The Reds and catcher Tucker Barnhart have discussed the possibility of him returning to Cincinnati, according to Mark Sheldon of MLB.com.
Barnhart, of course, has spent the vast majority of his career in the Reds’ organization, having been drafted by them back in 2009. He made it to the big leagues in 2014 and stayed with the team through the end of the 2021 campaign. The club had a $7.75MM club option to keep him around for 2022 but flipped him to the Tigers instead, the lone season he’s spent in a different organization so far.
Sheldon notes that Barnhart, who turns 32 in January, is still looking for a job as a primary catcher, which would likely mean that returning to the Reds would only happen if he fails to find that full-time job he’s looking for. The Reds have Tyler Stephenson atop their depth chart, though he only played 50 games in 2022 due to various injuries, including a concussion, a broken thumb and a broken clavicle. The depth options that the club used in Stephenson’s absence have all since been jettisoned from the roster, meaning they will have to find a backup and some depth, either from their own system or via external additions. That makes their interest in Barnhart fairly sensible.
However, from Barnhart’s point of view, it makes sense that he would look for a starting job before settling for a backup role. His numbers mostly went in the wrong direction in 2022, but he has a long track record that combines quality glovework with a bat just a bit below league average. His career batting line of .221/.287/.267 amounts to a wRC+ of 80. That means he’s been 20% below league average overall but catchers generally hit at a lower level than the rest of the league. The combined batting line for all catchers in 2022 was .226/.295/.367 for a wRC+ of 89. On the other side of his game, Defensive Runs Saved has given Barnhart a 14 in his career. FanGraphs’ framing metric has given him a negative number overall but thinks he’s improved and has been much kinder over the past four seasons.
The free agent market contains a few names above Barnhart, such as Willson Contreras and Christian Vázquez. But then there’s a tier of flawed but passable options, including Omar Narvaez, Gary Sánchez, Austin Hedges, Barnhart and others. The trade market could feature Sean Murphy as well as the Toronto trio of Danny Jansen, Alejandro Kirk and Gabriel Moreno.
There are various teams who are either known to be looking for catching help or are sensible fits for it, including the Cardinals, Astros, Giants, Tigers, Cubs, Brewers, Twins, Diamondbacks, Guardians and more. Barnhart and his representatives will likely be reaching out to those clubs and assessing their interest first, but it seems like he could circle back to the Reds as a fallback option if that search doesn’t pan out.
Tyler Stephenson is Devin Mesoraco 2.0. There is no way he will ever be healthy enough to be a full time starting catcher in MLB.
Just another bang up trade job by Avila
They gave up a guy that OPS’d under .700 in AA in 2022. I think it was a good deal for Detroit.
Barnhardt ops was .554 this year, .696 in previous aa.
Stopgap starting C candidate for WSox as well who need professional defense there. They can eat half of Grandal’s salary in a cash dump trade.
I seriously doubt that eating half of Grandal salary would be enough for anyone to take him. Talking about seriously flawed players – he’s the poster boy.
No chance they get him, I think another team will be willing to pay him a little more than the Reds would be comfortable with.
Makes a lot of sense. I was expecting it actually.
The problem will be the contract and how much or rather, how little he will take.
Exciting times in Cincy.
He was highly highly overrated. His performance in Detroit stunk.
He’s far from being a quality catcher
Sign Tucker and Casali. Move Stephenson to first base. India to LF.
India to LF for what reason? To move Votto to 2B???
India is not moving anywhere, nor should he.
Barnhart and Casali would be a good combo. Votto and Stephenson can man 1B and DH until Votto retires, probably after next year.
Concussions are nothing to sneeze at. They need to be proactive in that so they don’t lose that talented player in Stephenson.
India is a bad defender and will be even worse next year when they can’t over shift. I’ve been advocating moving him to LF as well, esp considering the glut of infielders coming up
That middle infield is going to be busting at the seams with talent over the next 3 years.
It’s not India’s fault he got moved off 3B, we had Suarez and Moustakas blocking him. Let him play somewhere on the field where his glove & arm can play up.
Just posted this very thing just now before I saw your post. Agreed 100%.
India to LF absolutely. But no chance Stephenson should move out from behind the plate.
India shouldn’t move necessarily either. All these so called prospect infielders have yet to prove anything in MLB, in fact, most are far from it, and none have been touted as great defenders. The one who was, Barrero has proven not to live up to the billing on routine plays and can’t swing the bat at all.
Reds could make some moves and create some buzz if they chose too. Sign Barnhart, bellinger and Wil Myers. Lorenzen and clevinger. Clevinger may be a tuff sign but rest should consider cincy. This would create a lot of buzz. Add 25/30 mil in payroll and they’d still be below that 120 mil mark so they’d still be profitable.
Some young pitchers come around and they could compete in central. If not, sell all your bounce back guys off at deadline like drury.
Reds would still be profitable if they had the Mets payroll. And all of those guys are retreads, not sure how much buzz being back Mikey Biceps would create
Better than Larry, Curly and Moe. Face it, they can only afford retreads or folks trying to make a comeback. The curse of a small market club.
All the free agent talk is centered around Yankees, Mets, Braves, Dodgers, Red Sox after all. You know why and it is the elephant in the room MLB refuses to fix.
Twins signed Correa and they’re “small market”. St Louis isn’t that much bigger than Cincy and they spend freely. Small market is BS, only teams willing to spend vs teams banking money
Year after year after year. Same 3-5 teams in on conversation about the elite free agents. So boring. If baseball was not such a great game I would stopped watching long ago.
Nothing will change until they join all of the teams into a national tv contract, and eliminate the local tv deals. That way they all will be working with essentially the same revenue. Stadium revenue will differ, but not enough to effect competitiveness of the teams.
Only someone from a large market would claim it is BS. You will notice Correa is a free agent again so that is not the best example.
Also that is just one large contract which is about all the small markets can handle.
Clevinger isn’t happening. The White Sox decided to overpay for one year.
Barnhart did a serviceable job in Detroit. His offense, including his attempt to switch hit again, was abysmal. If Detroit brings him back, I’m sure Haase gets more than 50% of the playing time. Barnhart worked well with the young pitchers, but on a team that didn’t hit, his not hitting stood out.
Tucker would be a nice pick up for the Reds.
IMHO Stephenson should be at 1B and DH 50/50 with Joey Votto. Stephenson is too good a hitter to be taking the punishment of a catcher. Already concussion protocol and broken collar bone etc. I know no guarantees he will not get hurt at 1B but much less likely. Further he is I think 6’4″ I think. Much better suited for 1B. I think it would help Votto’s hitting as well in his last year to 50% DH. Go ahead and sign Tucker for main catcher and get a backup. I know the Reds will not do this but if I am the GM I would do it in a heartbeat.
He is a good hitting catcher and maybe an average hitting 1B. I’d still rather have a good hitting catcher, knowing the risk of future concussions. He switched his mask to one that is designed to reduce the risk of concussions, so I think he’ll be fine. If he does get another one, especially early to mid season, then I’d DH / 1B him.
If the Reds are even remotely considering a move of Stephenson to first base after Votto leaves, then they need to be really aggressive and go after one of the three excellent young catchers the Blue Jays have. The last thing they’ll want to do is have a journeyman catcher hitting .217 behind the plate in ’24 and ’25 when the future arrives from the farm, and they have the minor league talent to get it done..
I am expecting the Reds to sign some guys early next year who are looking to have a good year and go back in the market next off season.
Bellinger probably will still be there. I actually think DeGrom will too because his expectations are ridiculous not staying on the mound but he is WAY out of their price range. But I do expect them to bring in a veteran starting pitcher.
They might get something out of them before next trade deadline like Pham and Drury after all.
This is where we are, Reds fans.