Three Options Gone, One Kept: San Diego Clears the Rotation Ledger

The Padres declined options on Nick Pivetta, Lucas Giolito, and Griffin Canning on Sunday, while exercising the option on Kyle Hart. It is a clean offseason accounting move on paper. In context, it lands a little harder.

Giolito spent the season on the 60-day IL and never threw a pitch for San Diego. Canning went 5-9 with a 5.68 ERA in relief, useful in volume but not someone you build around. Pivetta was not in the key player group at all this year. Letting all three go is defensible. The problem is what it leaves: Buehler and Vásquez as the rotation's returning arms, with King now a free agent after opting out last week. That is two starters, one of whom — as the analyst piece noted Sunday — carries real questions about what he actually is at this stage of his career.

Hart gets his option exercised, which gives the club a left-handed arm with roster flexibility. That is fine. It does not move the needle on the rotation problem.

My read is that the Padres needed to clear this ledger before they could address the real work, and now the ledger is clear. The next few weeks will show whether the front office treats King's departure as the emergency it is, or whether they settle for Buehler and Vásquez and hope the bullpen covers the gap. Morejon and Bradgley Rodriguez were good enough this year to absorb some of that slack. But "good enough bullpen" is not a rotation plan.