The San Diego Padres are freefalling and Mason Miller is now the biggest trade chip on the market that no one is entirely sure will actually move.
MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand asked rival executives this week whether the All-Star closer could actually be dealt before the Aug. 3 deadline, and the answers he got were revealing. The Padres are 46-46, have lost nine of their last 12, and sit 14 games back of the Dodgers in the NL West. They are 4.5 games out in the crowded NL Wild Card race. San Diego is not out of it, but they are teetering.
Miller is the piece other teams want. He is 27, throws 103 mph, has ridiculous swing-and-miss stuff, and is under team control through 2029. Elite closers with that kind of team control almost never hit the market. When they do, the return is enormous.
The question is whether the Padres would actually consider it. General manager AJ Preller has been aggressive about the concept of “controllable elite talent” for as long as he has run the team. Trading Miller would be a signal that the Padres are shifting the entire timeline of their competitive window. That is a big call.
Preller has proven he will make big calls. He traded Fernando Tatis Jr. rumors have been floated for years. He traded Juan Soto. He has not been afraid to reshuffle a core when the moment demands it. Miller is different because of the years of control and the fact that he is exactly the kind of pitcher who plays a bigger role in a short playoff series than in a regular season.
The teams that would jump at Miller are all the usual suspects. The Yankees have been looking for a shutdown closer for years. The Dodgers could add another elite arm to a bullpen that has already been strengthened. The Phillies have needed a real closer since Craig Kimbrel’s decline. The Blue Jays are trying to hang in the AL East and could use bullpen certainty.
The return would be massive. We are talking multiple top-100 prospects, plus. For a player who throws 60 innings a year, that is a controversial way to build. But Miller is a legitimate difference-maker whose impact in October could turn a good bullpen into an unhittable one.
San Diego’s other option is to hold him and try to trade around him. Ha-Seong Kim’s contract will need to be resolved. Michael King and Dylan Cease are both free agents at the end of the season and are more traditional deadline pieces. There is a version of the deadline where the Padres sell some pieces and keep Miller.
The most likely outcome, based on how Preller has run this team, is that Miller stays and San Diego tries to grind its way back into the Wild Card conversation. Preller is famously reluctant to acknowledge a full sell mode until it becomes inescapable. San Diego is not there yet.
But if the Padres lose five of their next seven and the Wild Card gap grows, everything changes. Miller will not go for less than a franchise-altering return. Any team that thinks about him needs to be prepared to empty out its top-tier prospect stock. And even that might not get it done.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
