The Padres have a few large decisions to make on their Opening Day roster. But the ripple effect for this year’s team goes well beyond the 25 guys they keep for the first game of the season.
Let’s go through this one step at a time. First, the timely news …
Dinelson Lamet, who was slated to be the number two starter, is going on the disabled list as the team tries to figure out what’s causing pain in his pitching elbow. It looks like he’ll be out until at least May so that opens a spot in the starting rotation.
38-year-old Chris Young, who was trying to return for a second stint in San Diego, will not be in that mix. It’s looking like Robbie Erlin or Tyson Ross will fill Lamet’s spot in the rotation for at least the first few weeks of the season.
Ross is another starting pitcher hoping for another successful San Diego stretch. Although it’s not officially official he is going to have a place in the rotation, either as the 2nd, 4th or 5th guy in the progression (Clayton Richard is the Opening Day guy and Luis Perdomo is the 3rd starter). But Ross being on the team leads us to the roster dilemma.
As a non-roster invitee to Spring Training he is not currently on the 40-man roster, which is the group of players that are eligible to be on the active 25-man roster. That means they have to remove someone to make room for Ross and on Monday they did just that, sending reliever Carter Capps outright to Triple-A El Paso.
The Padres are going to have to make another move on their 40-man roster because the final two guys in the mix at backup catcher, A.J. Ellis and Raffy Lopez, are both non-roster additions. If they decide to add promising prospect Joey Lucchesi or Eric Lauer to the big league rotation they’ll have to free up yet another spot on the 40-man.
The most likely ways of doing this are playing a few of their injured players on the 60-day disabled list, which temporarily takes them off the 40-man roster. Starting pitcher Colin Rea and outfielder Alex Dickerson are both possibilities for that.
