Padres Aren't Worried About Dodgers, Says Star Pitcher

The San Diego Padres are one of two Major League teams that remain undefeated in 2025. The National League West continues to prove itself as baseball's best division, as the Los Angeles Dodgers are also undefeated to start the year.

While the baseball world is eagerly waiting to see which team will eventually slow down first, right-handed pitcher Michael King said the 7-0 Padres are not concerned with what the 8-0 defending champions are doing.

“It’s way too early,” King said. “I’ve said that the teams that get out hot, you know they’re going to come back to earth. We feel like we’re a team that is not going to come back to earth.”

The Padres won't face their division rivals until June, but the two NL West teams have certainly caught the attention of the rest of the league with their strong starts to open the 2025 season.

Ironically enough, the Padres and Dodgers could not have had more polar opposite offseasons. The defending champions continued to spend millions by acquiring some of baseball's brightest stars. Meanwhile, the Friars were extremely frugal in their pursuits as payroll restrictions limited their spending this winter.

And yet, the Padres have yet again managed to put a winning product on the field. Earlier this year, manager Mike Shildt spoke about the team's eagerness to take down the World Series champion Dodgers.

“We only take care of what we can control. We think about the Dodgers — you brought it up — we respect it, we compete against them, we compete against everybody. We have 162 games. They’re on the schedule. It’s really about how we compete, how we play and how we carry ourselves and how we take care of our business,” Shildt said.

“We do that and play the game the right way — regardless of opponent we’ll feel good about shaking hands a lot of the times. I don’t want to spend any mental energy on any other club. We’re gonna respect them. We’re gonna prepare like heck for them."

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