Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.Obi-Wan Kenobi, Return of the Jedi Assessing the first half of the San Diego Padres 2026 season is not an easy thing to do. Some will say it’s been a success. Others will say it’s been underwhelming. Honestly, both side s are right, depending on your point of view. “We’ve definitely underachieved in all aspects, probably besides the bullpen. So, you look up with the record and you’re, I guess, satisfied with how poorly we would all say we’ve been playing to still be above .500,” says starting pitcher Michael King. “I think we definitely have a lot that we can turn around and be the ballclub that we want to be.” Looking at it from a glass-half-full perspective: the Padres are 43-39, half a game out of a Wild Card spot, despite multiple injuries in the starting rotation and massive underproduction from their lineup. On the pitching side, they’ve gotten 75.1 innings TOTAL from Nick Pivetta, Joe Musgrove, German Marquez, Lucas Giolito, and Yu Darvish. Somehow, Walker Buehler has reinvented himself to become one of their most reliable starters while the bullpen has been as good as anyone could have hoped, anchored by dynamic closer Mason Miller. For the moment the Padres are trying to use that elite bullpen to coax the depleted rotation into eating as many innings as possible. “We’ve tried to be a little creative with it with the openers and, you know, all that stuff is still on the table, with bullpen games and things like that,” says manager Craig Stammen. “Everything’s on the table to try to make it better. You think of it, we’ll probably try it.” On offense they’ve gotten fantastic seasons from Ty France, Gavin Sheets, and more recently Samad Taylor, three guys nobody was expecting to be anchors of the lineup at the end of Spring Training, so the role players have been better than advertised. Given all that, it’s borderline remarkable they have a winning record right now. However … the glass-half-empty lobby is every bit as strong. The Padres record very likely should be a whole lot better, if it weren’t for a woefully underwhelming lineup. San Diego is last in the league in runs scored, hits, and batting average, thanks in large part to their four most important (and expensive) hitters … Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr., Xander Bogaerts, and Jackson Merrill … limping to an uninspiring .663 collective OPS, well below the league average of .718. That high-priced quartet has combined to hit 34 home runs, just four more than Kyle Schwarber. Then you have concerns that the struggling rotation is going to overly tax their biggest asset, the bullpen. San Diego’s relievers have already thrown 344 innings this season, 6th-most in MLB. That kind of workload is a lot to ask of a group of relievers and expect them not to suffer a drop-off late in the season. “That’s my biggest worry because I lived it and I know what that was like,” says Stammen, who was a member of the 2021 Padres bullpen that was asked to cover too many innings and collapsed in September. “I know how we were feeling at the end of the season. We felt good, but it just wasn’t the same. My job as manager is to try to protect the bullpen in that way so that they are a strength for the entire season, not just in May and June.” So, where exactly does that leave us? As unsatisfying as this is, exactly where we were at the start of this exercise: nobody is really sure. If there’s a silver lining here it’s that the needs of the 2026 San Diego Padres are very clearly defined. President of Baseball Operations A.J. Preller will be hunting for starting pitching depth and offensive reinforcements as we head towards the August 3 MLB Trade Deadline. Importantly, there is still belief in the clubhouse that the stars who have been struggling are going to turn it around before the end of the season. If they all click at the same time, the second half could be one heck of a fun ride. “Absolutely. I mean, I felt like you saw it in 2024,” says King. “We were probably the best team (in the league) post-All-Star break. It’s all about getting hot and making sure that we keep our cold streaks as short as possible. I feel like we’ve had guys step up while other guys are cold. The bullpen stepped up while the starting pitchers were cold and, hopefully, it all comes together.” That 2024 Padres team had the best record in baseball after the All-Star break and nearly knocked off the Dodgers in the NLDS. A repeat of that is not impossible, but they can’t wait too much longer to start the process. ...read more read less