The Reds have flipped the script on their status as a small-market rebuilding team in the last two offseasons, trading prospects for major-league help in the short term, and even signing big-ticket free agents to long-term deals, all in an attempt to contend sooner than the standard-issue rebuilding would have achieved. It didn’t work last year, as the team went 75-87 — an improvement of eight wins over the previous season but only enough to get them from last place in the NL Central to fourth, and they were still outscored on the season by 10 runs. They’ve doubled down on the approach since then, trading their best prospect, Taylor Trammell, in the summer after trying and failing to change his swing, and now signing four major-league free agents (one from NPB) this winter. It still doesn’t seem like it’ll be enough; this team is better, but they don’t look like they’re 14 wins better — that would put them at 89-73, the record of the second wild-card winner in the NL in 2019, and thus is probably the price of admission to the playoffs.
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The latest signing is Nick Castellanos, a very good player signed to a reasonable deal, but someone the Reds just didn’t need. Castellanos took a while to blossom but has developed into a solid, league-average regular in a corner outfield spot, worth 5.7 WAR across the last two seasons, which rather understates the value of his bat because he’s been so bad defensively (-7 Outs Above Average, ranking 78th out of 92 outfielders last year). If you could DH him — and that might be an option in the National League before too long — you would have a 3+ WAR player, easily. The Reds, however, didn’t need another corner outfielder; Castellanos is marginally better than their in-house options, but they had just signed Shogo Akiyama as a free agent, and already had Aristides Aquino floating around off a 1-WAR, 19-homer rookie season that probably wasn’t going to be repeated.
They also added Mike Moustakas, Akiyama and Wade Miley, although only Miley seems like he provides even the chance of a significant upgrade over the player he’s replacing. The addition of Moustakas was outright puzzling, as he just blocks Nick Senzel, the No. 2 pick in the 2016 draft — and at one point the Reds’ top prospect — from returning to the infield and to a position (second base) where he’d probably be an above-average to plus defender. Senzel is now penciled in as the starting center fielder, but he was below-average there on defense in 800 innings last year, and he’s had a hard time staying healthy. And Moustakas was a very poor fit for the Reds’ offense; they were 12th in the NL last year in on-base percentage, and that’s Moustakas’ main weakness as a hitter, with just two seasons in seven where he’s posted an OBP of .320 or better. Miley is probably a win or so better than the Reds’ fifth starters from last year, maybe more if he stays healthy all year; if he makes, say, 50 starts over the two years of his contract, he’ll be a huge bargain at $15 million total.
The guys they’ve traded have largely thrived with their new organizations, which is damning to the Reds’ process both in deciding when to trade prospects and, to some extent, how they developed these players. Trammell was a top-20 prospect in the game going into 2019, but the Reds, who have joined the list of organizations trying to optimize the launch angles of many or most of their prospects, tried to alter his swing and instead ruined his season and much of his trade value; he hit .236/.349/.336 in Double A before the team traded him to San Diego in a three-team deal that landed them Trevor Bauer. Trammell, meanwhile, showed more power after going to San Diego, hitting four homers in a month and then hitting three more homers in the Double-A playoffs, although it came at the cost of more strikeouts in a small sample.
Worse, by far, have been the results of their big trade with the Dodgers from the previous winter. The two prospects they gave up have both improved substantially since they left, and both are likely to appear on my top 100 list next month. Josiah Gray has already emerged as a potential No. 2 starter, with a fastball that has dominated minor-league hitters and a slider that projects to plus; he’s really just a half-grade or so on his changeup away from being the next guy in the Walker Buehler-Dustin May Dodger pitching prospect relay. Shortstop Jeter Downs led the California League in doubles and in extra-base hits at age 20, while also finishing 10th in steals and posting walk and strikeout rates better than the league averages. He may not stay at short in the long term, but would probably be a plus defender at second or third.
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That’s two premium prospects the Reds gave up to get one year each of Alex Wood, who threw 35 innings around injuries and was worth less than replacement level; and Yasiel Puig, who posted a .302 OBP for the Reds before they traded him to Cleveland in July. This was a bad trade at the time, and it only looks worse in hindsight; with the trade of Trammell, the Reds’ system now lacks the kind of prospects they could use to go add a pitcher or perhaps a one-year improvement at catcher.
Trading three of your top five or so prospects for major-league help is justifiable if it helps result in more wins, especially if those wins get you into contention. But that didn’t happen for the Reds last year, and I don’t think it’s the case for this year, either. Their biggest holes were behind the plate and on the mound, and they haven’t addressed the former at all, while only slightly addressing the latter. Tanner Roark was traded just before the deadline last year; Anthony Desclafani is capable but has enough trouble with lefties that he’s flawed as a starter. The Reds gave $32 million a year to Moustakas and Castellanos; Zack Wheeler, who would have far more directly addressed an actual need here, got $23.5 million a year from the Phillies, while Hyun-Jin Ryu got $20 million a year. Instead of focusing on their pitching weaknesses, they’ve added solid position players who only marginally improved the team and, in one case, re-blocked a top young player who finally had a path to regular playing time at a position he plays well. There are certainly scenarios here where this works for the Reds — a few career years, such as Bauer repeating his one above-average season from 2018, would probably get them into the upper 80s in wins. The current over/under line for the Reds seems to be around 84 wins, and I wouldn’t take the over given their roster right now — or predict them to make the playoffs over two of the three teams that finished ahead of them in the NL Central in 2019.
(Photo of Reds president and director of operations Dick Williams and Castellanos: John Minchillo/AP Photo)
