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Padres Press Clips

Friday, September 21, 2018

Article Source Author Page

Don Welke, Padres VP of scouting operations, has died SD Union Tribune Sanders 2

Shortstops to watch in Padres’ farm system SD Union Tribune Sanders 6

Shoe on other foot as A.J. Preller, Padres approach Rule 5 roster SD Union Tribune Sanders 10

decisions

Padres mourn loss of scouting exec Welke MLB.com Thornburg 14

Coach: The storied life of Don Welke The Athletic Newberg 15

Robert Stock wants to throw 105. That may sound unlikely – but so The Athletic Lin 22

have plenty of things on his path to the majors

Three factors behind Francisco Mejia’s breakout season The Athletic Palmateer 35

Padres scouting vice president Don Welke dies at 75 AP AP 39

This Day in Padres History, 9/21 FriarWire Center 40

Legendary MLB Scout Don Welke Dies at 75 NBC 7 Stickney 41

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Don Welke, Padres VP of scouting operations, has died

Jeff Sanders

Before following protégé A.J. Preller to San Diego, Don Welke was an influential voice

in the Texas Rangers organization. It was there that Chris Kemp, then in his late-20s,

was breaking into scouting.

One of Kemp’s early assignments with Welke — a veteran of more than 50 years in

professional baseball — was to scout high-schooler Corey Seager. This trip, in

particular, started with a back-door entrance to the game on their calendar.

If rival scouts noticed their arrival, “then the jig was up,” Kemp recalled. “If Don

Welke was at a game, then his team was hot on that prospect. And he wanted to get to

know the mother, the principal, the high school football coach. He wanted to know

what made a player tick.

“To scout a player with Don Welke, you had to know everything about that player —

not just that he hit .400 and looked good in a baseball uniform.”

Welke, the Padres’ vice president of scouting operations, died Wednesday in San

Diego, two days before his 76th birthday. A cause of death was not disclosed.

“Don had a tremendous career in baseball, both as a talent evaluator and in the

relationships that he built,” Preller said Thursday in a statement released by the

Padres. “He was a visionary who knew and loved baseball, and he shared that

knowledge and passion with me and countless other scouts throughout his five

decades in the game. Beyond his accomplishments, Don was a loyal and generous

friend. Everyone whose lives he touched were better for having known him.”

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Welke joined the Padres in August 2014 shortly after Preller was hired. Mentorship of

the Padres’ general manager began when the two crossed paths in Los Angeles and

they worked closely together in Rangers GM Jon Daniels’ front office, where Welke

was directly involved in bringing in Adrian Beltre, Josh Hamilton, Elvis

Andrus and Jurickson Profar and bolstering the Rangers’ farm system ahead of

consecutive World Series appearances in 2010 and 2011.

"It’s a tough day for a lot of people in the game, and certainly with the Rangers,”

Daniels said in a statement provided to the Union-Tribune. “ ‘Coach’ was a pivotal

influence on our organization and many of us individually. He helped us bring in

some of the best players in our history. But more importantly he helped create the

culture of competitiveness and desire to think big that has fueled us.

“On a personal note, he was big in my own development, and a dear friend and

mentor. He lived life on his own terms. I’ll miss his quirks and passion for people."

A native of Illinois and a member of Carthage College’s Hall of Fame, where he played

baseball and basketball, Welke began his scouting career with the Reds in 1965. He

also worked for the Royals (1970-76), Orioles (1996-99) and Dodgers (1999-2004)

and was Hall of Fame GM Pat Gillick’s right-hand man with the Blue Jays (1977-95)

and Phillies (2006).

He was in Gillick’s ear when the Blue Jays flipped Fred McGriff and Tony Fernandez

to the Padres for Roberto Alomar and Joe Carter ahead of their back-to-back World

Series wins, and hot on John Olerud’s trail after a brain aneurysm limited his looks

before the 1989 draft.

Four years later, Olerud finished third in AL MVP as a third-round success story. The

Blue Jays would have had another on their hands had a one-handed Jim Abbott

signed with the Blue Jays as a 36th-round pick in 1985.

Instead, Abbott transformed himself into the No. 8 overall pick after a decorated

career at Michigan.

“Welke was an out-of-the-box thinker — a lot of imagination,” Gillick said. “He was a

visionary. He could not only project but he could imagine things for players.”

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In San Diego, Welke was both a sounding board and an infectious personality on and

off the field as Preller built out a young front office. He’d have a sticker in his pocket

anytime he bumped into General Partner Peter Seidler walking his 6-year-old

daughter around Petco Park, and an open ear for any of the up-and-comers in the

Padres’ scouting and player development departments.

“He gave everyone his time,” said Ryley Westman, a minor league instruction

coordinator who met Welke while with the Rangers. “He wanted to be around

everyone and didn't expect anything in return.”

“It was like Santa Claus walked into the building,” Assistant General Manager Fred

Uhlman Jr. said of Welke’s visits. “People just gravitated to him wherever he went.”

That was certainly the case, Uhlman said, when Preller sent Uhlman and Welke on a

free agent run before the 2016 season. The two took a red-eye to Miami to

meet Fernando Rodney at his gym. Hours later, Rodney, his family and friends joined

Welke and Uhlman for lunch. He was signed to a one-year deal that February.

“We joked a lot,” Uhlman recalled, “about Fernando coming to live with Don in San

Diego.”

In his five decades in the game, Welke had developed a mantra – solamente

beisbol(only baseball) – that Preller took to heart as he began his career. In San

Diego, seldom a decision was made without a conversation between the two.

They didn’t always agree. The discussions that ensued in those instances had been

valuable as Preller charted a course forward for an organization searching for

sustained success.

“When it was a player-specific discussion both of them were fearless,” Seidler said.

“They would disagree on players when they had convictions and when their

convictions lined up they would agree. They didn't let their friendship and mutual

admiration get in way of hearty debates.

“ … I frankly admired that about both of them.”

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The players that Welke liked he loved.

And vice versa.

That was as evident as anything when Padres Assistant General Manager Josh Stein

traveled with Welke to Lake Elsinore shortly after his hire in the summer of 2014.

The Storm were hosting the Rangers’ California League affiliate. The teenagers and

20-something-year-olds on that roster gravitated to the long-time scout as he asked

about their seasons, their families, even one of the player’s dogs he’d learned about in

some living room in some far off place.

“To see the respect he’d earned in those kids eyes, it was rare,” Stein said. “He’d

earned that. Don was definitely a loyal guy. If he put his neck out for you and vouched

for you and were one of the people he brought into an organization, he was going to

fight for you.”

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Minors Shortstops to watch in Padres’ farm system

Jeff Sanders

Clint Barmes. Alexi Amarista. Jedd Gyorko. Will Middlebrooks. Alexei Ramirez. Luis

Sardinas. Adam Rosales. Jose Rondon. Nick Noonan. Erick Aybar. Yangerivs

Solarte. Dusty Coleman. Allen Cordoba. Chase d’Arnaud.

The list of players tried out at shortstop between the end of Everth Cabrera’s stay in

2014 and Freddy Galvis’s 2018 pit-stop is long and not exactly pretty.

It won’t continue much longer as shortstop has developed from an organization-wide

black hole into arguably the strongest position group in arguably the deepest farm

system in the game.

Fernando Tatis Jr. is the unquestioned shortstop of the future and is now a stone’s

throw away from San Diego.

Thing is, he’s not the only one coming.

1. Fernando Tatis Jr.

• Age: 19

• Team(s): Double-A San Antonio

• 2018 stats: .286 avg., .355 OBP, .507 SLG, 16 HRs, 43 RBIs, 77 runs, 16 steals,

33 walks, 109 strikeouts (88 games, 353 at-bats)

• Height/weight: 6-foot-3 / 185 pounds

• Bats/Throws: R / R

• How acquired: Trade with White Sox in June 2016

• Need to know: The son of a major leaguer, Tatis appeared to be ascending

toward San Diego this summer when a season-ending broken thumb slowed his

roll. The injury is not expected to affect him going forward and, from a roster

management standpoint, will make it easy to require a start at Triple-A El Paso

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to at least start 2019 (think a couple weeks to delay the start of his service clock

and perhaps a couple months if the Padres decide to push him out of the Super

Two window). Of course, the fervor to bring Tatis to San Diego will hit an all-

time high if his 2019 production matches 2018. After an ice-cold adjustment

period in April (.564 OPS), Tatis hit seven of his 16 homers in May (1.054 OPS),

remained hot in June (.941) and played his way onto the All-Star Futures roster

alongside system-mates Luis Urias and Buddy Reed. Tatis even starred in

the game in Washington D.C., one of the highlights of yet another lost season at

the major league level. If Tatis – ranked behind only Vladimir Guerrero

Jr. in MLB.com’s top-100 – continues to develop as hoped, there may not be

many more of those in San Diego.

2. Gabriel Arias

• Age: 18

• Team(s): Low Single-A Fort Wayne

• 2018 stats: .240 avg., .302 OBP, .352 SLG, 6 HRs, 55 RBIs, 54 runs, 3 steals,

41 walks, 149 strikeouts (124 games, 455 games)

• Height/weight: 6-foot-1 / 201 pounds

• Bats/Throws: R / R

• How acquired: Non-drafted free agent in July 2016 (Venezuela)

• Need to know: MLB.com’s No. 5 international prospect in the 2016-17 class,

signed for $1.9 million as a 16-year-old and found himself in the Midwest

League the following summer at 17 years old. The lessons were just as tough

upon returning in 2018 but the strides he took in August were tremendous as

he paired four homers with a .286/.353/.562 batting line. On the defensive

side, the most impressive aspect of his game, Arias boasts arguably the system’s

best arm and very well could provide the Padres with an alternative option

should Fernando Tatis Jr. outgrow shortstop. Arias is ranked No. 20 in the

Padres system by MLB.com.

3. Xavier Edwards

• Age: 19

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• Team(s): Rookie-level AZL Padres, short-season Tri-City

• 2018 stats: .346 avg., .453 OBP, .409 SLG, 0 HRs, 16 RBIs, 40 runs, 22 steals,

31 walks, 25 strikeouts (45 games, 159 at-bats)

• Height/weight: 5-foot-10 / 155 pounds

• Bats/Throws: B / R

• How acquired: First round (No. 38) in 2018 (North Broward Prep HS, Fla.)

• Need to know: A wrist injury prevented Edwards from swinging right-handed

this summer, just about the only thing that slowed him in his pro debut. He

wrapped a .384/.471/.466 batting line around a three-week absence and

continued to hit following an aggressive promotion to the Northwest League,

where he fashioned a .799 OPS and was 10-for-10 in steal attempts. A leadoff-

hitter type with extra-base pop and the quickness to play on either side of

second base, Edwards required a $2.6 million bonus – more than $700,000

over slot – to forgo his commitment to Vanderbilt and the Padres are more than

pleased with the early return on their investment. Edwards is ranked No. 18 in

the system by MLB.com.

4. Owen Miller

• Age: 21

• Team(s): Short-season Tri-City, low Single-A Fort Wayne

• 2018 stats: .336 avg., .386 OBP, .460 SLG, 4 HRs, 33 RBIs, 40 runs, 4 steals,

19 walks, 41 strikeouts (75 games, 298 at-bats)

• Height/weight: 6-foot / 190 pounds

• Bats/Throws: R / R

• How acquired: Third round in 2018 (Illinois State)

• Need to know: Undrafted out of high school, Miller ascended into the third

round this summer after impressing the Padres brass in a Petco Park workout

before the draft. He proceeded to collect 100 hits in rising from the Northwest

League (.835 OPS) to the Midwest League (.846 OPS) and ultimately the

Double-A Texas League postseason. There are questions as to whether he’ll

have enough arm at shortstop, but the Padres are committed to allowing their

middle infield prospects to remain at shortstop until they prove they can no

longer handle the position. With average tools across the board and a plus

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baseball IQ, the Padres believe Miller is a good bet to overachieve his way all

the way to Petco Park. He could resume his climb at Double-A San Antonio to

start 2019. Miller is ranked No. 30 in the system by MLB.com.

5. Javy Guerra

• Age: 22

• Team(s): Triple-A El Paso

• 2018 stats: .223 avg., .269 OBP, .398 SLG, 13 HRs, 55 RBIs, 52 runs, 2 steals,

27 walks, 166 strikeouts (122 games, 430 at-bats)

• Height/weight: 6-foot-1 / 155 pounds

• Bats/Throws: L / R

• How acquired: Trade with Red Sox in November 2015

• Need to know: Once billed as the shortstop of the future when he was

included in the haul received for Craig Kimbrel, Guerra has struck out 660

times in 582 games, including 35.8 percent of his minor league plate

appearances in 2018. Elite defensive skills, however, led the Padres to add him

to the 40-man roster after the 2016 season and earned him a September call-up

this year. A lightning-quick bat continues to show flashes (.842 OPS in August),

but Padres manager Andy Greenacknowledged this month’s audition was a

utility look rather than a true opportunity to become an everyday player.

Other names to know: Olivier Basabe (A, .789 OPS), Ruddy Giron (AA, .664

OPS), Chris Baker (A+, .668 OPS), Luis Guzman (A+, .624 OPS), Kelvin Melean (A+,

.658 OPS), Jordy Barley (AZL, .599 OPS), Allen Cordob (A+, .546 OPS), Reinaldo

Ilarraza (A, .567 OPS), Yeison Santana (DSL, .746 OPS), Bryan Torres (DSL, .595

OPS).

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Shoe on other foot as A.J. Preller, Padres approach Rule 5 roster decisions

Jeff Sanders

The Orioles are free-falling toward the worst record in their 118 seasons. The Royals

have already lost 100 games, too, and a couple other teams could also approach the

century club, many of them staring at the same talent gap facing A.J. Preller three

years ago when the Padres turned to the Rule 5 draft to inject talent into a fledgling

organization.

The fourth-year general manager knows the shoe could be on the other foot this

winter.

“It's part of the process,” Preller acknowledged recently. “That's the way we've looked

at it. There's going to be times when hopefully you're the team making the good

selection and getting a young player and hopefully you build up your system to where

it’s a good problem to have if you have other teams looking at players in your system.

“Hopefully we're able to keep as many guys as we can.”

There are many to consider.

Even with the promotions of Jacob Nix, Trey Wingenter and Luis Urias giving the

Padres a head start on the upcoming 40-man roster conundrum, the organization’s

top-ranked farm system — arguably one of the deepest in the game — will force the

front office into a number of debates this offseason.

Preller will already have to move four players — Dinelson Lamet, Franchy Cordero,

Clayton Richard and Alex Dickerson — from the 60-day disabled list to the 40-man

roster at season’s end. Departing free agents (Freddy Galvis and A.J. Ellis) will free up

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some room, but not nearly enough to add all the players the club would prefer to put

on the 40-man roster before the Nov. 20 deadline.

Players 19 or older at the time of their signing can be plucked out of an organization if

left unprotected after four years in pro ball. Teams get a fifth year to protect players

who were 18 or younger when they signed.

Some decisions are easier than others among the 13 players who would be eligible for

December’s Rule 5 draft.

For instance, Chris Paddack, off his meteoric rise from Tommy John surgery, and

Anderson Espinoza, still in the early stages of his rehab, are no-brainer additions as

top pitching prospects. Likewise, Austin Allen, who tied for the system lead with 22

homers as a left-handed-hitting catcher, would certainly be taken if left unprotected.

Beyond that trio, there’s plenty to like about players such as former San Diego State

third baseman Ty France (22 homers), outfielder Edward Olivares (Yangervis Solarte

trade) and right-handers Pedro Avila (312 Ks in last 259 IP) and Hansel Rodriguez

(Melvin Upton trade).

The question is this: Who might other teams consider ready to hold down a big league

spot throughout the 2019 season, the requirement for any organization rooting

through another for talent?

“Losing any player in the minor league system who you think has a chance to have an

impact in the big leagues, who is an interesting player, that's always frustrating,”

Preller said. “But that process is a tough one because that player has to stay in the

major leagues. Even if it's a guy we have to leave off the roster, for that player to stay

in the big leagues all year long, that's usually not the case. Usually teams make good

decisions on who they leave off and they do it for set reasons.

“They may be prospects but not ready to come here and hold their own.”

That didn’t stop Preller when he grabbed four players in the December 2015 draft and

three more the following winter. As teams coming off 100-loss campaigns may decide

this winter, the Padres had little to lose after their all-in push fizzled in 2015.

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“The spot where we were at,” Preller said, “we felt like rather than a fringe veteran or

someone who had no carry-forward value, we could take a shot on a younger player

and see if they could hold their own and then throw them back in the system.”

That’s precisely what they did with catcher Luis Torrens, infielder Allen Cordoba and

right-hander Miguel Diaz, last year’s class of Rule 5 draftees.

The lone holdover from the 2016 quartet, right-hander Luis Perdomo, also spent a

great deal of this season in Triple-A El Paso after taking a step backward in his third

year in the organization.

All told, the Padres’ Rule 5 draftees combined for 54 2/3 innings and zero at-bats in

the majors this season, although the aim of the endeavor remains fixated well beyond

2018 or even 2019.

“I think that will be judged in three or four years,” Padres manager Andy Green said.

“It was always a long-term investment. There was not this expectation that we'd take

these guys and the next year they would be ready to go. … But you look up and you're

in 2020 pushing for a postseason spot and Miguel Diaz is one of the big arms out of

your bullpen giving you two or three innings and maybe Luis Torrens is one of your

depth catchers at that point in time.

“Those guys have that opportunity out in front of them.”

WHERE THEY ARE NOW

The Padres selected seven players in back-to-back Rule 5 drafts before the 2016 and

2017 seasons. Four of those players remain in the organization and two are in the

majors today.

December 2015

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• RHP Luis Perdomo: A Cardinals rep in an All-Star Futures Game, the 25-

year-old Dominican is 18-27 with a 5.46 ERA, 257 strikeouts and a 1.60 WHIP

in three big league seasons with the Padres.

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• OF Jabari Blash: The Mariners worked out a trade with the Padres when he

was removed from the 40-man roster in 2016. Blash hit eight homers over two

seasons with the Padres before he was shipped to the Yankees for Chase

Headley. He played the 2018 season in the Angels organization.

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• RHP Josh Martin: Now 28, Martin was returned to the Indians after failing

to make the Padres out of spring training. He has yet to graduate from Triple-A

ball.

•

• RHP Blake Smith: A second-round selection, Smith was also returned to his

team (the White Sox) after missing the cut coming out of camp. Smith, 30,

pitched five games in the majors in 2016 and is out of baseball.

December 2016

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• RHP Miguel Diaz: The first player taken in this draft, the 23-year-old Diaz

struck out 81 in 78 1/3 innings (3.33 ERA) split between Double-A San Antonio

and Triple-A El Paso. He has a 5.79 ERA in 14 innings in the majors this season.

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• C Luis Torrens: A .163 hitter in 56 games last year in the majors, the 22-year-

old Venezuelan was an everyday player for the first time in his career – at high

Single-A Lake Elsinore (.727 OPS).

•

• SS Allen Cordoba: A concussion sustained in an offseason car accident

forced him to the 60-day DL to start the year. He spent all of 2018 at high

Single-A Lake Elsinore (.543 OPS).

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Padres mourn loss of scouting exec Welke

By Chad Thornburg

Don Welke, the Padres' vice president of scouting operations, has died, the club confirmed on Thursday. He was 75.

A veteran of 50-plus seasons in professional baseball, Welke joined the Padres in 2014 after eight seasons with the Rangers. He began his career with the Reds in 1965 and also held roles with the Phillies (2006), Dodgers (1999-2004), Orioles (1996-99), Blue Jays (1977-96) and Royals (1970-76).

Throughout his career, Welke had a hand in signing stars such as Dave Stieb, Pat Hentgen, John Olerud, Jurickson Profar and Elvis Andrus.

"He was a legend in the baseball world and an invaluable member of the Padres front office," Padres executive chairman Ron Fowler and general partner Peter Seidler said in a statement. "Don was a super scout and a super guy, and we will miss him greatly."

"Don had a tremendous career in baseball, both as a talent evaluator and in the relationships that he built," said Padres executive vice president and general manager A.J. Preller in a statement. "He was a visionary who knew and loved baseball, and he shared that knowledge and passion with me and countless other scouts throughout his five decades in the game. Beyond his accomplishments, Don was a loyal and generous friend. Everyone whose lives he touched was better for having known him."

Welke was named Midwest Scout of the Year at the 2012 Winter Meetings in Nashville, Tenn., and received the Legends in Scouting Award from the Professional Baseball Scouts Foundation in 2011. He also worked as an advance scout for Team USA at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney and the 2003 Olympic qualifier in Panama. The Rangers organization's Scout of the Year Award is named after Welke, the inaugural winner of the award in 2011.

An Illinois native, Welke played baseball and basketball at Carthage College in Wisconsin and was named to the school's hall of fame as well as the hall of fame for his high school in Harvard, Ill. Welke also received a degree from Eastern Michigan University.

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Coach: The storied life of Don Welke

By Jamey Newberg

Don Welke, a central figure on the Rangers’ scouting and player development

team in the years leading to the franchise’s two American League pennants,

died Wednesday night in San Diego. He had been the Padres’ Vice President of

Scouting Operations for just over four years, following nine seasons with

Texas, most of which were spent as Senior Special Assistant to General

Manager Jon Daniels.

Welke, who would have turned 76 today, is survived by two daughters and a

son.

Known to friends and those in the industry as “Coach,” Welke originally joined

the Rangers in 2005, shortly after the Rangers had hired A.J. Preller from the

Dodgers. Welke had been with the Dodgers from 1999 through 2004,

mentoring Preller during that time. When the Padres hired Preller as their

General Manager in August of 2014, he requested permission to bring Welke

with him. It’s unusual for executives leaving one organization for another to

take colleagues with them for at least a year or two, but Texas, out of respect

for a man with half a century in the game, did not stand in Welke’s way.

A native of Harvard, Illinois (who was quick to tell unsuspecting folks, with a

smile, that he had a Harvard education), Welke attended Carthage College in

Kenosha, Wisconsin, playing baseball and basketball, after which he pursued a

graduate degree from Eastern Michigan University. While at EMU, he also

served as a graduate assistant with the baseball team. Thereafter, he had a six-

year run as the baseball coach at Concordia College in Ann Arbor, Michigan,

during which time he also helped coach the basketball team.

But before that, he started scouting. The Reds hired Welke to scout the

Midwest United States for baseball players while he was at EMU. Once he

landed the job at Concordia, he scouted the same region for the Royals. In

1977, he left coaching to devote his career to scouting on a full-time basis. He

joined the expansion Toronto Blue Jays that year, working for GM Pat Gillick.

It was a relationship that would span decades.

Welke was with Toronto from 1977 to 1995, earning World Series rings in

1992 and 1993. While with the Blue Jays, he was instrumental in the signings

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of John Olerud, Dave Stieb, and Pat Hentgen, and urged Gillick to use a Round

36 pick in 1985 on a one-handed high school pitcher from Michigan named Jim

Abbott. Toronto made the pick but didn’t sign the player. Three years later,

Abbott was an early first-round pick of the Angels, and went on to notch a

third-place finish in the 1991 AL Cy Young vote and win 87 big league games.

Gillick, a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, moved on to the Orioles in

1996. Welke went with him, spending four seasons in Baltimore before joining

the Dodgers in 1999.

After his first year with the Rangers in 2005, Welke left to join Gillick for his

first season as general manager in Philadelphia. Welke returned to Texas for

the 2007 season, where he remained until departing with Preller in 2014. His

relationship in the game with Preller has been nearly as lengthy as it was with

Gillick. Here the two discuss a scout’s DNA, which one fostered in the other.

During his time with the Rangers, Welke was pivotal in the acquisitions of

Adrian Beltre (whom he’d been around during his own time with Los

Angeles), Elvis Andrus and Neftali Feliz, Josh Hamilton, Jurickson Profar, and

Yu Darvish. In 2011, Welke was recognized by the Professional Baseball

Scouts Foundation with the Legends in Scouting Award, and at the Winter

Meetings in 2012, he was honored by his peers in the industry as the Midwest

Scout of the Year.

The Rangers, for years, have honored one of their scouts with the Don Welke

Scout of the Year Award at their annual dinner, presenting the winner with a

signature (and garish) red blazer in honor of Welke, a vocal fan of Louisville

basketball.

Daniels offered his thoughts on behalf of the Rangers on Thursday: “It’s a

tough day for a lot of people in the game, and certainly with the Rangers.

Coach was a pivotal influence on our organization and many of us

individually. He helped us bring in some of the best players in our history. But

more importantly, he helped create the culture of competitiveness and desire to

think big that has fueled us. On a personal note, he was big in my own

development, and a dear friend and mentor. He lived life on his own terms. I’ll

miss his quirks and passion for people.”

Preller issued his own statement on Thursday as well: “Don had a tremendous

career in baseball, both as a talent evaluator and in the relationships that he

built. He was a visionary who knew and loved baseball, and he shared that

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knowledge and passion with me and countless other scouts throughout his five

decades in the game. Beyond his accomplishments, Don was a loyal and

generous friend. Everyone whose lives he touched were better for having

known him.”

The Athletic‘s Jayson Stark captured Coach’s presence perfectly on Thursday

afternoon:

When I saw Don Welke at a ballpark, he reminded me of that guy who runs everybody's favorite restaurant in your town - because every single person in the park was happy to see him. And he knew everyone's name. And everyone's story. A true baseball character. And wonderful man.

Welke was a storyteller, a decorated scout, and a true baseball man.

On a personal note, like so many whose paths crossed with his, even

occasionally, I was fortunate to have the opportunity, here and there, to stand

outside a chain-link fence at a baseball field with Coach. It was impossible not

to learn something about the game every time you were around him.

When he left the Rangers four years ago to follow Preller to San Diego, I wrote

the following story for the Newberg Report. I wanted to share it here. And if I

had a red blazer, I’d probably put it on today. Just not in public.

“We need Don more than you do.”

So said Jon Daniels, a year into his job and casting an eye toward the 2007

teardown season, to Pat Gillick, the 25-year GM whose well-stocked Phillies

were about to embark on a five-year playoff run. Gillick, who had Don Welke

with him for 21 of those seasons, let Welke decide whether to make it 22, or to

return to the Rangers, with whom he’d spent 2005 before joining the Phillies in

2006.

We know what Welke decided then, and given that history, it can hardly be a

surprise that A.J. Preller, whose 13 years (with the exception of that 2006

season) in scouting have been with Welke, first with the Dodgers and then in

Texas, would make the same suggestion to Daniels that Daniels had made to

Gillick, or that Daniels, like Gillick, would pay things forward and let Welke

decide.

Or that Welke would choose the bigger challenge, and the chance to continue

to work with Preller, whom he described to Scott Miller (Fox Sports San

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Diego) last week as the “brightest young guy I’ve ever seen in my 47 years of

scouting,” the prodigy who convinced Daniels to bring the mentor over from

Los Angeles shortly after he’d arrived to join his college roommate himself.

There’s really no surprise here, other than the exception Daniels clearly made

to what everyone is reporting as a two-year freeze on Preller’s ability to hire

anyone employed in that time by the Rangers — until you think about the

above, and that’s when you realize that the surprise would have been if Daniels

had treated Don Welke differently from how Gillick did eight years ago, with

unmitigated respect for the revered baseball lifer and what he wanted to do

with his career at this point.

And with that, “Coach” was named on Tuesday as the San Diego Padres’ Vice

President of Scouting Operations.

I’ll miss the scouting stories and the excessively red Louisville-issue blazer and

that laugh and his description of the batting practice sound off certain bats as

“not normal” and the million-dollar bills and, man, seriously, those scouting

stories.

And the sartorial flair, the aptitude for harsh outfits, about which Thad Levine

once told Richard Durrett: “It’s cutting edge. He’s not encumbered by what’s

current, hip, or what fits.”

I read all those accounts of Coach and Preller, back when the latter was getting

his full-time start in the game 11 years ago, hitting Jerry’s Famous Deli or

Pantry Café in Los Angeles and talking baseball until 5 in the morning, and I’m

just as unsuspicious of the truth of those stories as I am completely envious.

I’ve spent one-thousandth of the time around Coach that Preller has, and I still

feel like I’ve learned more about baseball — about ability and about makeup

and chemistry and the drive to compete and about building something — from

him than just about everyone else I’ve run across, combined.

With Coach, you could learn plenty about “who” — he had his fingerprints all

over key trade acquisitions (Josh Hamilton and Elvis Andrus and Neftali Feliz)

and impact free agent signings (Adrian Beltre and very nearly Zack Greinke)

and certain draft picks (Tanner Scheppers and Robbie Ross) and international

kids (Yu Darvish and Martin Perez and Jurickson Profar and Jorge Alfaro) —

but if you listened intently enough, it was impossible not to absorb tons about

“why.”

19

A bunch of us made a father-son trip to Surprise in March, and we ran into

Coach on his golf cart, seconds after Shin-Soo Choo had leaned over for a 10-

minute talk with him, and after Nomar Mazara had swooped in to give him a

hug, and after any number of uniformed instructors and trainers and scouts in

floppy hats and chinos had leaned in for a quick handshake. Seeing Max,

Coach probably made some instant reference to something they’d talked about

three years earlier, and then he met four of Max’s friends, after which, this:

Preston, what’s the best thing about Jake’s game?

Max, what does Dominic do well?

Landry, is Max telling the truth?

There’s really no reason that should seem unusually cool to you, but the whole

idea of Coach making those boys think about the game and about a level

someone else plays it at that’s worth shooting for and subtly encouraging them

to appreciate and respect the game rather than trash-talk their own place in it —

in the smallest moment — resonated with me and four other dads.

The story about Coach looking over the Braves official’s scorecard and asking

who the catcher was, when he really just wanted to steal a glance at the name

of that lanky pitcher throwing the easy gas (“Feliz”), and the Hamilton stories

and the John Olerud stories and the Jim Abbott stories and the Durrett stories

he told us a week ago (“his sister-in-law wouldn’t give me any dirt on the guy .

. . not one usable tidbit . . . I mean c’mon!!”) and the story about Coach holding

a baseball in one hand and a football in the other and simply asking Jordan

Akins, “Which one?” — and looking not so much for the verbal response but

the conviction behind it — those will always resonate, too.

Texas in one hand, and San Diego in the other.

Which one?

And then, weeks away from his 72nd birthday, the convicted decision to chase

the challenge and to follow the man who has been like a son to him, and not in

some hackneyed sense of the word.

When Texas traded for Hamilton, one of the things that had Coach pounding

his fist on the table for him was a sense that the 26-year-old “had something to

prove.” It was a recurring theme, as the Rangers noted that Beltre and Mike

Napoli and Joe Nathan, among other veterans brought in to boost the roster,

20

had never won a title. It would stand to reason that they were hungry. Had

something to prove.

Does Coach have something to prove? Not really. But he’ll never not be

hungry to build a winner, and though the ring narrowly eluded him in Texas

(he has two, from the 1992 and 1993 Blue Jays), the challenge is greater in San

Diego. It’s certainly not the prevailing reason he’s moving on, but surely that

hunger factored in.

Would Darvish or Beltre or Hamilton or Perez be here if Don Welke hadn’t

been? Most of us will never know that. But his influence was felt all over this

organization in what has been its absolute heyday, from the standpoint of talent

inventory and acquisition geography and hardware, and just as losing A.J.

Preller isn’t a good thing even if the franchise remains extremely healthy

without him, seeing Coach move on to another club to do his thing, with all the

relationships he’s built around the game and all the wisdom and judgment and

ability to evaluate he shares, is certainly not something that, in and of itself,

makes you stronger.

Players moving on is how the world of pro sports works.

Deserving young executives changing organizations to find opportunity

happens all the time.

But when a wise old scout leaves — and make no mistake, the scout’s “beisbol

solamente” life is the most itinerant life imaginable to begin with — I suppose

it shouldn’t shake you, but this one’s different for me. This one’s personal.

Sure, this will be Coach’s eighth organization in his nearly 50 years in the

game. But Texas is where he spent the most time aside from one (Toronto,

which he joined as an expansion club) and, more importantly as far as I’m

concerned, it’s my team he’s leaving.

I feel like I learned a whole lot about baseball just being around Coach a little

bit the last 10 years, and then I think about all the scouts and baseball

operations folks in Texas who were around him nearly every single day, and

it’s for that reason that I’m confident that the Rangers will be fine in his

absence. His legacy includes dozens of players, from Kentucky to Japan, and

Colombia to Mission Viejo, but it also includes the talent evaluators and

advisors and coaches and, to be sure, a President & General Manager who

brought him to Texas in the first place (and the second).

21

Ask anyone in the Rangers front office to identify the word that, when it comes

out of Don Welke’s mouth in discussing a kid to draft or a free agent to chase

or a veteran to trade for at just the right time, makes everyone stop down, and

they will all agree: The word is “special.”

Yu Darvish. Adrian Beltre. Josh Hamilton.

Special.

Don Welke, too. Maybe it’s true that today, as opposed to eight years

ago, theyneed Don more than we do, and I’m happy for him that he’ll get to

keep working with Preller and that he’ll get to try and help redefine a franchise

that hasn’t seen 162+ since 2006 and that hasn’t won a playoff series of any

type since 1998. I’m confident that he’ll help San Diego do special things once

again.

And I’m thankful for the nine seasons he spent in Texas, and the times in that

span that I was fortunate enough for our paths to cross, every one of which

deepened my appreciation of the game and my passion for it, not to mention

my respect for the people who so uniquely help make it what it is, especially

those who you’d realize in short order are special, and not normal.

22

Robert Stock wants to throw 105. That

may sound unlikely — but so have plenty

of things on his path to the majors

Dennis Lin

Music captured Gregg Stock’s imagination, so he shelved his athletic

endeavors and, eventually, his studies. It was the 1970s, and the metal scene

would soon take root in Seattle. Stock dropped out of high school. He played

guitar in a band called Strike. Around the same time, a hard rock group formed

in the vicinity.

Queensrÿche has since sold millions of albums worldwide. Though their paths

long ago diverged, lead guitarist Michael Wilton and Stock once played for the

same team. Before he shredded in sold-out arenas, Wilton distinguished

himself in a different setting.

“He was always the one kid who was the best hitter and the best pitcher, the

superstar of Little League,” Stock says. “He couldn’t hit a curveball, but in

Little League it was all fastballs and he teed off on that.”

Three decades after Wilton imposed his will on youth baseball fields, another

prodigy emerged. In 2002, the oldest of Stock’s five children, Robert Stock,

dazzled for an all-star team of 11- and 12-year-olds from Southern California.

They stormed through Pony Baseball’s World Series in Monterey, Calif.,

where Stock homered and delivered a no-hitter in a decisive rout of Taiwan.

Later that summer, his travel-ball team advanced to the final day of a

tournament in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Across four games, Stock went 12-for-12 at the plate with six home runs. He

either pitched or caught every inning. In the finale, he tossed a complete-game

two-hitter against a South Florida team that featured another two-way standout.

“The first inning, we started hitting his fastball, got a couple hits off him,”

recalls Padres first baseman Eric Hosmer. “And then he started throwing that

slider, the same one he has today, and we just had no chance.”

The next year, Baseball America named Stock the top 13-year-old in the

country. He earned the same distinction at ages 14 and 15. Three months before

23

his 17th birthday — and three years before Bryce Harper enrolled at a Nevada

community college — Stock bypassed his senior year at Agoura High to

become a USC freshman. He was, in a sense, Bryce Harper before Harper.

“You just always kind of knew he was destined for the big leagues,” Hosmer

says.

A dozen years later, fate has delivered an early-round draft selection, a position

change, multiple releases and, among other stops, one unforgettable season on

the bottom rung of professional baseball. Stock’s bat and catching gear have

collected dust. His performances range from a few innings to a few pitches. A

member of the Padres’ bullpen, he toils in the obscurity of a last-place team.

Yet that in itself is a remarkable development. Stock is also a 28-year-old

rookie lighting up radar guns like he never had before. The possibilities once

again feel limitless, though all along, he harbored the belief that so many others

had relinquished.

“Having been at the top, people have this narrative of the youth player who

could never make it at the higher level,” Gregg Stock says. “And I think they

wanted to see him as that. He never accepted it.”

His career sprouted in a living room in the Pacific Northwest. Gregg’s wife,

Randi, was pregnant with the couple’s first daughter, so she sat on a couch and

flipped baseballs to her toddler sons. Robert and brother Richard, 14 months

younger, demonstrated precocious power, breaking a window or three.

Around their sixth and fifth birthdays, they graduated to coach-pitch

competition. The Stocks had relocated to the baseball hotbed of Southern

California. Gregg, after stints as a band member and guitar teacher, had

returned to school and acquired an electrical engineering degree from the

University of Washington. He would co-found a company that creates guitar

effects pedals and other music electronics.

“That’s why he’s always telling us to follow our dreams,” Richard says,

“because he became an engineer after trying to be a rock star.”

Gregg applied his formal education in aiding his sons’ pursuits. Robert was 10

when his father began posting on an online baseball forum. The site belonged

to Paul Nyman, one of the Internet’s original pitching gurus. Nyman coined the

terms “inverted W” and “the intent to throw hard.” He preached the value of

24

film study and continuous trial and error. His ideas resonated with Gregg, a

fellow engineer.

Gregg started sending video of Robert and Richard’s at-bats to Nyman for

evaluation. The Stocks logged countless hours analyzing tape of all-time greats

such as Nolan Ryan and Manny Ramírez. Despite the lack of high-definition

footage, they unknowingly placed themselves on the front line of a movement.

“What ‘Pitching Ninja’ is doing, my dad was doing on QuickTime Player in,

like, 1998,” Richard says. “We would sit down and watch these clips and then

go hit in the backyard, take video of our swings and compare it to the big-

leaguers.”

The search for an edge led the family to another out-of-state connection. A visit

to Nyman’s site revealed a video of future NFL safety Adam

Archuleta working with a pioneering trainer in the Phoenix area. Robert, 13 at

the time, was physically advanced for his age, but Gregg himself had

experienced a preteen growth spurt and suspected Robert’s peers would catch

up in time.

Velocity, though, was something that could keep progressing, and Jay

Schroeder’s methods seemed useful for improving conditioning and endurance.

The Stocks drove 400 miles from their home in Westlake Village, Calif., to

meet Schroeder in person.

Robert was enthused for all of it.

“My dad probably saw how much I loved it, so that probably made him more

interested in it,” Robert says. “Obviously, if you see your son enjoy something,

you want to help him improve.”

Repeated success fueled Stock’s drive and preserved his childlike fixation with

the sport. He went from throwing 60 mph at age 10 to touching 95 mph five

years later. A catcher when not on the mound, he displayed rare power from the

left side. He made the U.S. junior national team as a 14-year-old and again at

15, playing alongside future major league stars. In the 2006 Aflac All-

American Classic at San Diego State, he struck out the side as a pitcher, moved

behind the plate and homered off Rick Porcello.

“On a catching scale, back then you’d call it an ‘80’ arm,’” says Logan White,

a Padres executive and the Dodgers’ former scouting director. “The question

you had was if the bat was going to be enough. But there were a ton of people

25

at the time that thought he would’ve been in the top five, 10 picks if he had

entered the draft with his high school class.”

Stock instead arrived at USC as a 16-year-old, having been accepted through

an early-admissions program. It felt like a win-win decision. He would receive

an education for three years before entering the draft at 19. Plus, he would

focus on his top choice in the field.

“It was an easy decision to go to USC, where the coach, Chad Kreuter, had a

10-year big-league career as a catcher,” Robert says. “I thought that was a good

place to go learn how to continue on as a catcher.”

It is a very 2014 story.

Sara Krutewicz, a college sophomore from St. Louis, was spending her spring

break visiting her best friend at the University of Miami. The duo headed up

the coast to take in a couple of Grapefruit League games. Their reasons for

attendance extended beyond an interest in preseason baseball.

Krutewicz’s friend had matched on Tinder with St. Louis Cardinals minor

leaguer Danny Miranda. After agreeing to meet, she informed the pitcher he

would need to bring a friend of his own. Miranda opted for his roommate.

Sparks flew, in unexpected fashion.

On a blind double date, Robert Stock made a memorable first impression.

Krutewicz was smitten, if not fully aware of Stock’s background.

“I thought he was very smart and very athletic, and oh gosh, I don’t even

know,” Krutewicz says. “He was very charming.”

In time, she learned that he had been a superstar in amateur baseball circles.

That he left high school early to face Pac-10 competition. That in 2012, three

years after the Cardinals made him a second-round draftee, he was converted

from catcher to reliever. When Stock met Krutewicz in the spring of 2014, the

former superstar was no longer much of a prospect.

Krutewicz also learned that Stock was what his brother Richard calls an

emotional “flatliner,” a quality ideal for navigating the challenges of

professional baseball.

“Right from the beginning, we were going through a lot of me seeing how he

handles those situations, which he does,” Krutewicz says. “I could’ve never

told the difference between when he was frustrated and when he was happy.”

26

College had proven a mixed bag. Stock caught and pitched in relief, showing

only glimpses of dominance. Yet teams remained intrigued by his blend of

potential and youth. The Cardinals drafted him 67th overall in 2009, and Stock

received a $525,000 bonus. As a left-handed hitting catcher, he appeared to

have an obvious route to the majors.

By the time he met his future fiancée five years later, he faced an uncertain

future. His catching and hitting career never took off as expected. Hours after

the Cardinals signed Yadier Molina to a five-year extension, they informed

Stock he was moving to the mound. He was forced to retrain himself as a

pitcher, this time against grown men. He languished for three seasons as an A-

ball reliever, recording decent velocity but steep walk rates.

The Cardinals released Stock days before Christmas 2014. He caught on with

the Houston Astros, lasted three weeks in spring training and was released

again. He traveled to Ohio for an independent-ball tryout, threw 97 mph for the

first time in his life and was signed by the Frontier League’s Normal

CornBelters. On his first day in Normal, Ill., he learned the Pittsburgh Pirates

had purchased his contract.

Stock spent that season cycling through extended spring training, rookie ball,

High A and Double A. He sat for most of it, healthy yet marooned in the

bullpen. In one extra-inning game, he was passed over for a backup shortstop

moonlighting as an emergency pitcher.

“You definitely feel like you had been slighted, that you’re kind of wasting

your time,” Stock says. “But at the same time, you think, ‘Well, what am I

going to do to remedy the situation? Just pitch better the next time you get an

opportunity.’”

The opportunities never materialized. Not enough of them, anyway. The results

were not sufficient to warrant more playing time. Stock finished the season

with a 7.71 ERA and 19 walks in 16 ⅓ innings. Pittsburgh’s Double-A affiliate

made the playoffs but sent him home early. He technically elected free agency

that offseason, but it was clear he was an unwanted commodity. As spring

approached, he scheduled a workout in front of big-league clubs.

“No one showed up, and it was just, like, rock bottom,” Richard Stock says.

“And I remember Robert told my mom, ‘Don’t worry, there’s no universe in

which I don’t play major league baseball.’ That was like a eureka moment,

when I realized Robert was different than everyone.”

27

Richard Stock’s own big-league dreams had begun to crack on a summer

afternoon at Dodger Stadium.

An excellent high school player in his own right, he had been invited to

participate in a tournament for top recruits from California and neighboring

states. Then a particularly strenuous round of batting practice left him with a

stress fracture in his lower back.

He would experience minor back pain in college. He transferred from USC to

Los Angeles Pierce College to the University of Nebraska. The pain worsened

after he reached professional baseball. He spent three seasons in the Indians’

system, mostly as a backup catcher, before he was released.

Stock latched on with the independent-league Sioux Falls Canaries in 2015. He

played more than he ever had, and loved it. After that season, he was traded to

another indy-ball team.

Joe Calfapietra, the New Jersey Jackals’ manager, learned in his first phone call

with his new acquisition that Stock had a free-agent brother. “Does he want to

play for us?” Calfapietra asked. Stock put his hand over the phone. “Hey,

Robert,” Richard said, “do you want to play for the Jackals?” “Sure,” Robert

replied, out of alternatives.

Aside from the occasional alumni game, the Stock brothers had missed playing

with each other at Agoura High. They embarked on their first season as both

teammates and batterymates. They made a monthly salary of $1,200, roomed

together and played in New Jersey, New York, Ontario and Québec.

“We had an absolute blast,” Robert says. “That’s the most fun I’ve had playing

baseball since I was 12, excluding maybe this year.”

His enjoyment was magnified by the fact that he had barely pitched in 2015.

He established a league record by appearing in 52 of the Jackals’ 100 games.

He even caught two games after a batting-cage ricochet struck Richard in the

eye. The total would have been higher if their manager hadn’t compelled

Robert to take the occasional day off.

“The kid never ever, ever turned down the baseball,” Calfapietra says. “I had to

police him. Because it was superhuman-like. It really was.”

The results were encouraging. Robert issued 40 walks in 60 innings, but he also

struck out 73 and notched a 2.85 ERA. In empty ballparks, he finally received

28

the repetitions he had lacked. His velocity crept up. He rediscovered his ability

to compete and apply unyielding pressure to opposing batters. Unlike in

affiliated ball, the only goal was to win. And if you helped your team win, you

would play again the next day.

“Guys are there because they love baseball and they want to play,” Gregg

Stock says. “They have some hopes of getting back into the affiliated baseball,

but I think they kind of know it’s the last hurrah, so let’s have fun and

compete.”

Robert entertained no such resignation. In his first face-to-face meeting with

Calfapietra, he declared he would one day play in the majors. Calfapietra was

so struck by the earnestness in Stock’s voice that he believed him.

The manager told a friend, Cincinnati Reds scout Shawn Pender, about the

personable former prodigy who bristled at any instruction to rest. When the

Jackals were eliminated from the playoffs, the stars aligned: Pender was

heading from New York to his home in Philadelphia. The Jackals’ ballpark was

along the way.

The next day, a small group of players worked out for Pender at Yogi Berra

Stadium. Robert threw. Richard took batting practice. One-time major league

pitcher Johnny Hellweg performed well enough that Pender signed him shortly

thereafter. The Jackals’ top hitter also received a contract. Robert was not so

fortunate.

“I had interest, but there were a couple things working against Robert,” Pender

says. “No. 1, he was a little older. … And Robert was also a little overweight.”

Stock had subsisted throughout a financially tight year on McDonald’s, chicken

tenders and other leftover concessions items. He is more blunt in his

recollection. “I was definitely fat at the end of the season,” he says.

So, when Pender requested he shed 25 to 30 pounds, Stock responded without

offense. He and Krutewicz moved to Arizona for the winter. Frustrated by the

lack of an offer but determined to remedy the situation, Stock went on a diet

and pushed himself in the gym.

He also resolved to crank his velocity to new heights, reasoning that a spike

would increase his chances of being noticed. He thought back to one of

Nyman’s most basic tenets: If you want to improve at something, measure it.

29

He went to a nearby park, set up a net and radar gun, and threw as hard as

possible. The process would be repeated over and over.

Krutewicz suggested they introduce another element.

“I remember his agent was struggling to get scouts to come out and see him,”

she says. “And I’m like, All right, well this year he’s way better than he ever

was. He’s throwing 98 miles an hour consistently, but people are going to think

he’s still the same guy, especially because he was in indy ball and barely any

scouts are out there. … They’re not going to believe you if you just say, ‘Hey,

I’m throwing 98.’ Anybody can say that. So I’m like, All right, let’s take a

video of it.”

The resulting YouTube footage was posted on a Facebook page for current and

former professional baseball players. It featured Stock maxing out at 98.8 mph,

a new personal record. Within 24 hours, the phone was ringing. When scouts

requested something more formal, Stock found a catcher to throw to at an

indoor facility. That, too, was uploaded to YouTube.

On the second day of big-league spring training, Stock arrived at the Reds’

complex in Goodyear, Ariz. Pender hardly recognized the pitcher exiting a car

by the front entrance. Sporting a slimmed-down physique, Stock threw a

bullpen in front of the scout, Reds Hall of Famer Mario Soto and pitching

coordinator Tony Fossas. Bryan Price, then the team’s manager, walked by

during the session.

“Who the hell is that guy?” Price asked.

Within days, Stock had signed a minor league contract with the Reds. His

climb back to affiliated ball was complete. From afar, his indy-ball manager

beamed.

On the phone, Calfapietra’s voice cracks as he recounts his experience with the

Stocks. Calfapietra now guides the Kansas City T-Bones, but he spent 14 years

with the Jackals. Several players from that tenure have reached the majors,

each call-up as rewarding as the last.

“I get choked up about it,” Calfapietra says, “because when you think about

what these kids do and what they sacrifice…”

His voice trails off.

30

Almost a decade after Stock entered professional baseball, those closest to him

have never heard him consider a certain idea.

“It’s crazy, because I would always think about quitting,” says Richard Stock,

who recently completed his English degree at Nebraska and is rehabbing his

back in advance of a possible comeback attempt. “He didn’t.”

“Literally never,” Krutewicz says. “We don’t even talk about what his career

path would be post-baseball. And we never did, even during the times when it

would definitely look like it might not happen.”

At the lowest moments, Stock recalled the opposite of those experiences. Like

the fact he was the youngest player ever selected to the U.S. junior national

team. Or his star turn at Tony Gwynn Stadium. Or his ability to throw 95 mph

as a 15-year-old.

“What keeps me going is knowing that I’d been on the level of so many guys

who had not only made the major leagues but been successful,” Stock says.

The same confidence inspired a strategic bet in the aftermath of the 2017 minor

league season. Stock had avoided another release. He’d finished with a 2.82

ERA and 2.9 walks per nine innings, easily the best rate of his career. He’d

risen to Double A by late May and stuck there.

But when the Reds proposed to re-sign him for 2018, the offer did not include

an invitation to major league camp. Stock opted for free agency and headed to

the Mexican Winter League to audition for 29 other clubs. He did not permit a

run in his first month with the Charros de Jalisco, a team managed by Tony

Tarasco, San Diego’s outfield and baserunning coordinator.

The Padres already had interest in Stock. Matt Klotsche, a member of the front

office, saw scattershot command but considerable arm strength in a look during

the 2016 indy-ball season. San Diego invited Stock to throw a bullpen the

following spring, but he chose to sign with Cincinnati before that could happen.

After a few more reports in 2017, pro scouting director Pete DeYoung

dispatched veteran evaluator Keith Boeck to Mexico. That visit, combined with

feedback from Tarasco, convinced the Padres to move quickly.

“It kind of sounded like a no-brainer, honestly, to give this guy a shot,”

assistant GM Josh Stein says.

31

A big-league invitation was extended. Stock accepted. He returned from

Mexico set on making another strong impression in the spring. Out came the

net and the radar gun.

On Dec. 19 at Agoura High, Krutewicz’s camera captured Stock firing a 100.1

mph pitch into the glove of his youngest brother, Jacob. “One hundred!” Stock

exclaimed after the radar board flashed a new personal record. A jolt of

adrenaline surged through his body. His next two pitches registered at 101.1

and 101.3 mph.

“That’s, like, a lifetime goal,” Stock says. “That’s the most pumped up I’ve

ever been.”

“That’s more emotion than I’ve ever seen out of him,” Krutewicz laughs.

In early February, Stock and Krutewicz got engaged. Then he reported to

Peoria, Ariz., for his first big-league camp as a pitcher. He soon showed he was

more than a one-dimensional hurler.

“The thing that impressed me the most,” Padres catcher Austin Hedges says,

“was that he had an off-speed pitch to go with it. Not a lot of guys that are

max-effort, upper-90s throwers have a good off-speed to go with it.”

Stock continued honing his slider as the regular season opened. He earned a

late-April promotion from Double A to Triple A, where, in 24 appearances, he

logged a 2.54 ERA and eight saves. The Stocks figured a long-awaited reward

was around the corner.

On June 22, Stock’s parents and two brothers watched him throw a scoreless

inning for Triple-A El Paso in Sacramento. The following morning, they got in

the car for the return trip to the Los Angeles area. About halfway into the drive,

news broke that Jordan Lyles, the Padres’ scheduled starter in San Francisco,

had been scratched and a bullpen game had been ordered. It was the type of

development that typically necessitates next-day reinforcements. At the wheel,

Richard joked they should turn around.

Several hours after they departed Sacramento, the Stocks arrived at their home

in Westlake Village. They had barely set down their bags when Richard’s

phone rang. Weary from the drive, he answered the call and heard Robert, his

voice nearly emotionless, say he was going to the big leagues.

32

“I was like, ‘Oh, hell yeah, dude,’” Richard says. “And then I was like, ‘Wait.

Damn it.’”

The Stocks piled back into the car. They would drive through the night to make

it to San Francisco. Hundreds of miles away in El Paso, Texas, Krutewicz

scrambled to find the earliest available flight in the morning.

They were all there the ensuing afternoon, sitting above the visiting dugout at

AT&T Park. In the 10th inning of a tie game, they watched Robert jog from the

bullpen to the mound. Their hearts sank as he surrendered a hard-luck leadoff

double. Their spirits soared as he retired the next three batters, stranding a

runner at third.

“Regardless of whatever happens, you just know at that point that he’s made it

to the big leagues,” Gregg Stock says. “All the thoughts, all the places where

you could’ve given up, where he didn’t, you kind of reflect on that. It was an

amazing feeling.”

Robert Stock made his 29th big-league appearance Wednesday at Petco Park.

He threw a scoreless inning. The Padres won for the 61st time in 2018.

Stock’s debut qualifies as a clear victory in another season of 90-plus losses.

He has compiled a 2.15 ERA in 37 ⅔ innings, with 37 strikeouts and 12 walks.

He is among the most versatile and durable members of the bullpen, having

gone two or more innings eight times.

Aside from 6-foot-7 Trey Wingenter, he also is the staff’s hardest thrower, with

an average fastball velocity of 97.5 mph. Three of his pitches have been

clocked decimal points above 100. His growing fan base includes Rob

Friedman, proprietor of the Pitching Ninja Twitter account.

“I didn’t expect him, from a workload perspective, to handle multiple innings

as efficiently and proficiently as he has,” Padres manager Andy Green said

recently. “Typically, you don’t ask guys throwing 100 miles an hour to throw

three innings for you, but I guess we’re just crazy enough to do that right now.”

This, Jay Schroeder says, is just the beginning.

“Our goal,” Stock’s longtime trainer says, “is 105, 106 miles per hour

consistently, something that nobody else is doing. … If you don’t have an

expectation that’s above and beyond, you’re probably never going to achieve

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what others that are, quote, the best are doing. So our goal is to surpass that, set

a new standard. I can tell you we believe that it actually will happen.”

It may sound outlandish, but consider: Schroeder, the owner of EVO UltraFit in

Phoenix, suffered a broken neck and back in a motorcycle accident more than

three decades ago. After researching Soviet training literature, he regained his

ability to walk and rehabbed himself back to full strength. Based on his

personal experience, he developed a training system for helping people move in

biomechanically efficient positions while staying injury-resistant.

Dozens of NHL and NFL players have come to swear by Schroeder’s methods.

The movement is spreading around Major League Baseball, with Dodgers

reliever Ryan Madson and Arizona center fielder A.J. Pollock among notable

clientele. Stock, who has used the system off and on since he was 13, is an

outspoken advocate.

“Without it, I would’ve been done pitching years ago, I think,” Stock says. “So

many pitchers, you run into little aches and pains and you have no idea how to

make them get better. And so you kind of learn how to pitch with aches and

pains, but maybe at the cost of your velocity, and obviously my velocity has

been the reason I’ve continued to get opportunities and jobs in baseball.”

As part of the program, Stock spends up to 12 hours every day hooked up to an

Accelerated Recovery Performance (ARP) electrical-stimulation machine. One

device is designed for training, another for recovery. He can rarely be found at

his locker without an electrode attached to some part of his body. After games,

he sits with cords dangling from his head for 45 minutes.

“Robert will do it until he’s an 80-year-old man, I think,” Krutewicz says,

laughing.

The lightweight contraption, which signals the brain to lengthen certain

muscles, is designed to increase blood flow and break down scar tissue. Full

use requires a significant tolerance for pain. Stock converses regularly with

Schroeder’s partner, Charles Maka, who serves as a go-between. Schroeder

creates protocols and exercises to help Stock keep moving efficiently and

address specific problems as they arise.

In the last few years, Stock has grown more serious than ever about the

program. He will spend this offseason living in Arizona, near the EVO Ultrafit

training center.

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“Not everybody’s ready to do it full-bore. It wasn’t the right time for him, and

all of a sudden it was the right time,” Schroeder says. “It was like, ‘Shit, I may

not make it.’ So his attitude became one of, ‘Well, this may be it, so here we

go. We’re going to do it.’”

Stock’s teammates and coaches have come to accept the constant presence of

the ARP machine as one of his endearing quirks. He is a self-professed nerd,

with a voracious interest in books, gaming and The Lord of the Rings; a tree

from the fantasy series is tattooed to his left torso. During baseball’s Players’

Weekend, he wore his gamer name, Cretch, across the back of his jersey.

“He’s a super interesting person,” says Padres pitching coach Darren Balsley.

“Our conversations are probably 20 percent baseball and 80 percent other

things. Like his background, how he started using the stim machine, anything

you can imagine. As long as he’s throwing this well, I’m not going to talk to

him much about pitching.”

In some ways, Balsley says, Stock reminds him of Troy Percival, another

converted catcher. It is high praise. Percival became a hard-throwing closer and

spent 14 seasons in the majors, four as an All-Star.

In late July, as the Padres slogged through the worst stretch of their latest

rebuilding season, veteran reliever Craig Stammen smiled at the mention of

Stock’s name.

“It’s an amazing story,” Stammen said. “It’s a story of perseverance and never

giving up and always believing in yourself. This team kind of needs that

mantra. Even though things are going absolutely as bad as they possibly could

right now, we’ve got to persevere and dream of what our future could be and

reach for that every single day.”

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Three factors behind Francisco Mejía’s

breakout season

By Dustin Palmateer

Francisco Mejía might just have a flair for the dramatic.

Back when he was in the Cleveland Indians organization, Mejía rattled off

a 50-game hitting streak, the longest one in the minors since 1954. Then, in his

first big-league start with the Padres, he launched home runs in his first two at-

bats. On Sunday, with the Padres and Rangers tied at three in the ninth, the

switch-hitting catcher notched his first major league grand slam and his first

walk-off home run on one sweet swing.

Not bad for someone who doesn’t turn 23 until the end of October.

What makes Mejía different from the promising young players that have joined

or will soon join him in the majors in San Diego is the abruptness of his arrival.

Signed by the Indians for $350,000 out of the Dominican Republic in 2012,

Mejía was nearly a finished product when the Padres acquired him in July for

relievers Brad Hand and Adam Cimber. To that point, he had spent parts of six

seasons in Cleveland’s minor-league pipeline, playing in 478 games. With the

Padres, it would take just 31 more games at Triple-A El Paso for Mejía to earn

what should amount to a permanent call-up.

With the bulk of Mejía’s development coming in a different organization,

Padres fans didn’t get to witness the slow burn as a semi-anonymous

international signing turned into one of the best prospects in baseball firsthand.

It was a different path than, say, Luis Urías, who was signed from Mexico way

back in 2013 and spent time at every stateside Padres affiliate before reaching

San Diego. In fact, among the Padres top 10 current prospects and all the 25-

and-under non-relievers to already debut with the big-league team — a total of

19 players — only Mejía, Manuel Margot and former Rule 5 pick Luis

Perdomo played more than half their minor league games outside the Padres

organization.

Either way, how Mejía got to San Diego is quickly becoming a footnote, as his

early performance in the majors has been a bright spot in a cellar-dwelling

season. Just how good of a hitter could this guy be?

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Earlier this season, we identified the high-contact minor-league profile as one

that could break out in the majors. The right combination of an elite contact

rate and launch angle adjustments — plus the introduction to the jumpier big-

league baseball — has proven to unlock hidden power for talented players like

Francisco Lindor and Mookie Betts. Even Urías, the subject of that earlier

article, showed glimpses of light-tower power in his abbreviated major league

debut.

If Urías was a sneaky pick for a big-league breakout, Mejía might just be a

glaringly obvious one. Just from a minor-league performance perspective —

never mind the lightning-quick bat speed — he’s got at least three things going

for him.

Age for leagues

Back in 2014, when Mejía played in the short-season New York-Penn League

at 18, he finished the season as the third-youngest player to garner at least 200

plate appearances, behind only fellow position players Amed Rosario and Luis

Torrens. This would become a theme. The next season, when he debuted in the

full-season Midwest League, he was one of just 20 teenaged hitters to reach

that 200 PA threshold.

According to Baseball Reference, only once — in a 60-game repeat of the

Midwest League in 2016 — did the difference between Mejía’s age and the

average age of the players in his league get to within two years. One of the

tenets of minor-league performance analysis is an awareness of age and level.

Mejía easily clears the bar here.

Better than average strikeout and power numbers

Getting back to the comparison with his teammate, Urías showed sublime

strikeout rates in the minors, but not once did he post an Isolated Power better

than his league’s number. Mejía has consistently excelled in both categories,

recording better than average numbers at almost every stop.

Level Year Age K%+ ISO+

Rookie 2013 17 72.9 204.7

Low-A 2014 18 86.0 117.9

Single-A 2015 19 87.9 96.2

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Single-A 2016 20 69.3 173.6

High-A 2016 20 65.3 122.0

Double-A 2017 21 70.1 139.9

Triple-A (Cle) 2018 22 78.6 108.0

Triple-A (SD) 2018 22 90.4 166.0

* — K%+ and ISO+ are indexed to a league average of 100. For K%+,

anything under 100 is better than average; for ISO, numbers over 100 are

better than average.

The only time Mejía was below average in either strikeout rate or ISO was in

2015 at Single A, when his ISO came in just a tick below the league average.

Just last year, at Double-A Lynchburg, he ranked in the top fifth of the league

in both strikeout percentage and ISO as a 21-year-old. Only a handful of

players matched that feat, and most of them were older than Mejía.

Excelling in both areas could give Mejía a jumpstart on taking advantage of

the juiced ball of the majors, as balls in play with a little oomph behind them

tend to carry farther. In a league where fellow sub-six-foot players like Lindor

and José Ramírez are challenging for home run titles with a contact-based

approach, Mejía could follow a similar path toward unexpected power output.

Suboptimal offensive environments

While Mejía’s Cleveland-centric background makes him something other than

a homegrown player, it also means that most of his development came in

leagues foreign to the Padres’ prospect hounds.

In Mejía’s minor league path, familiar stops like Tri-City, Lake Elsinore and

San Antonio were instead replaced by places like Mahoning Valley, Lynchburg

and Akron. Hitter-friendly locales like the Northwest League, California

League and Pacific Coast League were traded for their more pitcher-friendly

counterparts on the East Coast: the New York-Penn League, Carolina League

and International League.

Level Runs per game OPS BABiP ISO

Low-A, 2014 -0.74 -29 -9 -8

High-A, 2016 -0.49 -20 -8 -15

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Double-A, 2017 -0.03 +14 -4 +12

Triple-A, 2018 -0.81 -54 -16 -16

The above table shows the differential in four indicators between Mejía’s

league and the corresponding stop in the Padres’ farm system (the Indians and

Padres both have teams in the Arizona Rookie League and Midwest League, so

those are omitted). In 2014, for example, the New York-Penn League (Mejía’s

league) averaged 4.15 runs per game, three-quarters of a run fewer than the

Northwest League.

The gulf between Triple-A’s Pacific Coast and International Leagues is

consistently one of the widest in baseball. Buoyed by some high-altitude

ballparks, the PCL often plays as one of the best hitters’ leagues in the minors.

The International League, on the other hand, is more of a pitchers’ paradise.

It’s perhaps no surprise that after amassing just seven homers in 79 games in

the International League with Cleveland this year, Mejía doubled that total to

14 in just 31 post-trade games in the PCL.

Overall, Mejía didn’t play in a true hitters’ league or park until he found El

Paso. His surface numbers would have looked a lot prettier had he come

through San Diego’s system instead of Cleveland’s.

Like any rookie, Mejía still has work to do at the plate — not to mention,

behind it. In a small sample this season, pitchers have challenged him in the

zone just 36.1 percent of the time, according to Baseball Prospectus. That’s the

lowest zone percentage in the majors. Mejía has had some trouble offering at

the right pitches, swinging at 48.8 percent of the strikes but 42.1 percent of the

pitches outside the zone. He’s striking out in one out of every four trips to the

plate.

The league will continue to gather information on Mejía, and he’ll have to

continue to adjust. In a short look, it’s easy to see why the Padres think he can

do it. In the minors, he performed in adverse conditions, a young catcher placed

in tough hitters’ environments. He just kept hitting.

Even if Mejía shares time with Austin Hedges for a while, he’s poised to be a

cornerstone in San Diego’s lineup for years to come.

39

Padres scouting vice president Don Welke dies at 75

Associated Press

SAN DIEGO -- San Diego Padres vice president of scouting Don Welke has died. He was 75. The team said he died Wednesday night in San Diego surrounded by family. No cause was given.

Welke worked in baseball for more than 50 years. He joined the Padres in 2014, following general manager A.J. Preller from the Texas Rangers to San Diego. Welke also worked with the Phillies, Dodgers, Orioles, Blue Jays, Royals and Reds. Welke was instrumental in the Rangers reaching consecutive World Series in 2010 and 2011. He was directly involved in the signings and acquisitions of Adrian Beltre, Jurickson Profar and Elvis Andrus. He also helped sign Dave Stieb, Pat Hentgen and John Olerud. In a statement, Preller called Welke a "visionary who knew and loved baseball, and he shared that knowledge and passion with me and countless other scouts throughout his five decades in the game."

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This Day in Padres History, 9/21 By Bill Center

Sept. 21, 1979 — Right-hander Gaylord Perry allows four hits and a walk with five strikeouts in seven innings to get his 20th win of the season as the Padres score a 5–1 win over the Giants at San Diego Stadium. Perry joins Randy Jones (twice) as the only Padre pitchers to win 20 games in a season.

Sept. 21, 1979 — Left-hander Chris Welsh allows three hits and four walks with three strikeouts in a complete-game shutout and is 1-for-3 with a RBI and a run scored as the Padres defeat the Reds 6–0 at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

Sept. 21, 1985 — Eric Show allows three hits with four strikeouts in a complete-game shutout and Tim Flannery has two hits and drives in the game’s only run as the Padres defeat the Braves 1–0 at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

Sept. 21, 1986 — In his Major League debut, right-hander Jimmy Jones, the Padres’ first-round draft pick in 1982, throws a complete-game one-hitter in the Padres’ 5–0 win at Houston. The only hit off Jones is a third-inning triple by pitching rival Bob Knepper. Jones faces one hitter over the minimum as he allows no walks with five strikeouts.

Sept. 21, 2010 — Left-hander Clayton Richard allows eight hits and two walks with six strikeouts in a complete-game shutout as the Padres score a 6–0 win over the Dodgers in Los Angeles.

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Legendary MLB Scout Don Welke Dies at 75 "Don was a super scout and a super guy, and we will miss him greatly”

By R. Stickney

Don Welke, the Vice President of Scouting Operations for the San Diego Padres, has

died, the team confirmed Thursday.

Welke, who began scouting for major league baseball with the Cincinnati Reds in 1965,

worked in the league for more than 50 years.

At some point in his long career, Welke worked for the following: the Texas Rangers, the

Philadelphia Phillies, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Baltimore Orioles, the Toronto Blue

Jays, the Kansas City Royals and the Team USA Olympic baseball team.

He joined the San Diego Padres in 2014.

San Diego Padres Executive Chairman Ron Fowler and General Partner Peter Seidler

described Welke as a dear friend who was invaluable to the Padres' front office.

"He was a legend in the baseball world," Seidler said in a written statement. "Don was a

super scout and a super guy, and we will miss him greatly.”

Padres Executive Vice President & General Manager A.J. Preller described Welke as a

visionary.

"Don had a tremendous career in baseball, both as a talent evaluator and in the

relationships that he built," Preller said. "Beyond his accomplishments, Don was a loyal

and generous friend. Everyone whose lives he touched were better for having known

him."

A native of Illinois, the 75-year-old Welke had three children and made his home in San

Diego.