For $1 million plus some relative pocket change he could earn by surpassing certain playing-time thresholds, the Padres felt what Jurickson Profar would bring was well worth it.

He would be good enough to fill their hole in left field, maybe just until they signed or traded for someone else. And he would provide passion, intensity and a presence. That is what they really valued.

He is close with Fernando Tatis Jr. and has enough tenure to have his words mean something to other veterans. He plays hard and with an edge. On the day he signed in February, Jake Cronenworth was among those who called Profar a “glue guy.”

Profar came up in the Rangers organization learning from Adrian Beltre, Ian Kinsler and Nelson Cruz.

Leadership, Profar said, “that’s the most important thing. It’s more important than the stats.”

But there he was going into Thursday’s game, batting .323 (highest in the major leagues) and with a .420 on-base percentage (tops in the National League) and 47 RBIs (most on the team).

He was batting .522 in close-and-late situations, .364 with runners in scoring position and 1.000 (3-for-3) with the bases loaded. He has six game-winning RBIs, 11 go-ahead RBIs and five game-tying RBIs.

It is pretty scary to imagine how much the Padres would be struggling without him.

What has Profar rankled is how much they are struggling anyway.

“We need to get better,” he said. “We have to. We have a team that should be way better. The guys need to step it up.”

Profar spoke in a pair of conversations over the final two days of the Padres’ 1-5 road trip, which concluded Wednesday.

Rest assured, if Profar is saying these things to a reporter, he has said them to teammates.

He cares about the Padres. His best seasons, even before his career year this season, have come in San Diego.

He doesn’t want this opportunity to slip away. Not another one.

He wasn’t around for the failure of 2023. Not really. He arrived in September, and the Padres went 16-5 from then to the end of the season.

“They know what happened last year,” he said. “We can’t have that again. … ‘Oh, it’s early, we have time.’ Until you don’t have any more time.”

Profar believes the Padres possess many hallmarks of a good team. And that forms the basis of his frustration.

“I feel like the efforts that we have given, we have given a lot, but we are not getting wins right now,” he said. “But we also created it. We just need to focus to be better. … We always find a way to lose games. We’re doing a lot of good things, but still we find ways to lose games. I’m not happy with it.

“We just need to focus on ourselves and get better in a lot of things. I don’t think little things like baserunning make us lose. Sometimes you’re gonna make outs. There’s more important things that we don’t do, and we lose games because of that. … Some guys are not swinging the bat like they are capable of. And pitching. Those are things we need to get better at.”

Playing the Phillies offered a chance to compare and contrast. Entering the series, the Padres were not that far behind the Phillies in many offensive categories. Yet they were 12 games behind them in standings. A couple big difference were in the Phillies’ much better clutch hitting and much higher run total.

“Yes,” Profar said. “We should be much better.”

It was pointed out to Profar that the Padres are challenged by Manny Machado not having yet produced in the manner he has virtually his entire career. The Phillies’ deep lineup also allowed for comparison on that topic.

“Of course,” Profar said. “But I feel like he’s pretty close. He’s working hard every day on his stuff, and he’s close. But at the same time, we can do things to win games. We do things to win games. We’re going to be way better when he starts hitting better. But a team like Philadelphia, there’s a lot of good players that hit. It’s not only Bryce Harper. We have enough good players. … We don’t have to rely on him. He’s a great player. He’s Manny Machado. He’s going to swing the bat better. But other players — me — we need to hit too.”

Speaking Wednesday morning, Profar went to great lengths to not single out the pitching staff. He kept alluding to needing to hit better.

But in the aftermath of a game in which the bullpen could not entirely bridge the gap to the ninth inning and Robert Suarez was called on for a seventh time this season to try to close out a game by working more than one inning, the frustration was evident.

“Obviously, something like that is going to happen because we use him for four or five outs,” Profar said of Suarez blowing his first save that night. “So we need to get better and help him out. We did a lot to win the game. We should have won the game. But we didn’t. We have up home runs. And then we asked (Suarez) to come in in the eighth. He did it many times already. A lot. … So we just have to play better. That’s the bottom line.”