How Vásquez has built on strong 2025 for injury-riddled Padres rotation

The Padres’ rotation has badly needed someone to step up, with Nick Pivetta, Joe Musgrove and Griffin Canning all already on the injured list to begin the season. Randy Vásquez might not wear a cape (at least while in the public eye), but he has been the hero San Diego was looking for early in 2026.

Vásquez, 1-0 with a 2.49 ERA this season, makes his fifth start Tuesday night against the Rockies at 8:40 p.m. ET. The Padres have won all four games in which Vásquez has pitched. And not only have the results built on Vásquez’s strong 2025, but there are meaningful signs under the hood that the 27-year-old is on an upward trajectory.

Vásquez is among a handful of MLB pitchers who have shown significant jumps in fastball velocity early in the season. He’s pumping his four-seamer at 94.8 mph, way up from 93.5 mph a year ago and continuing a trend that began last September. He worked with Yu Darvish to modify his offseason regimen with an eye toward increasing velo.

There’s also been a slight change in arsenal for Vásquez, who typically works with seven pitches.

The 6-foot, 165-pounder is throwing his four-seamer much more frequently in 2026: 29.9% of the time compared to 21% in 2025. The pitch is also getting an extra 1.2 inches of induced vertical break (aka “rise”) than it was before.

Meanwhile, Vásquez’s best complement in 2026 has been a slightly harder changeup (up 1.2 mph), which he’s throwing almost twice as often in a small sample. He’s used it 13.1% of the time in 2026 compared to just 6.9% in 2025. That has additionally meant fewer curveballs and sweepers across four starts.

The biggest key with these changes? Vásquez is earning a LOT more whiffs and strikeouts with the improved arsenal.

The fastball is getting chases outside of the strike zone at a 33.3% clip, and opposing batters have whiffed on 30.2% of their swings against it. The changeup, meanwhile, is getting a 27.8% chase rate and 50% -- yes, 50% -- whiff rate.

Neither pitch was better than 20% in those stats in 2025 for Vásquez, who finished the year with the worst overall whiff rate (15.7%) of any pitcher who threw at least 75 innings.

We, of course, need to keep in mind that there have only been four Vásquez starts so far in 2026. It’s still a small sample. But these changes have given him just a .202 xwOBA for opponents on the fastball compared to .297 in 2025. The changeup has been even better, pitching to a .181 xwOBA after a .323 mark last year.

Vásquez has been consistent at getting ahead of hitters with a 62.2% first-strike rate, but he’s been in the zone much less often overall, a 7.1% drop. And why not? Hitters are expanding the zone against him 6.3% more often than 2025 thus far. The changeup is again a huge indicator here, getting that 27.8% chase rate while being in the zone just 21.7% of the time. He had a 40.9% in-zone rate with the pitch in 2025.

But Vásquez also continues to be one of the most unique pitchers in the game. He worked his 3.84 ERA last season despite an inflated 5.37 expected ERA and 4.85 fielding-independent pitching.

This season, FIP loves Vásquez at 2.67, while xERA still projects regression at 5.38. He’s inducing the most weak contact of his career at 7.1% and is getting ground balls slightly more frequently, but opponents have an inflated 17.9% barrel rate against him (ideal combination of exit velocity and launch angle).

Still, Vásquez just keeps getting the job done. Once seen as just a throw-in piece of the 2023 Juan Soto trade, Vásquez has now become one of the Padres’ most-important arms and might be breaking out in real time.