Like many September call-ups, Christian Villanueva’s road to Monday’s big league debut was littered with detours, speed bumps and all-out gridlock.

A knee operation cut short his first season shortly after signing with the Rangers in 2009. He was buried behind Kris Bryant in the Cubs’ system when he fashioned his first 20-homer campaign in 2015. A fractured fibula wiped away the encore before it got started, sending Villanueva to free agency without a single big league plate appearance to show for his first seven years in pro baseball.

Needless to say, the 26-year-old third baseman — the Padres’ starting third baseman on Monday night — was anticipating sharing an emotional first night in the majors with the family who supported him throughout his journey to the big leagues, the final push coming via the minor league deal he signed with the Padres in December.

His wife and 5-month-old son, Christian Jr., joined him on the flight from El Paso. More family, including his mother, hoped to arrive from Guadalajara, Mexico, in time for Monday’s first pitch.


An older brother, Eduardo, will not be among them. He died unexpectedly due to a “problem with his lungs” – at 29 years young – in spring training as Villanueva prepared to push on with his third organization.

“He and God are the reasons I’m here,” Villanueva, speaking through an interpreter, said in Petco Park’s home clubhouse. “He was the family member who most pushed me. He wanted to see this, too. It was a dream for him, too. That was one of the big motivators.

“I wanted to reach this goal and do it for him.”

Villanueva’s perseverance continued after rejoining the organization following his brother’s sudden passing.


After a shoulder injury sent him to El Paso’s disabled list for the first month of the season, bagged a five-hit game en route to Pacific Coast League player of the week honors in mid-May. He added a second nod from the PCL two months later after homering twice in back-to-back games to close June. By season’s end Villanueva was sitting on a second 20-homer season, 86 RBIs, a .296/.369/.528 batting line and exactly zero phone calls from the big league team.

“I was just focused on playing,” Villanueva said. “I was focused on winning a championship down there, but obviously it was always dream to be called up to the big leagues.”

The same as it was in Chicago.

Of course, the path to the majors was complicated when the Cubs drafted Bryant with the second pick in 2013 nearly a year after acquiring Villanueva and Kyle Hendricks from the Rangers for Ryan Dempster.


Villanueva hit 19 home runs at Double-A Tennessee that first year in the Cubs system. He moved backwards from Triple-A Iowa back to Tennessee as Bryant rose as Minor League Baseball’s Player of the Year in 2014. He hit 18 of his 20 homers in Iowa in 2015 when Bryant was the NL Rookie of the Year and was on the shelf throughout Bryant’s MVP campaign last year.

“I just always tried to be myself and play my game,” Villanueva said, “and know that other teams were out there seeing me.”

Led by General Manager A.J. Preller, the rebuilding Padres were among those teams. Familiar with Preller from their days with the Rangers, Villanueva promptly signed a minor league with San Diego after electing free agency in December.

Nine months later, El Paso manager Rod Barajas delivered the news that Villanueva had waited so long for.


He was going to be a major leaguer.

Finally.

“It’s a dream come true,” Villanueva said before going 0-for-3 with a strikeout in his big league debut. “It’s really amazing. After a tough career – I had some bumps, some injuries throughout my career so far – it’s really amazing to be here.”


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jeff.sanders@sduniontribune.com; Twitter: @sdutSanders