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“Fresh from the sticks,” “bright-eyed and bushy-tailed” upon making his way from Mobile, Ala., to San Diego, Jake Peavy eventually entrenched himself in America’s Finest City.
In fact, the contract that stemmed from his NL Cy Young Award essentially paid for a house within a stone’s throw of Trevor Hoffman’s and Mark Loretta’s homes.
Peavy lived there long after he was traded to the White Sox and won Word Series titles with the Red Sox and Giants. He’s again living in Mobile these days. But he’s also home again, too.
Peavy will be inducted alongside former Padres teammate Adrian Gonzalez and women’s basketball star Charde Houston into the Breitbard Hall of Fame during Monday’s Salute to the Champions at the Hyatt Regency La Jolla. Peavy’s inclusion comes on the heels of his 2023 induction into the Padres Hall of Fame as the organization that raised him as a 15th-round pick into the most accomplished homegrown pitcher in franchise history finally brought him back into the fold.
“What means the world to me is being tied to a place that raised me,” Peavy said. “ … That community shaped me in who I am as a 43-year-old dad of six living in Alabama.”
For eight years, Peavy was a crucial part of the Padres.
He owns the franchise strikeout record with 1,348, ranks second in winning percentage (.575), quality starts (142), strikeout rate (9.04 per nine innings), opponent average (.232) and opponent on-base percentage (.297) and is tied for second in wins (92) with former NL Cy Young winner Randy Jones.
Peavy struck out a record 16 batters in a game — twice — in 2007 he became the only Padres pitcher to ever win a Triple Crown, penning 19 wins, a 2.54 ERA and 240 strikeouts en route to a unanimous NL Cy Young Award.
The contract that Peavy signed after the season — $52 million over four years — should have made him a San Diego fixture for years to come.
That was certainly part of his thinking, as he took a “hometown discount” to stay here.
“I’d taken way less money to stay,” Peavy said. “Just because I wanted to raise my family in San Diego.”
Owner John Moores’ divorce led to the sale of the team, a reduction in payroll and a need to move the Padres’ most expensive assets.
Peavy had a full no-trade clause. He said no to the New York Yankees because it was so far away from the roots he’d put down in San Diego. But he was OK with Chicago. As OK as he’d be, anyway.
“I left crying,” Peavy said of the July 2009 trade to the White Sox.
The Padres received four players back for Peavy: Clayton Richard, Aaron Poreda, Adam Russell and Dexter Carter. Only Richard went on to become a player of note.
A two-time All-Star as a Padre, Peavy went on to earn a third trip to the Midsummer Classic in his fourth year with the White Sox. He won his first World Series ring the next year after a trade to the Red Sox and a second after Bruce Bochy’s Giants acquired him in July 2014.
Employment in San Francisco afforded Peavy plenty of return visits to San Diego.
But he did not receive a hero’s welcome.
Far from it.
“I came back with the White Sox and the Giants, and there was never any acknowledgment,” Peavy said. “Now you’re the enemy. That’s what I thought. I have a duck boat from a championship (with the Red Sox). … Winning a championship takes it to another level, but your first love is your first love.”
Peavy chalked up the Padres’ radio silence to all the turnover that followed Moores’ exit. His own divorce compelled him to move back to Mobile.
Peavy hadn’t been around the organization at all when Spencer Dallin, the clubhouse manager during Peavy’s days as a Padre, dialed him before the 2021 season.
A kid who grew up in East County wanted to wear No. 44 for the Padres because he grew up wanting to pitch like Peavy.
It’s not like anyone needed Peavy’s permission. The number had been worn since Peavy left by the likes of Rene Rivera, Dale Thayer and Pedro Avila.
But Dallin wanted Peavy to know Joe Musgrove’s story.
“Then I watched this kid throw a no-hitter,” Peavy said. “That hit the heartstring deep.”
A door leading Peavy home had been cracked open. Then the ownership that replaced Moores — spearheaded by Peter Seidler, Tom Seidler and CEO Erik Greupner — flung it wide open, inviting Peavy to throw out the first pitch ahead of the Padres’ Game 4 of the 2022 NLDS against the Dodgers at Petco Park.
A wave of emotion and memories overtook Peavy as he touched back down in San Diego that weekend.
Peavy was inducted into the Padres’ Hall of Fame the following year. Peavy will soon participate in his second fantasy camp at the Padres’ Peoria spring training complex. He hopes to find more and more reasons to find himself in San Diego.
Because it’s home, too.
“I identified so hard with this community and the people, and I revel in what Peter and Tom have built with Padres baseball,” Peavy said. …
“I long to be a part of it.”
77th Salute to the Champions
Honorees: Former Padres stars Jake Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez and former WNBA standout Charde Houston
When: 5:30 p.m. Monday
Where: Hyatt Regency La Jolla
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