It’s that time of year again. As the season winds down and pennant races heat up, baseball experts from around the country start sizing up the various busts and disappointments who have wilted in the limelight.
San Diego Padres starter Dylan Cease is one of them. Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe is one of the most respected experts in the country, and Cease was one of the starters on his Anti-All Star team this weekend.
This wasn’t a hard selection to make. Abraham cited the fact that Cease has been hit hard all year despite finishing fourth in the NL Cy Young voting in 2024, and Cease’s 4.59 ERA to go with an 8-11 record speaks for itself. His fellow starters on the Anti-All Star team included Jack Flaherty of the Detroit Tigers and Walker Buehler of the Philadelphia Phillies by way of the Boston Red Sox, so “underperforming” is the password for this particular list.
The Padres have taken an interesting approach to propping up the performance of their erstwhile ace. Cease’s last two starts have been against the Colorado Rockies, which is the equivalent of a Triple A rehab outing at this point in the season. Before that he pitched against the underachieving Baltimore Orioles, giving up two runs in four innings.
His starts against the Rockies resulted in a pair of wins, with Cease giving up just a single run in each of them. Last night’s victory was an 11-3 laugher, and the Pads are hoping this kind of light duty will get him back on track going forward.
Cease is skipping San Diego’s crucial series against the reeling New York Mets at Citi Field this week, with his next start is scheduled against the Chicago White Sox next Friday at Rate Field. This is basically another Triple A outing, and it would set up Cease to go against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Petco during the final series of the season, with the Padres presumably setting their playoff rotation.
Cease’s success is a critical part of whatever postseason success the Padres hope to have, and it’s big for Cease personally, too. He’ll be an unrestricted free agent this offseason as he turns 30, and potential suitors will be looking closely at his numbers down the stretch as they consider throwing big money at the Padres starter.
Cease probably isn’t thinking about that, but you have to assume it’s weighing on his mind to at least some extent. It’s easy to focus exclusively on your next start when things are going well, but there’s a lot at stake for him, both personally and professionally, and his struggle are tough to ignore.