Mike Shildt stood in a corner of the visiting clubhouse at Wrigley Field after the Padres’ final game of 2025.
He spoke in a soft voice about the love he had for his players and the culture that had been built during his two seasons as coach.
He was devastated, proud and tired.
And he was done.
He was pretty sure of that as he looked around the room that night after a 3-1 loss to the Cubs in Game 3 of the National League Wild Card Series.
Nine days later, Shildt made his retirement official.
After two seasons as manager of the Padres, he opted out of a contract that had two years remaining, citing a “heavy toll” the job had taken on him “mentally and physically.”
Shildt, who led his team to the playoffs in each of the five full seasons he managed, informed the Padres of his decision Saturday.
In a letter he emailed to the Union-Tribune, Shildt said, “It’s time for me to take care of myself and leave on my terms.” »
Shildt and two Padres sources said the decision to retire was solely Shildt’s.
Shildt, 56, finishes his managerial career with a 435-340 record. That .561 winning percentage is tied for 20th all-time among those who managed at least 750 games and seventh among men whose managerial careers extended beyond 1951.
His teams have won at least 90 games in each of the four 162-game seasons he has managed, 2019 and 21 with the Cardinals and 2024 and 25 with the Padres.
The Padres won 93 games in 2024 before losing to the Dodgers in the NL Division Series and 90 games in 2025 before the NL Wild Card loss to the Cubs.
In a statement, Padres President of Baseball Operations AJ Preller said, “We would like to congratulate Mike on a successful career and thank him for his significant contributions to the Padres and the San Diego community over the past four years, including consecutive 90-win seasons and two playoff appearances as a manager. His dedication and passion for baseball will leave one impact on our organization, and we wish him the best in his next chapter. The Padres’ search for a new manager will begin immediately with the goal of winning a World Series championship in 2026.”
The new manager will be the Padres’ third since 2022 and fourth since Andy Green was fired near the end of the 2019 season.
There are now eight management positions in MLB.
The Padres will likely interview some members of the organization.
Pitching coach Ruben Niebla, who has built a successful pitching staff that has been in almost constant flux over the past four seasons, is reportedly a lock to be interviewed.
Special assistant to baseball operations AJ Ellis, a longtime major league catcher who worked closely with Shildt last season, is widely considered a future manager.
Scott Servais, who managed the Mariners from 2016-2024 and was a major league catcher for 11 seasons, is now a highly regarded special player development assistant within the organization.
The Padres could also interview bench coach Brian Esposito and former player Mark Loretta, who is special assistant to CEO Erik Greupner.
Whoever replaces Shildt will inherit most of the core of a club that has won 183 games over the past two seasons, the most in franchise history over a two-year span. The 2026 Padres will attempt to do something unprecedented in the franchise’s existence by becoming the third straight Padres team to make the playoffs.
It’s safe to say Shildt left the team in better shape than he found it.
The North Carolina native, who never played professionally, joined the Padres after 18 years in the Cardinals organization, where he rose from regional scout in 2003 to big league manager in 2018.
He became a minor league coach in 2005 and managed the minor leagues from 2009 to 2016 before joining the Cardinals’ major league team in 2017. In June 2018, when Mike Matheny was fired, Shildt took over as interim manager.
The Cardinals went 41-28 for the rest of the season and he got the job permanently.
Shildt was named NL Manager of the Year and the Cardinals advanced to the NL Championship Series in 2019. They lost a wild-card series to the Padres after the covid-shortened 2020 season and made the NL wild-card game in 2021.
A little more than a week after the Cardinals lost that game to the Dodgers on a ninth-inning home run, Shildt was fired for what the Cardinals called “philosophical differences.”
He spent the next two years working for the Padres as a “player development consultant.” The role evolved until he spent the majority of his time with the major league team and he served as a backup coach at first and third base.
Shildt was the favorite from the start to get the management job vacated by Bob Melvin, who left in October 2023 to lead the Giants.
The Padres were coming off a very disappointing season, in which a team with the third-highest payroll in the major leagues went 82-80 and missed the playoffs.
There was discord between Melvin and the front office and a lack of cohesion within the clubhouse.
Just eight days before Shildt’s hiring was announced, the team’s beloved president, Peter Seidler, died.
Shildt came to this position with eyes wide open, having observed all facets of the organization.
Perhaps his greatest contribution – even before instilling a style of play emphasizing winning at the margins – was changing the leadership dynamic within the clubhouse.
Less than five weeks after his hiring, he had traveled the country, as well as the Caribbean, to meet individually with several players who had been with the team for several years. He listened to what they said, made suggestions and then put them together. These players credited him with fostering cohesion and empowering them to run the clubhouse in a way that was important to them.
Shildt then got players to buy into a brand of baseball that was fundamentally sound and often relied on manufacturing runs and outplaying opponents.
He handled virtually every game with an urgency rare in a sport that has 162 in a season. He was exhausted at the end of days that involved spending 12 hours at the stadium. He is single and has never stopped thinking about the players, the opponent, the best ways to win.
And, he says, his unwavering dedication to all aspects of his job came at the expense of his overall well-being.
So the man whose path to becoming a big league manager was extremely unique — considering he didn’t make it past college and got his start as a coach in high school — took the rare step of calling it a career.
It was during the final month of the season, he said, that he realized he might have to retire.
In his open letter, Shildt said: “After 34 years of devoting myself to the rigors of coaching and management, I can look back with great pleasure on achieving my two main goals: helping players make the most of their God-given abilities and become better men. And also, winning games. I move forward with a smile on my face, contentment in my soul and genuine excitement for what God has Next.”
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