What’s going nowhere fast and red all over? The Cincinnati Reds, of course!
After a 76-win season, the Reds have seemingly adopted the bold strategy of maintaining the status quo. Their offseason thus far has consisted of just three moves of any note: trading away Mat Latos, trading away Aldredo Simon and trading for Marlon Byrd. That’s two moves with an eye on rebuilding and another with an eye on winning in 2015. They net effect is to cancel each other out, putting Cincy in the unenviable position of being stuck in baseball limbo.
Looking at the make-up of the current Reds roster, going all-in for a shot at a World Series in 2015 makes a lot of sense. They have Joey Votto, one of the best hitters in baseball, coming back healthy for a full season. They’ve also got a quality rotation, but one where their best pitchers, Johnny Cueto and Mike Leake, are both set to hit free agency after the season. Catcher Devin Mesoraco is coming into his own at the age of 26, but Brandon Phillips isn’t getting any younger (or cheaper). Other franchise centerpieces Jay Bruce and Aroldis Chapman are set to hit free agency after the 2016 season.
That’s the kind of roster that has a very small window to win. So picking up Marlon Byrd to fill the hole in left field makes a lot of sense, but not coupled with the Latos and Simon trades. With the Pirates and Cardinals looking strong, the Brewers still competitive and the Cubs set to take a big step forward, it wouldn’t be easy for the Reds, but laying out some extra cash and dipping into the farm system to make some trades to improve the big league roster could have put Cincinnati on the same level as the rest of the NL Central. With their rotation, if it still had Latos, they could have been in position to make some noise in the postseason.
But they didn’t hold on to Latos. They traded him away for a quality pitching prospect in Anthony DeSclafani. Now that’s a nice move to make if you are planning to tear it all down and rebuild. That would also be a justifiable option for the Reds given the aforementioned level of competition in the NL Central. With assets like Latos, Cueto, Leake, Bruce and Chapman, Cincinnati could restock their farm system in a big hurry. Heck, they could even really go all out and trade Votto for a treasure trove of prospects while also freeing up a lot of long-term money, an important consideration for a small market team.
It doesn’t appear they are going to do that though, not with Walt Jocketty recently triggering that Marlon Byrd trade in which they surrendered a quality pitching prospect in Ben Lively. That’s the opposite of rebuilding. It also isn’t nearly enough to push the Reds forward forward enough to be a contender in the NL Central, much less change the perception that they are the favorite to finish in fifth place in the division.
In so doing, Jocketty has all but flushed the Reds’ season down the toilet before it even begins and set back their ability to rebuild by a few months. Even that assumes that Jocketty realizes the state of the franchise by the trade deadline and doesn’t continue to operate under the delusion that this current roster is good enough to be anything more than a .500 club.
