Michael King was born in Rochester, N.Y. He prepped in Rhode Island. The Miami Marlins drafted him out of Boston College and he ultimately debuted with the New York Yankees.<\/p>\n
Yes, the pull back to the East Coast this winter was real.<\/p>\n
So was the attachment that took root in two years in San Diego.<\/p>\n
\u201cFamily got started here,\u201d King said Friday afternoon as his wife Sheila and his five-month-old daughter Grace sat in the front row alongside his parents in the Petco Park auditorium. \u201cWe have roots here. The foundation that we have, the atmosphere playing here is just second to none. The players that (A.J. Preller) has put together, the staff that he has put together made it so it was very familiar to me and very fun to be a part of.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I think we have some unfinished business, and I want to be a part of a championship team.\u201d<\/p>\n
King\u2019s return on a three-year, $75 million deal \u2014 with opt-outs \u2014 is a step in that direction for a franchise that\u2019s endured a curious offseason.<\/p>\n
Manager Mike Shildt suddenly retired after leading the team to back-to-back postseason berths for just the second time in franchise history. The man hired to replace him, Carig Stammen, was a special assistant who was on no one\u2019s radar outside the front office. And, with a lawsuit contesting control of the team still pending, the Padres were officially put up for sale. All the while, the front office charted a course forward as the likes of King, Dylan Cease, Robert Suarez, Luis Arraez and Ryan O\u2019Hearn waded into free agency.<\/p>\n
Cease signed with the Blue Jays for $210 million over seven years, which seemed to signal that the demand for starting pitching could price the Padres out of a reunion with King. But the 30-year-old right-hander was realistic about his market after injuries limited him to 73\u2153 innings in his walk year.<\/p>\n
\u201cDylan signs a seven-year contract because he hasn\u2019t missed a start in maybe his entire career,\u201d King said. \u201cThat adds length to a contract. Coming off an injury, I knew I wasn\u2019t going to get a seven-year contract. I think you pay for length based on durability, and then you pay dollars based on performance. Dylan was obviously able to do both of those. Unfortunately, I was only able to do one this past year, but I\u2019ve got to prove it in these next few years for my next contract.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Michael](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/SUT-L-padres-1220-004.jpg\")
Michael King, left, speaks during a news conference after the Padres re-signed him to a three-year, $75-million contract as President of baseball operations A.J. Preller, right, laughs at Petco Park on Friday. (Meg McLaughlin \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n
The structure of King\u2019s contract certainly suggests that he\u2019ll get another bite at the apple.<\/p>\n
While an average annual value of $25 million pushes the Padres\u2019 luxury tax hit to just under $258 million \u2014 firmly above the first $244 million threshold, according to Fangraphs.com \u2014 the breakdown presents advantages for both the pitcher and a team intent on fielding a winning team.<\/p>\n
King will receive a $12 million signing bonus spread across the three years of the deal. He\u2019ll get $9 million to start 2026 as the Union-Tribune projections put the Padres\u2019 current commitments at just under $200 million for next season.<\/p>\n
If King opts out after this season, a $5 million buyout will cap the value of one year of the contract at $22 million ($14 million this year, with $8 million of his signing bonus owed over the following two seasons). If King opts in, his player options will pay him $28 million in 2027 and $30 million in 2028.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a risk that the Padres were willing to take on even after nerve and knee issues derailed King\u2019s encore to an impressive first year in the rotation. He posted a 2.95 ERA over 173 \u2154 innings in 2024, finishing seventh in NL Cy Young voting.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know the work ethic,\u201d said Preller, the Padres\u2019 president of baseball operations. \u201cWe know the aptitude and the mind. What know what type of competitor he is. \u2026 Any time you\u2019re looking to make any type of investment, you\u2019re just looking for somebody you trust.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Michael](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/SUT-L-padres-1220-003.jpg\")
Michael King, left, smiles during a news conference after the Padres re-signed him to a three-year, $75-million contract at Petco Park on Friday, Dec. 19, 2025 in San Diego, California. (Meg McLaughlin \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n
King was certainly hoping the Padres would come around.<\/p>\n
Preller and Co. checked in on King early in the offseason but didn\u2019t circle back until 10 days ago, after it went public that the Yankees, Red Sox and Orioles were among the teams with interest.<\/p>\n
It was about that time that Preller had pitching coach Ruben Niebla and new manager Craig Stammen send text messages to feel out King\u2019s interest in a return.<\/p>\n
As King expected, his market had been impacted by a disappointing walk year.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a couple (of teams) that lowballed me,\u201d King said with a laugh. \u201cBut then there were a couple that blew me away and unfortunately weren\u2019t in cities that had a winning mentality or a roster that I believed in for the next few years. I told my agent \u2014 and he probably wasn\u2019t happy with it \u2014 that I wanted to win for the duration of the contract, and I don\u2019t care if that means I have to take less of a deal than whatever you\u2019re negotiating.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Padres](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/SUT-L-padres-1220-013.jpg\")
Padres CEO Erik Greupner, pitcher Michael King, president of baseball operations A.J. Preller and chairman John Seidler pose for a photo during a news conference announcing that the team re-signed King to a three-year, $75-million contract at Petco Park on Friday, Dec. 19, 2025 in San Diego, California. (Meg McLaughlin \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n
The Padres not only checked all those boxes, they were the one West Coast team that King was willing to play for.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think geography played a little bit in terms of where I would like to go,\u201d King said. \u201cI think that the unknown of being on those teams is a little different. The willingness to win on those teams is just foreign. I had no idea what I was walking into. I had those meetings, and yeah, in those Zoom calls and those in-person meetings, you kind of get a feel for it.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut ultimately, when you sit back and think about a winning team and winning mentality, I know that I got one of the best (GMs) in the business to get us to where we want to be and feeling the playoff atmosphere and pressure in San Diego was something I want to feel every year for the rest of my career.\u201d<\/p>\n
Likewise, the Padres view King\u2019s return as an important piece of a rotation puzzle that had been jumbled by the loss of Yu Darvish to elbow surgery and the prospect of losing both King and Cease to free agency.<\/p>\n
The Padres\u2019 ace during King\u2019s injury-riddled 2025 season, Nick Pivetta has even been mentioned in trade rumors this winter, but \u201cwe go into it now with Nick Pivetta coming off a Cy Young-type season and Joe Musgrove coming back (from Tommy John surgery), which is super exciting for everyone, and Michael,\u201d Preller said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the front of the rotation is in any order, however you want to do it. You have to start with starting pitching and elite performers that can throw innings, and I think for us having those three leading it and a lot of competition after that. Obviously there\u2019s still a lot of offseason left and we\u2019re going to look to continue to improve our team. \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cBut putting Michael in that spot with Nick and Joe kind of fronting it, that\u2019s a good feeling for (Stammen) and Ruben and everybody here in San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael King was born in Rochester, N.Y. He prepped in Rhode Island. The Miami Marlins drafted him out…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357597,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,4245,462,477,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-357596","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-latest-headlines","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-san-diego-padres","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}