The San Diego Padres had to wait for catcher Ethan Salas to develop, but the wait has been worth it.
The San Diego Padres get ripped for their farm system all the time, and in some ways the criticisms are valid. GM A.J. Preller believes that prospects can be powerful trade fodder when the right moment comes along, but it’s also true that the talent at the top is formidable.
The ultimate example of that talent is catcher Ethan Salas, who’s had a remarkable season, and he was named Minor League Player of the Year for the Padres by Baseball America. It’s an amazing achievement given where Salas was at the beginning of the season, not to mention at various points in his oft-difficult journey.
The Padres gave Salas a $5 million bonus despite his youth, and Salas has been swimming uphill trying to compete against other older prospects, minor leaguers and the major leaguers who have fallen into the minor league ranks.
Salas has struggled with injuries for the last couple of years, and this is the first season in which he’s been fully healthy. It’s allowed his talent to fully emerge, as he hit and then dominated at both Double-A and Triple-A.
A stress reaction in his lower back cost him almost all of the 2025 season, and as a result he wasn’t able to make up for lost time in the Arizona Fall League. The last time Salas played regularly before this year, and even as one of the youngest players in the Midwest League in 2024, he was subpar.
The Padres backed him up throughout as their catcher of the future, but it was easy to wonder if this was just lip service. San Diego was finally getting solid production from Luis Campusano at catcher, but then Salas put up a slash line of .296/.374/.448 with ten home runs and 17 stolen bases in 96 minor league games at San Antonio and then El Paso.
Salas’s defense has always stood out, so his offensive production completed an impressive picture. It took him a while to get his first major league hit, but when he did it was a triple, and Salas also became the youngest catcher in MLB history to hit two homers in the same game at the tender age of 20.
Salas has been relatively sanguine about this. He says he’s just having fun playing baseball, and he added earlier this year that “they love you when you’re hot and hate you when you’re not.” The Padres are happy they stayed with him during the bad times, and he’s well-deserving when it comes to this award.
