The San Diego Padres have had immense talent grace their roster throughout the years. Since 1969, the Friars have had 13 players who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame. That includes obvious players such as Tony Gwynn and Dave Winfield, but it also has some other, more surprising players. Below is a Padres all-time lineup solely consisting of greats who had shorter stints in the brown and gold.
Padres All-Time Lineup of Short-Timers
C Mike Piazza (2006)
Hall of Fame catcher Mike Piazza is one of the greatest offensive backstops in the history of the game. He batted .308/.377/.545 with a career 143 OPS+ (where 100 is average). He slugged 427 homers, the most by a primary catcher in history. It’s quite possibly a record that may not be broken. Piazza is far more remembered for his time with the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Mets, though perhaps his most memorable story comes from his unconventional drafting.
The catcher was taken in the 62nd round as a favor to Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda. Lasorda was friends with Piazza’s father and obliged only so that Piazza would be able to use the fact that he was drafted to receive collegiate offers. But the offers never came, so Piazza begged Lasorda for a tryout. He impressed enough to receive a $15,000 signing bonus. After that, Piazza never looked back, winning the National League Rookie of the Year award in 1993.
Later in his career, Piazza posted consecutive sub-1 WAR seasons with the Mets from 2004-05 before signing a one-year deal with the Friars. Piazza hit .283/.342/.501 and posted 3.0 WAR. He also slugged a ridiculous 22 homers that still stands as the Padres’ single-season home run record by a catcher.
1B Willie McCovey (1974-1976)
The 1969 NL MVP is most known for his time with the San Francisco Giants. He spent 19 of his 22 seasons with San Diego’s northern rivals. He’s one of only 18 players who have 2,000 hits and 500 homers. In his MVP year, Willie McCovey put up an incredible 8.1 WAR season, slugging 45 home runs with an OPS+ of 209.
The towering first baseman was a six-time All-Star and a Hall of Famer. But the greatest indicator of McCovey’s ability as a hitter was feared pitcher Bob Gibson calling him “the scariest hitter in baseball.” Gibson was so terrifying that Hall of Famer Hank Aaron famously said he would “knock down his own grandmother if she dared to challenge him,” so for as fearsome a pitcher as Gibson to praise McCovey is a true sign of his abilities.
Willie McCovey with the San Diego Padres. pic.twitter.com/dEL9REJvmo
— Baseball’s Greatest Moments (@BBGreatMoments) March 16, 2026
McCovey spent two full seasons with the Padres, being traded over in his age-36 season. The first was, by far, his best in terms of WAR (3.2 in 1974 compared to 1.6 in 1975), but he still managed to slug over 20 homers in each season. His tenure in San Diego was certainly not a memorable one, but the feared slugger’s time with the Friars was impressive nonetheless.
2B Roberto Alomar (1988-1990)
Let’s continue this Padres all-time lineup with one of the best second basemen of his era. Roberto Alomar put up 67.0 WAR and was just 276 hits away from the 3,000 plateau. The Padres signed Alomar straight out of Puerto Rico as an international free agent in 1985. He had some help in getting noticed. He was the son of shortstop Sandy Alomar Sr., and the defense showed. Alomar was very much his father’s son in the way he fielded the ball. The second baseman won 10 Gold Glove awards but proved himself to be a better hitter than his father, winning four Silver Slugger awards.
Roberto Alomar #Padres pic.twitter.com/wlMnblu043
— 1969-Present (@PadresHistory) February 4, 2023
Alomar impressed immediately with the Padres, only batting below .280 in one of the three seasons he spent with the club. He was traded rather surprisingly to the Toronto Blue Jays for Fred McGriff, where he won back-to-back World Series in 1992 and 1993. His only “flaw” was never being a power hitter, instead batting for average. He slugged 210 home runs in his career, only hitting more than 20 in three seasons.
SS Miguel Tejada (2010)
Miguel Tejada is much more memorable as an Oakland Athletic — or maybe as a Baltimore Oriole for some — than as a Padre. To be fair, he played only 59 games for the club. He was traded at the 2010 deadline and posted remarkably good numbers. In the final two months of the season, Tejada posted 1.2 WAR and slugged eight home runs. Had he played that way with San Diego the whole year, he would have put together a 3.3 WAR season with 22 homers.
9/22/2010: Miguel Tejada slugged the 300th home run of his #MLB career. He’d hit seven more taters before hanging up his spikes. #Padres (via MLB) pic.twitter.com/paZUS9lLDn
— MLB Daily Dingers (@MLBDailyDingers) January 31, 2025
Another claim to fame for Tejada is his conspicuous absence from the 2011 movie Moneyball. The movie demonstrates the improbable success of the 2002 Athletics, but omits that Tejada won the AL MVP that year. He batted .308 and slugged a career-high 34 homers. It was a breakout year in what would become a steady stream of success for the remainder of his career.
3B Gary Sheffield (1992-1993)
A young Gary Sheffield was traded to the Padres by the Milwaukee Brewers prior to the 1992 season. He immediately impressed, posting the best season of his young career. He slashed .330/.385/.580 with a .965 OPS and 33 home runs. Sheffield finished the 1992 season with 6.2 WAR, the second-highest mark of his whole career.
8/4/1992: Gary Sheffield hit his 20th home run of the season for the Padres. He’d finish with 33 homers, 100 RBI and a league-leading .330 batting average.#Padres (via MLB) @GaslampBall @TalkingFriars pic.twitter.com/3DhUBYfbK5
— MLB Daily Dingers (@MLBDailyDingers) December 3, 2024
Sheffield probably would have been a Padre for much longer, but, in 1993, San Diego ownership was in the midst of massive payroll cuts. Sheffield’s $3.1 million contract was deemed too expensive, and the front office was forced to trade him to the then-Florida Marlins. The trade was not well-received by fans for obvious reasons, though the Padres may have had the last laugh. One of the players given up by the Marlins to acquire Sheffield was a 26-year-old Trevor Hoffman.
OF Greg Vaughn (1996-1998)
Greg Vaughn spent two-plus seasons with the Friars, being traded over from the Brewers during the 1996 season. He underwhelmed in his first full season, batting .216 with 18 homers. But in 1998, Vaughn put up the greatest offensive season by a Padre in history. He accumulated 6.3 WAR, mashing 50 home runs. That is a Padres single-season record yet to be broken.
#OTD in 1998, Tony Gwynn and Greg Vaughn hit back-to-back home runs in Game 1 of the World Series. pic.twitter.com/p9ZtMJiZjS
— Padres On This Day (@PadresOTD) October 17, 2020
Vaughn was an incredibly important part of the Friars’ World Series run in 1998. Apart from batting .272 in the regular season and driving in 119 runs to help the Padres reach the postseason, he slugged three homers across 11 playoff games. Much can be wondered about whether or not his power was due to steroids. But, for what it’s worth, the slugger has never been named by any PED investigation and has an unblemished record in that area. His 50-homer season remains the greatest power-hitting display by a Padre to this day.
OF Rickey Henderson (1996-1997, 2001)
The “Man of Steal” was mostly famous for his time with the A’s, but he had a brief yet memorable stint as a Padre. Rickey Henderson actually recorded his 3,000th hit with San Diego in the 2001 season. By that point, Rickey was stealing only 30 bases a season, recording 91 in his time with the Friars. He wasn’t a great hitter with the Padres, batting .247 with the club with just 23 home runs.
But his best moment with San Diego came in 1997. On Opening Day against the Mets, Chris Gomez, Henderson, and Quilvio Veras slugged back-to-back-to-back home runs. It wouldn’t happen again until September 2024, when Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, and Donovan Solano slugged three consecutive shots against the Houston Astros.
4/1/1997: Chris Gomez, Rickey Henderson, and Quilvio Veras went back-to-back-to-back in a #Padres #Opening Day victory vs. the #Mets. (via MLB) pic.twitter.com/ZJJCGI0Dv0
— MLB Daily Dingers (@MLBDailyDingers) April 1, 2025
OF Juan Soto (2022-2023)
Time to wrap up this unique Padres all-time lineup. This one is kind of cheating. Obviously, Juan Soto hasn’t retired yet. He likely won’t for some time, continuing to be one of the best hitters in baseball after signing a record-breaking contract with the Mets. So consider this as more of a premonition of things to come. Soto’s time in San Diego already feels so long ago. By the time he retires (and likely enters Cooperstown), his time as a Friar will be mostly forgotten.
JUAN SOTO TO THE SECOND DECK 😳
(via @padres)pic.twitter.com/9nXKyf9GRG
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) May 27, 2023
The Padres gave up a lot to the Washington Nationals to acquire the young slugger. They built a superstar team of Soto, Tatis, Machado, and Xander Bogaerts after falling short of the World Series in 2022. That team spectacularly underperformed, with the 2023 Padres being a massive failure in the regular season and missing the postseason entirely. Soto was traded to the New York Yankees in the offseason for a haul, but his tenure with the Padres was certainly something to behold.
Main Photo Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports
