The Padres traded James Shields to the White Sox:

The San Diego Padres have traded pitcher James Shields and cash to the Chicago White Sox for pitcher Erik Johnson and shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr.

The deal was made Saturday. It came three days after Padres executive chairman Ron Fowler criticized the team’s recent performances as being ”embarrassing” and ”pathetic,” and called out Shields for his poor start Tuesday at Seattle.

In a season and a third with the Padres, Shields allowed a .254/.331/.447 slash line, including 42 home runs. Twenty three of those homers were in San Diego, a park known for hurting long balls. He allowed a .304 OBP and a .412 slugging percentage for his career prior to moving to SD. Things did not work out well in southern California, so Shields returns to the AL Central.

Erik Johnson walks a lot of batters and allows a lot of home runs, so don’t expect him to be much of an improvement. For some reason, I can’t find Fernando Tatis, Jr. at Baseball Reference. Maybe Tatis will be great some day, but right now it looks like a trade to dump James Shields on whoever would take him.