Padres take Estrada off IL and add him to bullpen

Estrada missed time at the end of April due to an elbow issue and will now head back to the injured list due to inflammation in his knee. The Padres are hopeful that he’ll be able to return after just a couple of weeks. David Morgan was recalled from Triple-A El Paso to take his place in the Padres’ bullpen.

Estrada will head back to the middle innings mix for the Padres after a short break with elbow tendonitis. Hopefully his velocity is recovered after his four-seamer fell from an average of 97.9 mph in 2025 to 95.0 mph at the outset of 2026.

The 26-year-old hurler made 11 appearances during his time with the Padres, posting an unappealing 6.08 ERA, 2.10 WHIP and a 15/11 K/BB ratio across 13 1/3 innings of work. A corresponding move will be made on Friday, which is expected to be the activation from the injured list of either Jeremiah Estrada or Yuki Matsui to fill the empty spot in the Padres’ bullpen.

Estrada has been a workhorse in the Padres’ bullpen and a valuable member of their setup crew in front of closer Mason Miller, so his absence will definitely hurt the Padres in the short term. Fortunately for them, Jason Adam was activated from the injured list in a corresponding move on Friday to take his place. No word yet on how long Estrada is expected to be shelved for.

Rosenthal, Lin and Sammon add the Padres have expressed interest in the Mets’ trio of elite pitching prospects — Nolan McLean, Jonah Tong and Brandon Sproat — while noting that franchise cornerstones Francisco Lindor and Fernando Tatis Jr. have not surfaced in trade discussions. Any deal involving those prospects would qualify as a blockbuster, though McLean’s inclusion would be especially surprising given that he’s been viewed as virtually untouchable since making his major-league debut late last season. New York remains in the market for an established front-line starter and an additional high-leverage reliever to pair with newly acquired stopper Devin Williams following Edwin Díaz’s departure to Los Angeles. While The Athletic notes that nothing appears imminent, this is a situation worth monitoring closely from a fantasy standpoint.

With Robert Suarez not available after working in back-to-back games, the Padres to Estrada, and he was up to the challenge. It’s the third save of the season for the 26-year-old, and his ERA is a solid 2.93 over the first 94 games of the season. If Estrada ever got the chance to close, there’d be a lot to like.

Suarez has dropped his appeal after the league reduced his original three-game suspension to a two-game ban for hitting Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani with a pitch during last week’s series against Los Angeles. It’ll be some combination of Jason Adam, Jeremiah Estrada and Adrian Morejon handling the closing duties while he’s out.

After the Padres tied the game in the ninth and scored the go-ahead run in the tenth, Estrada was summoned to close things out. A sacrifice bunt moved the runner on second before two groundouts ended the game with Estrada’s second save of the season.

With Robert Suarez getting the night off after pitching in four of the last five games, Estrada got the game to pick up his first save of the season as he was summoned to end the game with a two-run lead. He worked around one hit, striking out two to secure the win for San Diego.

In Estrada’s defense, he really should have Christian Yelich struck out to begin the ninth, which probably would have led to a scoreless frame. Instead, he allowed on a walk to Yelich and two hits. It was quite curious that the Padres decided to use Estrada and avoid Robert Suarez tonight. Both had worked the previous two days, but Suarez threw fewer pitches in those outings, and had, unlike Estrada, gone four straight days without working previously. He is also the older of the two by eight years. If we were the Padres, we’d consider Estrada the more important reliever of the two going forward. Suarez, though, is in the second year of a five-year, $46 million contract.