Padres Prospects Notes From the Peoria Backfields.

PEORIA- The San Diego Padres minor league spring training officially opened Thursday, March 6, with games set to get underway March 11. Over the next four weeks, the fields at the Peoria Sports Complex will continue to be chock full of more than 170 players vying for spots on a minor league roster and fine-tuning their game in preparation for the start of the 2025 season 

Last weekend, MadFriars kicked off on-site coverage of Padres prospects with a bevy of player interviews and in-depth discussions with coaches regarding Padres prospects scattered in the Peoria backfields. 

While those pieces will be available on our website for subscribers starting this weekend, here are a couple of notes we compiled on key Padres prospects.

Ryan Och 

The Southern Mississippi alum spent time with the big league club as a non-roster invitee this spring before being reassigned Thursday morning. After missing the 2023 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, the left-hander posted excellent numbers between Fort Wayne and San Antonio last year, including a 33.9% strikeout rate, 2.30 FIP, and 2.99 xFIP. 

Even with the success of 2024, Och continued to fine-tune and tinker his stuff while with the big league group in Peoria. The offering he adjusted the most is the slider, as he now utilizes what he calls a baby-spike grip.  

“For me, I am not the greatest supinator, so the baby-spike grip helps me, I think, be able to spin it better,” said Och. “The slider is the pitch I have been hammering the most this spring. Ruben [Niebla] and [Hideo] Nomo have really helped me get in tune with that pitch.” 

Along with changing the slider grip, Och has had lengthy conversations with Padres coaches regarding vertical approach angle, with the aim of continuing to make his motion and arm angle even more deceptive.

“Vertical approach angle is still kind of new to me, but now we’re adding more of a crossfire to my motion and making me horizontal. Just trying to be as weird as possible; to make the hitters as uncomfortable as possible is the goal.”

A changeup rounds out Och’s arsenal. He’s focused on keeping his delivery the same on the pitch, not only for the sake of deception but to help its shape and action.

“The thought with my change is to kinda throw it exactly like a fastball and let the spin do the rest,” noted Och. “It’s not getting too consumed in, ‘oh I gotta make this pitch roll over and drop off.‘ It’s just throw it like a fastball, and the seams will do the rest.”

Braden Nett 

While Nett introduced himself nicely to San Diego fans this spring with a 42.4% whiff rate and 23.8% strikeout rate in four spring training innings, those who’ve paid attention to the system are not shocked by the former undrafted free agent’s performance. 

Nett noted that he has worked hard this spring on hammering down his cutter to address one of his bigger struggles last season in Fort Wayne. 

“The cutter, for me, is mainly for getting ahead on a lefty guy because I have had troubles with left-handers in the past,” said Nett. “Having something reliable that I can throw in to get them off the plate has helped me.”

While Nett’s arsenal is deep, there is one pitch he has shelved at the moment: the splitter. 

Nett threw the pitch more than he ever had in Liga de Béisbol Profesional Roberto Clemente (Puerto Rican winter league). But this spring, he’s felt the pitch has been too inconsistent. “When I got here, it was kind of an inconsistent pitch. So I think we’re going to step away from it for a while and work on some other things,” said Nett. 

Ethan Salas 

2025 is already the third spring training that 18-year-old Ethan Salas has participated in in the Padres organization. 

After playing 134 games between High-A Fort Wayne and the 2024 Arizona Fall League, Salas’s offseason was all about letting his body rest and recuperate. Salas noted that he had added muscle over the winter and grown just a touch. 

While Salas generally took time away from the game, he still regularly took cage reps and batting practice during this offseason in an effort to turn the late-season adjustments of having a more relaxed and athletic lower half, holding his hands higher, and closing his front side into muscle memory. 

“I just wanted to keep dialing in the adjustments I had made and making them natural moves. Keep getting that good separation and get my bat where it needs to be at the point of contact,” said Salas. 

“That was a huge part of my offseason; it was a good thing that I never really stopped hitting. I think even at the end of the season [in Fort Wayne], all the things we changed while they were working were still a little foreign. But in the offseason, I hammered my routine, and coming into this spring, I feel really good about where my bat is at.

In 13 trips to the plate before he was sent to minor league camp, the 18-year-old drew four walks this spring, consistently showing impressive pitch recognition and looking quite comfortable against pitchers a decade or more older than him throughout the spring.

Isaiah Lowe

While 2024 was a breakout year for Lowe, seeing the former 11th-round pick stay healthy for a full season was also critical. Lowe relied heavily on the fastball and slider last season, and understandably so, given how dominant each was. The slider, in particular, generated a 44% swing-and-miss rate between Single-A and High-A. 

At the tail end of last season, Lowe began to look more comfortable with his third offering, a changeup. He was throwing it with more command and starting to see it yield more swing and miss. Traditionally, Lowe has utilized a Vulcan grip. 

“The changeup [has been] more for against lefties than it is righties,” said Lowe.

However, in the last month, Lowe worked on his changeup with former Padres closer and Hall of Famer Trevor Hoffman to develop what he calls his second changeup that utilizes a palm-ball type grip. 

“The Vulcan comes out harder and has more run,” said Lowe. “With the palm ball grip, from what I’ve heard from hitters, it comes out almost with like a knuckle or a split action. With the palm grip, the big thing is to get out in front.” 

Along with the new changeup, Lowe has continued to refine his newly added cutter. The pitch not only bridges his arsenal, but he views it as a potential weapon against both left- and right-handers. 

“I probably won’t feature it right away because I am still getting a feel for it, but I will use it more as time goes on,” Lowe said. “I think against right-handers, it will help me get guys off the sweeper and slider, and it can get in on the hands of lefties.”