NL West Notes: Soto, Padres, Merrill, Wood, Giants, Heaney, Taylor

Speculation continues to revolve around which team (if any) can break in Juan Soto away from the Nationals ahead of the trading deadline, or even which clubs are the top contenders as August 2 approaches. according to John Heyman and Joel Sherman from The New York PostThe Nats may be “focusing on one or two teams at the moment,” with some competitors seeing the Cardinals as a potential contender to be one of those clubs given St. Louis’ amount of MLB-ready talent. As far as NL West goes, however, a rival executive says Ken Rosenthal athlete which – which”I think San Diego is as weighted as the other 28 teams combined. They have the players and they have [A.J.] Briller. “

Certainly, the Padres“Chief Baseball Operations is always open to bold moves, and that confidence extends to the team’s prospects in the sense that Padres are “confident in their ability to continue revamping their farm system.” While San Diego has already engaged high-quality companies in other deals on the Over the years, however, more and more interesting new names keep appearing.For example, Rosenthal writes that teams have shown interest in Shortstop Jackson Merrill and defensive player James WoodPadres’ top two picks from the 2021 draft. Both Merrill and Wood were high school picks still a few years away from the seniors, so in terms of Soto, Padres could hold on to the young duo as future building blocks while tackling other possibilities that fit the citizens’ demands. Better.

More from NL West…

• The giantsDefense was an underrated reason behind the club’s success in 2021, but this year, San Francisco slipped near the bottom of several key defensive stats. As a result, Rosenthal reports that the Giants are considering adding a strong defender, ideally for a player or DH candidate (Tommy La Stella Cited as an example by Rosenthal). Having one good glove in the mix may raise all the tides, allowing the Giants to better align their players and help fill in the holes from multiple injuries around the roster.
• Andrew Heaney It is expected to be activated from the infected list for 15 days to start Dodgers“A game against the Nationals is on Wednesday,” manager Dave Roberts said. Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register and other correspondents. After starting two season-opening seasons, Heaney only appeared again (on June 19), sandwiched between two long stints of IL with shoulder issues. The left-handed threw five rounds into the last rehab start in the minor league, and it’s safe to assume that L.A. will keep Heaney’s workload relatively limited as he climbs back up. In other Dodgers injury news, Chris Taylor (Broken foot) Participated in hitting practice yesterday and a ticket for rehab may be issued later this week.