The Padres have one of the deepest farm systems in baseball, and among those names is pitcher Chris Paddack. As he was being taken out of a spring training game against the Mariners on Monday evening, Paddack was told by manager Andy Green that he's joining the Show to start the 2019 season.
Paddack's reaction was one for the books.
"I told him, 'Congratulations for making the club, because you earned it,'" Green said, per MLB.com. "Because he really did. He did it the way you want to see everybody do it."
Paddack said he was fighting off tears on his way to the dugout.
"After I crossed that line, I got pretty emotional looking into the dugout seeing my teammates, in a good way," he said, via MLB.com. "Tears of joy. Tears of hard work. Just kind of reflected on everything that happened. … If you were in the hallway, you probably heard me screaming."
Paddack, 23, played with the Double-A San Antonio Missions and the Class-A Advanced Lake Elsinore Storm last season. He was 7-3 with a 2.10 ERA and 120 strikeouts to a staggeringly low eight walks.
Paddack, who lobbied to be San Diego's Opening Day starter earlier in spring training, will crack the Padres' rotation, alongside the likes of Joey Lucchesi and Eric Lauer.
