As the calendar turns to the year 2021, Fernando Tatis Jr. is still tearing the cover off of the baseball and the Padres continue to make news in a slow moving off-season.
Padres General Manager A.J Preller has been on the offensive this offseason bolstering his team with the additions of Blake Snell and Yu Darvish through trade and the signing of infielder Ha-seong Kim. In an MLB Network Radio interview he gave insight on what the clubs next focus was.
"We wanted to focus during the beginning part of the offseason on improving our ballclub and then get to the new year and start to dig in on Tatis' situation," Preller told MLB Network Radio on Sunday. "We've had very preliminary-type conversations just letting each other know that there's interest there. Hopefully we're on common ground to work something out at some point before the season."
Tatis Jr. is on his rookie contracting paying him $575,000 for the upcoming season before he faces his 3 arbitration years and ultimately becoming a unrestricted free agent in 2025. The just turned 22 year old has quickly emerged as one of the young faces of baseball. In 2020, he had a slash line of .277/.366/.571with 17 home runs and 45 runs batted in. He finished fourth in the National League MVP voting in the shortened season.
As for the extension numbers, the most recent example of a rising star receiving an extension would be Ronald Acuna inking an 8 year/$100 million deal. The difference between Tatis and Acuna is that at the time of signing Acuna was still 6 years away from free agency, as Tatis is only four. Sources are saying that the deal could be similar to Alex Bregman and the Astros signed when he was 24 years old. That deal was for 6 years/ $100 million. With more leverage, this leaves us believing that Tatis will sign a 6 year deal worth $125 million and allow him to be a free agent at the age of 28.