The Reds have added $11MM to their payroll within the past two days. They signed outfielder Austin Hays to a one-year deal with a mutual option and assumed $6MM of the $12MM remaining on Taylor Rogers’ contract. They also inked veteran southpaw Wade Miley to a minor league deal that’d come with a $2.5MM base salary if he breaks camp.
It seems that’ll settle the roster going into Spring Training. President of baseball operations Nick Krall tells Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer that the Reds are “probably in a spot where this is (the) team going to camp.” Krall didn’t firmly shut the door on making any other moves — no front office head would — but it appears the Reds are content to take this group into Spring Training.
Earlier this evening, Jon Heyman of the New York Post floated the Reds as a potential dark horse fit for Pete Alonso. Cincinnati’s first base mix is a question after Jeimer Candelario and Christian Encarnacion-Strand struggled last season. Encarnacion-Strand was limited to 29 games before undergoing season-ending wrist surgery. While Alonso would unquestionably raise the floor, it’s hard to see a scenario in which Cincinnati would meet his asking price.
Alonso is reportedly open to a short-term deal with opt-outs after the market didn’t present the longer term he was seeking. That’ll only increase the average annual value, though, which is probably a non-starter for Cincinnati. Shortly after acquiring Gavin Lux from the Dodgers, Krall said the Reds didn’t have “a ton” of payroll space. Their subsequent local TV deal with Main Street Sports (the rebranded Diamond Sports Group) created some spending room for the Hays and Rogers investments. Offering $25MM+ annually to lure Alonso to Cincinnati would be on a completely different level.
RosterResource calculates the Reds’ payroll around $115MM. They finished last season in the $100MM range. According to Cot’s Contracts, Cincinnati’s franchise-record Opening Day payroll was around $127MM back in 2019.
So the Reds won’t jump in on Alonso? Stunning. I wonder whether the Mets still want to? If so, it would still be bidding against themselves.
The normally crazy-spending Mets have played this perfectly thus far.
Pete 3 years 61m! 1 more than Walker!
Sp this proves Jon Heyman was full of bovine excrement, as we all suspected.
Elly De La Cruz is a force of nature. In a year or two, the Reds could have a dominant rotation with Greene, Lowder, Burns and Petty. If McLain, CES and Stephenson can be healthy, Steer stays decent, this is a very good team. Fortunately for Cubs and Brewers fans, the owner is too cheap to add the missing pieces. For a wealthy owner ready to spend, this is a great team to build around. I do think Noelvi is toast though.
Reds should trade for Luis Robert, makes way too much sense. They need a righty bat in OF and maybe Elly can spark something in Robert who would mash in that home park. Great young starting pitching, Robert and maybe another piece and that team could be REALLY good.
Not at the reported price they were asking for. Sorry.
I’m glad Nick Krall held firm not giving away the farm system for Chicago White Sox Luis Roberts Jr.. He’s injury prone along with a large salary and Chicago White Sox are trying to get rid of him too. I can’t stand all these CWS trolls trying to sway/sucker Reds fans and Nick Krall in acquiring him and paying dearly with excellent young pitching prospects of the Reds. No thank you!!
I totally agree. Roberts has only had one good season (minors included) as far as power. He is an injury waiting to happen. They did far better with Hayes and keeping their young players.
The wealth of the owner doesn’t matter, as they don’t spend out of their own pockets (except maybe Cohen with the Mets). Cincinnati is just a relatively small baseball market that hasn’t had much recent success. At least they do spend enough compared to other small markets to where you can’t really accuse the owner of pocketing too much of the profits like with the Pirates and the Athletics.
Start the off season grade articles. First up Reds.
How do you feel they did?
Is the pen set? All positions filled? If so I will give them a C. They did what was needed. Hays is a fine outfielder. Even more so vs LHP. I liked the reliever they traded to NYY so not crazy about that trade. Lux is interesting but small markets need those draft picks. But getting a starting pitcher for India I think they really won that trade.
No small market has ever spent more than 130m. So 115m pretty solid. If they win they will have the attendance and room to add at deadline. New manager is winning move. Acceptable alright off season. They made a effort.
>spending $115 million is solid
Cool opinion but how much they make last year? Keep playing fantasy GM but you should be mentioning how much they made next to how much they spent
How much they made is completely irrelevant so it would be foolish to mention.
I think it’s foolish not to mention but for the first time in your post history, you’re speaking like a GM. Honestly it’s fans like you who keep baseball the way it is. All fans should be keeping track of this and holding teams accountable. Fans like you have ruined the sport
No small market has spent over 130. For reds 127. Is it because they can’t? Or because they won’t? It doesn’t matter. All that matters is they don’t.
I will take all the credit for ruining baseball.
Major League Baseball (MLB) has announced that the Los Angeles Dodgers’ World Series win over the New York Yankees generated record domestic and international viewership, merchandise sales, attendances and social media engagement.
Confirmed:
Five-game series drew more than 30 million viewers across North America and Asia
This year’s Fall Classic was the most-watched World Series ever in Japan with an average of 12.1 million viewers
Sales of Dodgers’ title-winning merchandise set a record for the first 24 hours following any championship clinch, across all sports, according to MLB ecommerce partner Fanatics
On social media, the World Series delivered the most engagements and views of any six-day stretch in MLB history
Dodgers-Yankees series delivered a 176 per cent increase in engagements and 209 per cent surge in video views compared to 2023 World Series
Of the 210 million views on MLB’s YouTube 61 per cent were attributed to international viewers, marking a 210 per cent increase
2024 World Series saw a total attendance of 253,104 over five games
Average attendance was 50,621 per game – the highest since 2003
What’s the bottomline? I can tell you know nothing about economics by the way you keep saying profits have nothing to do with expenses. Your takes are always the worst on this site. You have no basis in reality. Keep arguing for billionaires though and I’m sure you’ll make sense eventually. The dodgers and Yankees brought those numbers, not the reds silly
You’re irrelevant! Just kidding I completely agree just wanted to say that.
You sound like a child and should feel embarrassment.
You can’t tell anything. You’re fortunate you can read and type. I didn’t say anything about economics so it’s impossible for anyone to determine what I know about it.
1 more time. Reds max spent is 127m. No small market ever spent drastically more. I think Cleveland went to 130 or so before. None of them spend. That’s all that matters. Can’t or won’t is irrelevant! Thats for Wade. What matters is they don’t. No need to be a economic expert to figure that out.
I’d figure ownership is making 25 to 50 million a year. A reasonable amount on a over a billion dollars franchise.
The comment format sucks. Dream GM is right. Murray is a child. I can’t even be a jerk right with the odd format. Reply to one guy and it shows up under the next.
@WadeBoggsWildRide can always do this.
We got enough jerks already but I won’t stop you. Some would call me one. I prefer smart as. I think I use a more sophisticated snarky sarcasm method than a jerk.
No team reveals all of their financial information, nor should they. While we can get ballpark figures (pun intended) on their various sources of revenue, we have no idea what all of their expenses entail.
Aside from the MLB payroll, they also have to pay the minor leaguers, the various managers, coaches, and scouts, the administrative staff, upper management, and all other employees; as well as buying equipment, developing and ordering merch, advertising, ballpark maintenance (including their minor league parks), making any debt payments, etc.
Pensions ouch. Insurance ouch. Traveling. Eating. Lodging. Hard to name them all. You did well. Yeah they aren’t just pocketing hundreds of millions. Oh taxes another painful one.
“Under the new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) negotiated in 2022, each MLB team pools 48 per cent of local revenues with the total amount split equally between all 30 teams. This results in each team taking in 3.3 per cent of the total—an estimated $110 million USD, if not more. Teams also receive a share of national revenues, totalling around $90 million USD per team.”
Do the reds really receive this much?
I read something that said each team took in over $375 million last year. That can’t be true. There’s no way that the reds cry poor when taking in this much money. Can someone provide me with links to how much the reds made in 2024?
I doubt that “each team” figure is really each team, but an average of 30 teams. Obviously the large markets make that number higher. AlsI, player salaries aren’t the only expense a team have, and staff salaries are another set of salaries. The more special assistants a team has, that number goes up. Barry Larkin and Eric Davis aren’t working on the cheap.
That being said, the article stated what they have spent before. We know they lost money on the RSN fiasco, down from the reported 60 million, but still.
India was shipped out when he criticized management (and suggested Alonso by the way) but they can’t ship out the fans for criticizing them.
It’s funny, when Marge was the owner, they were top 5-10 in payroll. She might have thought all scouts do is watch ballgames, but she paid the players. That was before the RSN fiasco was in full bore but still happened.
Draw your own conclusions. There is a reason I say #SelltheteamBob.
You knew when they were doing minor league deals and handing out spring training invites, that was it.
By March 15th they’ll be 10 NRI’s in training camp that weren’t there on March 1st