After more than a week of trade rumors, starting pitcher Chris Paddack and reliever Emilio Pagan is heading to the Minnesota Twins in exchange for reliever Taylor Rogers and outfielder Brent Rooker.

The Athletic‘s Ken Rosenthal reports the Twins will also send $6.6 million to the Padres to pay down Rogers’ $7.3 million contract, so the Padres will shed around $3.5 million with this deal on top of solidifying the back end of their bullpen.

All three players have been linked to the Mets in trades, with Paddack and Pagan being the backbone of a deal that would have sent Dominic Smith to the Padres. The Mets also would have received Eric Hosmer and $34 million, but the Mets balked at the deal because they didn’t want to pay the remaining $25 million due to Hosmer after the Padres would’ve paid down the contract over the final four years.

Paddack and his three years of team control find a new home in a Minnesota rotation featuring the likes of Sonny Gray, Joe Ryan and Dylan Bundy.

The Twins must have confidence they can help improve Paddack’s fastball control, similar to the confidence the Mets apparently had as trade rumors swirled last weekend. The Athletic‘s Dan Hayes says the Twins have wanted Paddack “forever,” which surely doesn’t hurt in the quest to turn around Paddack’s career after a solid rookie season in 2019.

As for the Padres, they’ll get Rogers for a year before he goes to free agency. The lefty has been a consistently above-average reliever for the Twins since his debut in 2016. He has a 3.15 career ERA (3.00 FIP) with a 139 ERA+ over five-plus seasons, culminating in an All-Star appearance last season.

Rogers and his sweeping slider (not quite his brother Tyler’s, though) will slot into a late-inning role alongside Craig Stammen and Robert Suarez in the Padres bullpen–probably the weakest link on the contending team.

These two franchises culminate their offseasons on Opening Day with trades after each team made multitudes of trades and signings after the lockout ended.

The Twins traded Mitch Garver, Josh Donaldson and Isiah Kiner-Falefa and acquired Sonny Gray, Gary Sanchez and Gio Urshela. They also signed Carlos Correa and Joe Smith. The Padres, on the other hand, traded for Sean Manaea, Luke Voit and Jorge Alfaro over the last month in addition to Rogers. They also placed top prospect C.J. Abrams on their Opening Day roster as they look to compete in a competitive NL West.

The post Padres Trade Chris Paddack To Twins For Taylor Rogers appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Sam Navarro-USA TODAY Sports

Updated Post 4/2/22, 5:54 PM EST

The deal has “hit a snag,” Jon Heyman of MLB Network reported, and others such as Joel Sherman of the New York Post and Andy Martino of SNY confirmed. Sherman added that the Mets had discussed whether to take on about $24 million of Hosmer’s salary and ultimately decided against it.

Updated Post 4/2/22, 1:37 PM EST

Andy Martino of SNY added that the Mets would flip Hosmer after acquiring him, possibly to the Cubs. The trade still isn’t done, but it continues to be a “serious possibility.”

Updated Post 4/2/22, 10:34 AM EST

Joel Sherman reports Padres reliever Emilio Pagan has also been discussed in the scope of a trade. Sherman also says the Padres would eat around $30 million of Hosmer’s remaining $59 million in a deal. There is still no deal reportedly being agreed to.

Original Post 4/2/22, 2:49 AM EST

The Mets and Padres have discussed a trade that would involve Dominic Smith, Eric Hosmer and Chris Paddack, an article by Dennis Len, Ken Rosenthal and others from The Athletic reported late Friday night.

The teams have talked about a variety of trade options, the article explained. One was that the Mets would send Smith to the Padres for Hosmer and Paddack. The Padres have been looking to trade Hosmer for more than a year, and that want likely only increased after the team posted an underwhelming 79-83 record last year. He still has four years and $59 million left on his contract.

The article adds that the Mets have been in discussions with multiple teams, and that in recent weeks, the Padres have become a potential match. With Jacob deGrom now set to miss at least the first month of the season, the Mets may be even more inclined to acquire another starting pitcher.

Mets fans may remember Paddack from the competitive fire he showed when Pete Alonso won National League Rookie of the Month in April 2019. Alonso said in response, “If he was mad about that, there’s five other months.” Alonso, of course, went on to win Rookie of the Year.

Paddack finished that year with a strong 3.33 ERA in 26 games, but he hasn’t been the same since. He put up a 4.73 ERA in 12 games in 2020, then a 5.07 ERA over 23 games in the Padres’ mediocre 2021 campaign. He’s still 26 years and has a career K/9 above nine with a BB/9 below two.

Hosmer, meanwhile, is a tough sell considering he’s a 32-year-old first baseman who posted a fWAR of 0.0 last year. He’s been mostly a league-average hitter for most of his career. One strength is his durability, but it’s hard to see where he would even fit into the Mets’ lineup, considering they already have Alonso at first base and Robinson Cano at DH. Hosmer would effectively replace Smith, but Hosmer doesn’t have the ability to play left field that Smith has.

Paddack makes more sense for the Mets than Hosmer, and there’s obviously no guarantee that this is exactly how an eventual trade would look. It will be interesting to see if any of this comes to fruition.

The post Mets-Padres Trade Will Not Happen appeared first on Metsmerized Online.