The San Diego Padres are set to make a big splash on the trade market Wednesday, as the team is finalizing a deal to acquire veteran starting pitcher Dylan Cease from the Chicago White Sox, according to ESPN’s MLB insider Jeff Passan.
In exchange for Cease, the Padres will reportedly be sending prospects Drew Thorpe, Samuel Zavala and Jairo Iriarte to the rebuilding White Sox, per Mark Feinsand of the MLB Network. Reliever Steven Wilson, 29, is also headed to Chicago.
Thorpe, a 23-year-old right-handed reliever, ranks as the No. 85 prospect in baseball, per MLB Pipeline. He was San Diego’s No. 5 prospect. Zavala, a 19-year-old outfielder, was the team’s No. 7 prospect while Iriarte, 22, also a right-handed pitcher, was ranked as the team’s No. 8 prospect.
Cease, 28, is coming off an inconsistent season in 2023, but he’s only two years removed from finishing second place in the AL Cy Young voting back in ‘22, when he struck out 227 batters across 184 innings with a 2.20 ERA.
He’s recorded at least 214 strikeouts in each of the last three seasons, though his control can be an issue at times, with 225 walks during that span.
San Diego will be looking to compete in the NL West with the Los Angeles Dodgers, San Francisco Giants and reigning NL champion Arizona Diamondbacks this season, the former of whom loaded up with the acquisitions of Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Teoscar Hernández, among others, this offseason.
Cease will join a starting rotation consisting of Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove, Michael King and Jhony Brito, where he’ll look to rediscover the form he displayed just two seasons ago.
Cease was linked to the New York Yankees as recently as Wednesday amid the worrisome update on Gerrit Cole’s elbow injury, however it was the Padres who managed to reach a deal with Chicago and land the star right-hander.
