San Diego Padres baseball has always carried a chip on its shoulder. Big ballparks, marine layer, pitchers who eat innings for breakfast — and still, every few years a bat shows up that makes the whole league lean in. These are the hitters who turned Petco into a bandbox for a night, who made Jack Murphy feel like a Little League field, who forced national broadcasts to practice saying “San Diego” in October.
That’s the spirit of the Silver Slugger in San Diego, a trophy that means a little more here because it’s never been easy.