the league minimum salary promptly after he was released by the Philadelphia Phillies. The former two-time All-Star was in the final season of a five-year contract and was still owed $20 million from the Phillies.

The deal seemed like a steal — until it wasn't.

Castellanos hit .191 with four home runs, 20 runs batted in and a .560 OPS across 39 games with the Padres. He was given a new challenge in San Diego as a bench player.

The former Silver Slugger had spent a majority of the last four seasons as an everyday player in the Phillies lineup, but was tasked with providing a spark to the Padres lineup in limited opportunities.

The Padres played Castellanos' former team twice in the span of a week, and it was the road series in Philadelphia where the team chose to designate the veteran for assignment.

While the outfielder said he was content with his new role in San Diego, manager Craig Stammen believes it wasn't a perfect situation for the former All-Star.

“It just felt kind of trending towards the direction of he wasn’t very comfortable in that role,” Stammen said. “For him personally, I know he’s got a lot going on with his family and wanting to be around his kids a lot. Maybe this is an opportunity for that. But maybe an opportunity for him to go somewhere else and find a place where he could play every day.”

Craig Stammen detailed the Padres' decision to designate Nick Castellanos for assignment, how the conversation went with Nick and what Samad Taylor brings to the team: pic.twitter.com/3bIyURtbMN
— 97.3 The Fan (@973TheFanSD) June 3, 2026

The Padres are three games above .500 after getting swept by the Phillies, and the offense remains a glaring concern. While the Padres need Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, and Jackson Merrill to improve at the plate, the team could also use more pop at the bottom of their lineup.

“We’re not changing the core of what our offense is. The goal of the offense is to score more runs than what we’ve been scoring. I know that’s going to happen," Stammen said. "Just trying to change it up a little bit, see if maybe that’s the right formula to get kick-started a little bit, get this offense going a little bit. Get our team going a little bit.

"It’s not necessarily the offense, but just, ‘How can we play some team baseball?’"

As for Castellanos' replacement, the Padres called up Samad Taylor. According to Stammen, the team brought him up to provide more versatility off the bench.

“We’ve been talking a little bit about our roster and the flexibility that we’d like to have with the bench — maybe a little bit more speed, little bit more dynamic players,” Stammen said. “With our last two guys we brought up … we got a little bit more element of speed, some defense, some versatility that we can use on the bench."

Taylor slashed .319/.406/.500 with seven home runs, 25 RBIs, nine stolen bases and an OPS of .906 across 51 games at Triple-A El Paso.

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