Tingler’s Tidbits: Jayce Tingler talked starting pitching Tuesday morning
Tags: Spring Training, Jayce Tingler, San Diego Padres, MLB

Jayce Tingler

With “Tommy John” graduate Garrett Richards making his spring debut Tuesday and top prospects MacKenzie Gore and Luis Patino scheduled to appear later this week, Padres manager Jayce Tingler discussed starting pitching Tuesday during his morning media briefing:

“I’m really happy with where Chris Paddack is at, the way Zach Davies is throwing the ball,” said Tingler. “(Dinelson) Lamet had his first outing a couple days ago. We’ve been happy with Joey Lucchesi and (Adrian) Morejon.

“It stinks for (Cal) Quantrill right now with having the flu bug and he’s trying to get his strength back. (Michel) Baez. (Ronald) Bolaños are in the mix with a little bit of a rib cage issue. Overall, we feel really good about the depth of the starting pitching. We have three more weeks as these guys build up to sort that stuff out.”

Tingler then discussed Richards, who missed most of last season following “Tommy John” elbow reconstruction surgery.

“I’m very excited to see Garrett Richards, especially seeing him work as hard as he has,” said Tingler. “Going through his bullpens and his live batting practices, he’s been licking his chops to get out there. It’s going to be good to get him out there in game action and see where we go.

“I’ve seen Garrett, maybe, at the top of his game. He’s as nasty as they come stuff-wise. He’s coming back from Tommy John surgery. It’s been a very good process. I know it has been a long road for him. Personally, physically to overcome all he has. I’m just excited for him to get on the mound and get some of those butterflies out of the way and get out there and compete.

“My history dealing with Tommy John guys, the velocity, the strength is usually there. Sometimes, one of the later things to come is the command, touch and feel for the baseball. We’ve been pretty impressed from what we’ve seen from Garrett in live batting practice and through bullpens. Again, sometimes the nerves and emotions of the game. We’ll kind of see where we’re at. I expect him to be pretty good today.”

Tingler said Patino will make his spring debut Wednesday out of the bullpen with Gore in the same role Thursday.

“I want them to have the experience,” said Tingler of the Padres top two pitching prospects. “Obviously, they have had the experience of being around the Major League staff and Major League players . . . going through all the drills, getting a feel for how everything goes. My expectations are they’ve done their prep, they’ve done their work. I want them to go out and enjoy their game and pitch their game and we’ll go from there. What we don’t expect is for them to try to be something they are not. Be yourself and pitch your game.

“It starts with throwing the ball over the plate. And that’s where we’ll find out how their stuff plays. If they are scattered around the zone and not throwing it over, we’re not going to find out much. So, hopefully, they are aggressive in attacking the zone. Big league hitters will tell them where their stuff is at.”

Tingler discussed the flu going around the Padres camp and discussed Fernando Tatis Jr.’s case:

“His fever was up pretty high yesterday,” Tingler said of Tatis. “He started to feel a little bit better in the evening. I haven’t gotten with the training staff this morning, we’re hoping he starts to turn the corner. I don’t know when he will be back. It’s a sensitive deal making sure that he is taken care of. At the same time, obviously the bug is going around this complex. So as much as we want him back and around, we want to make sure the doctors can say it’s not contagious anymore.”

Tingler on the three-way battle at second between Jurickson Profar, Brian Dozier and Greg Garcia:

“Like at all the positions, we’ve rotated guys around at second,” said Tingler. “The one thing I feel confident in is we haven’t used many minor league guys for these innings. They were invited to camp for a reason. We want to see those guys play. There has been real opportunity for innings, for at-bats and I’d like to continue that. I like the professionalism in all three. They have the ability to get on base. They can play defense. They come from different backgrounds, but of them do a pretty good job of managing the strike zone. From an offensive standpoint, they all carry that trait. Some of them have a little bit more strength defensively, whether it be decision making or range or sure hands. It’s just a good healthy competition.”

Finally, Tingler on Tommy Pham: “We’re looking for him to be an absolute disciplined hitter in the box, to swing the bat aggressively, to hit it line to line. When he puts the ball in play to run hard down the line. To be a threat on the bases. To be part of the heartbeat that we’re looking for our lineup to be one through eight. Defensively, I expect him to get off the ball, to have good jumps. Expect him to go gap to gap. The reason I expect that is because that’s who he is.”