“I should have used the resources available to me to ensure that no banned substances were in what I took. I failed to do so,” Tatis said in his statement. “I have no excuse for my error, and I would never do anything to cheat or disrespect this game I love.”
Tatis had yet to appear in a game this season because of a wrist injury he suffered in an offseason motorcycle accident. He will be ineligible to play for the Padres should they make the postseason. San Diego is 16 games behind the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League West but would own the newly created third NL wild-card spot if the season ended Friday.
“We were surprised and extremely disappointed to learn today that Fernando Tatis Jr. tested positive for a performance-enhancing substance in violation of Major League Baseball’s Joint Prevention and Treatment Program and subsequently received an 80-game suspension without pay,” the Padres said in a statement. “We fully support the Program and are hopeful that Fernando will learn from this experience.”
The league’s policy dictates that clubs are not notified of a player’s positive test until the day that player is set to be added to the restricted list, so the Padres did not know Tatis had tested positive when they engineered a franchise-altering deal to acquire Juan Soto from the Washington Nationals at the trade deadline.
At the time, that deal looked like a splurge for a team soundly in contention with its young superstar, Tatis, preparing to return from injury for the stretch run. In hindsight, Soto and Josh Bell will replace much-needed production as the Padres try to make the long October run they and general manager AJ Preller have sought for most of the past decade.
Now Soto and Bell will anchor a Padres lineup that still contains Manny Machado, a formidable heart of the order that appeared poised to be dominant down the stretch but had not been yet: San Diego is 3-5 since trading for Soto, including a sweep at the hands of the Dodgers last week.
When Tatis has been healthy in the big leagues, he has been explosive. Last season, despite battling a shoulder injury down the stretch, he led the league with 42 homers at age 22. He was an MVP candidate in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
But after battling the shoulder problem late in 2021, Tatis returned from the lockout with a new problem, one his team had not been able to address while the players negotiated a new collective bargaining agreement: He had broken his wrist in a motorcycle accident. His return had been slower in coming than some hoped, but it seemed likely to arrive soon. He will not return until 2023.
This is a developing story that has been updated.