Padres denying Jayce Tingler change only to fire him days later is weak

The San Diego Padres leaned into their disfunction by denying a report about firing manager Jayce Tingler only to cut him loose days later.

The Padres weren’t content to let their second-half collapse, elimination from the playoffs and losing record be the only embarrassing parts of their 2021 season.

They even got the firing of manager Jayce Tingler all wrong.

The Padres officially fired Jayce Tingler after making denials

On Wednesday, San Diego officially parted ways with Tingler.

The firing comes just a few days after the Padres denied a report from Jon Heyman claiming Tingler would be let go.

“Per A.J. Preller, no decision has been made on Jayce (Tingler’s) employment status at this time. Heyman’s report is completely premature. He will be managing our game today,” a spokesperson for San Diego said via Dennis Lin of The Athletic.

The critical word there turned out to be “premature.” The Padres didn’t want to own up to it yet.

This is precisely the kind of organizational disfunction that turned a promising roster into an utter disappointment.

The entire MLB world could see Tingler wouldn’t be retained as manager. The timing of Heyman’s report might have been inconvenient, with two games left to play in the season, but the information wasn’t wrong. Realistically, it didn’t matter. The Padres were eliminated a week earlier. Tinger’s fate was effectively sealed then.

Lying about the decision still being up in the air made San Diego look foolish. It made them look weak. It would have been better to remain silent than to act like the inevitable wasn’t about to happen. There wouldn’t have been harm in coming clean either.

The Padres need to show they can be more competent hiring their next manager than they were firing the last one.