MLB’s annual Winter Meetings officially got underway in Orlando, FL on Monday. This is the event where San Diego Padres general manager A.J. Preller has made some of his biggest moves. It’s where he brought Matt Kemp over from the Dodgers, sent Juan Soto to the Yankees, and signed Xander Bogaerts to a monster free agent contract.
It didn’t take long for Preller to do something at the 2025 meetings, but this one won’t generate quite as much buzz as the others. On Monday the Padres signed minor league reliever Daison Acosta to a one-year contract.
No, in case you’re wondering, that is not Usher in a Padres uniform, although the resemblance is a little spooky.
The 27-year-old righty was signed out of the Dominican Republic by the Mets in 2016. He joined the Nationals organization before the 2024 season and suddenly his strikeout numbers spiked, rising from a career average of about 9.5 punchouts per nine innings to 12.5 per inning. Acosta has yet to make his MLB debut but this is the kind of signing San Diego has had success with in recent years.
Acosta has some kind of trait that they like. Pitching coach Ruben Niebla is the best in the game at taking a trait and helping a pitcher use it to become an effective big leaguer. He’s the third “under-the-radar” relief signing of the off-season, joining Kyle Hart and Ty Adcock, and it looks like one of the Padres strategies for building the 2026 roster is revealing itself. If Acosta, or any of the other two, are able to make the kind of leaps we’ve seen from the likes of Jeremiah Estrada and David Morgan the last couple of years, it gives the Padres more flexibility because they’ll either:
A) Add one more piece to what is already one of the top three bullpens in the game.
B) Backfill a spot vacated by one of San Diego’s elite relievers who’s making the transition to a starting role.
C) Be a replacement for a reliever who gets traded to help fill other holes on the roster.
The Friars are still very much in the market for starting pitching and a 1st base/DH kind of bat that can add thump to a lineup that could use a few more home run threats.
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