Padres face a dilemma with ace Mat Latos

Future is now in San Diego

Is protecting the future more important than winning now? That’s a question the Padres soon may have to answer.

When San Diego began the season, the team promised to protect precocious right-hander Mat Latos, who in his career had never started more than 21 games nor pitched more than 123 innings. At the time, a 150-inning limit seemed reasonable since the Padres had no idea the 22-year-old would become the ace of the best team in the National League.

Now, however, the Padres face a dilemma.

Latos, who leads the team with 11 wins, a 2.47 earned-run average and 119 strikeouts, has already thrown 123 1/3 innings and his start Sunday will be his 21st of the season. If the Padres keep him in the rotation, Latos figures to make at least 10 more starts and pitch another 60 to 70 innings, a phenomenal jump for a guy who began last season in the Midwest League. If they rest him, they might not make the playoffs.

“We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves,” said Padres Manager Bud Black, a former major league pitcher and pitching coach. “If we get past that far range, then we’ll see where we are. There are ways to stay within that range as we move forward too. We could skip him a start, we could push him back a day or two, here and there.”

But do those options really include shutting him down?

“If he feels it’s the right thing to do for him and the organization, that’s the right thing to do,” Black said. “It’s not that tough.”

Wavering over the waiver wire

Teams hoping a late-season trade will steel them for a pennant chase should beware of the words of one American League executive, who predicted deals could be hard to make this month.

Before a player can change teams he must first pass through waivers, meaning every team gets a chance to claim him — and his salary — before he can be traded. So if one team suspects a competitor has interest in a player who suddenly shows up on the waiver wire, it can try to disrupt the deal by making a claim — hoping all the while to persuade the offering team to keep the player.

“Today there’s more blocking going on than I ever remember,” the executive said.

That strategy can backfire, though. On at least two occasions the Padres put in waiver claims on aging, high-priced relievers they couldn’t afford, hoping to block a trade from happening. Both times the player’s original team wound up sending both the pitcher and his inflated salary to San Diego.

Dodgers’ draft pick making a point

The Dodgers say they’re making no progress in attempts to sign right-hander Zach Lee, their top pick in last June’s draft. But they may have landed a nugget much further down the list in 30th-round selection Shawn Tolleson, the 922nd player taken.

After going 2-7 with a 5.17 ERA last spring at Baylor, where he was used primarily as a starter, the right-hander has blossomed in the bullpen at Ogden, the Dodgers’ affiliate in the rookie-level Pioneer League, entering the weekend 1-0 with a 0.47 ERA and a league-best 13 saves in 18 games.

“I was drafted in the 30th round, but maybe I’m not a 30th-rounder,” says Tolleson, who is averaging nearly two strikeouts an inning. “So yeah, I came in here not even just trying to prove that but just to prove that I’m good enough to make it.”

kevin.baxter@latimes.com