It seems the folks who are (still) on track to buy the Padres hold a favorable view of A.J. Preller and his staff.

While that comes as no surprise, further affirmation has come in recent days amid Padres draft-related efforts.

“I know that they are very aware and interested in the draft,” Preller said Saturday of the group headed by José E. Feliciano and Kwanza Jones after the Padres drafted five players.

Peller said the Feliciano-Jones group and holdover control person John Seidler were “very supportive” of the team’s work in the draft, which continues Sunday.

“I think they were excited to see the process and the work, in terms of what ended up happening with our selections,” he added.

Some Padres fans have expressed angst that MLB hasn’t announced the club’s sale as complete, noting the team announced May 2 that the Seidler family had agreed to transfer control of the team to a group headed by Feliciano and Jones.

A non-Padres source said there’s no reason for alarm.

Valued at $3.9 billion, the deal blew away the MLB record set by the Mets’ sale six years ago.

Investing millions of guaranteed dollars in teenagers isn’t for the timid, either. And that may be a source of simpatico between the incoming investors and the baseball front office.

Betting big on teens such as James Wood, CJ Abrams, Jackson Merrill, MacKenzie Gore, Xavier Edwards and 16-year-old internationals such as Leo De Vries and Ethan Salas has paid off under Preller and vice president of amateur and international scouting Chris Kemp, a pair of former Texas Rangers scouting executives who came to the Padres in late 2014.

Preller said the group led by Feliciano, who manages a private equity and alternative investment firm based in Santa Monica, has noticed those outcomes.

“Part of their interest in this organization and this team is because of the work that Chris and the amateur group has done over the years, our ability to find and develop young talent,” Preller said.

Many big-league teams prefer to invest higher draft picks in collegiate players because a player’s college seasons further round out the scouting evaluation.

In contrast, the Padres lean toward younger players fresh out of high school,

“We’ve got confidence to fish in those waters,” Preller said, “and hopefully we found some real good ones here in the first two picks.”

With the 21st chip, the club took 18-year-old pitcher Coleman Borthwick, making it 10 straight years the club selected a high school players with its first pick.

Kemp said competitiveness is Borthwick’s defining makeup trait, saying also he has a “beautiful mind” for figuring out how to succeed.

The  6-foot-6 right-hander led his high school team, coached by his father, to a Florida state title in May and assisted a U.S. junior team managed by World Series-winning pitcher Brad Penny to a gold medal in September.

Borthwick said he played football as a freshman.

My favorite tidbit: his main position was middle linebacker, in addition to backup quarterback.

The Padres took Canadian shortstop Elliot Lascelles, a Yale recruit from greater Toronto, a round later with the second pick at No. 60. He’s 18, too.

“You just try to find the value,” Preller said of guaranteeing higher-round premiums to pre-collegians. “So, if a lot of industry is going toward one class of players, that usually leaves some other players that are open for us. We do our homework. We take a lot of pride in our group. We’ve had a lot of success finding players, both in high school and college, not just here in the last few years.

“You don’t want to limit yourself. It’s a little bit of the industry trend going one way, and usually that means some value is the other way.”

While the incoming Padres owners can’t be impressed with the team’s sub-.500 win-loss record on MLB’s seventh-highest payroll and the starting rotation’s implosions reminiscent of 2021, the same folks in charge were involved in the process that led to selecting 18-year-old friends Merrill and Wood in the first and second rounds five years ago.

Wood enabled the trade for Juan Soto, whose monster year that ensued came, unfortunately, with the 2024 Yankees. Wood has blossomed into one of MLB’s best offensive players.

We’ll see what the next young group can do.