Free Agent Signing: Padres Add to Rotation With 10-Year Veteran Lefty

The San Diego Padres have been looking to add to their rotation throughout the course of the offseason. They lost Dylan Cease in free agency to the Toronto Blue Jays, and Yu Darvish will miss the 2026 season to injury.

And while the Friars have been connected at times to some of the bigger names on the free agent and trade markets, they've gone out on Thursday and brought in a 10-year veteran who won't move the needle that much, but is a veteran left-hander nonetheless.

Veteran lefty Marco Gonzales to Padres. Minors deal with MLB camp invite. $1.5M if makes team with $1M incentives.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) January 29, 2026

It's a minor league deal for 34-year-old Marco Gonzales. He will earn $1.5 million if he makes the major league team, and can secure another $1 million in incentives.

Marco Gonzales's last MLB action came in 2024; he'll try to make Padres in '26

Gonzales last saw action in the majors in 2024, posting a 4.54 ERA and a 1.60 WHIP over seven starts with the Pittsburgh Pirates. Opponents batted .312 off him. Yikes. He did not pitch professionally in 2025.

Tremayne Person of Friars on Base says this move "quietly admits the front office has spent most of the winter trying not to say out loud that this rotation is still one bad week away from panic mode."

Aside from that short stint with the Pirates, Gonzales has spent the majority of his career with the Seattle Mariners and St. Louis Cardinals. In 926.2 career innings, he has a 4.16 ERA and a 1.30 WHIP.

He had a couple of very solid years in Seattle in 2020 and 2021, posting ERAs of 3.10 and 3.96, and WHIPs of 0.95 and 1.16.

The Padres' rotation is headed up by Michael King, Nick Pivetta and Joe Musgrove (who has had an injury-riddled last three years, including missing the entire 2025 season). If Gonzales breaks camp with the team, he could nab one of the bottom couple of spots in the rotation.