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Reds Place Hunter Greene On 15-Day Injured List

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9:10 pm: After tonight’s game, Reds manager David Bell said Greene’s MRI looked encouraging (per Goldsmith). While he added that it was too soon to offer a timeline for Greene’s return, the skipper seemed optimistic his ace could be back on the mound once his minimum 15-day stint on the IL is up.

7:51 pm: The Reds have placed All-Star starting pitcher Hunter Greene on the 15-day injured list with right elbow soreness, the team announced. The club did not make a corresponding move before tonight’s game against the Royals at Great American Ball Park.

Greene, 25, was utterly dominant in his last start, holding the Cardinals to four hits and one run over seven innings. He struck out eight and walked only one. However, he reportedly felt soreness in his elbow following the outing (per Charlie Goldsmith of the Cincinnati Enquirer). The pain temporarily went away, but it returned while he was playing catch today. President of baseball operations Nick Krall told Goldsmith that the IL stint is precautionary as of right now, and Greene will need an MRI before the team can decide on any next steps.

The young flamethrower underwent Tommy John surgery as a minor leaguer in 2018. While his elbow has remained healthy since then, Greene spent several weeks on the IL with a shoulder strain in 2022 and hip soreness in 2023. At long last, it seemed like 2024 would be the year he put everything together. His star potential has long been evident, but he was finally enjoying star-caliber results, with a 2.83 ERA through a career-high 143 1/3 innings pitched. Unfortunately, his excellent season has now been put on hold. It’s unclear how serious the issue might be, but it’s naturally worrisome when a hard-throwing pitcher with a history of UCL problems goes on the IL with elbow pain.

With Graham Ashcraft and Brandon Williamson on the 60-day IL, Cincinnati’s starting depth is already quite thin. Other starters on the 40-man roster include Connor Phillips and Lyon Richardson, but Phillips was sent to the Reds’ training complex in June amid tremendous struggles at Triple-A (10.11 ERA in 14 GS), while Richardson has recently been pitching out of the bullpen at Triple-A amid a difficult season of his own (4.58 ERA in 23 G).

Thus, the Reds will likely need to add a pitcher to the 40-man roster to start in Greene’s place on Monday. They already have an open spot to do so. Mark Sheldon of MLB.com names 23-year-old right-hander Julian Aguiar and 31-year-old right-hander Connor Overton as potential options, but he notes that the team is not planning to promote 22-year-old righty Rhett Lowder, one of the organization’s top prospects, from Double-A.

Matt McLain's Rehab By Injury Setback

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After finishing fifth in NL Rookie of the Year voting in 2023, Matt McLain’s sophomore season has thus far been a wash, as a shoulder surgery in March has kept him off the field.  McLain was set to begin a minor rehab assignment tomorrow but those plans have now been put on hold, Reds manager David Bell told the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Gordon Wittenmyer and other reporters.  McLain suffered a stress reaction in his ribcage area last week and was assigned a shutdown period of 3-7 days, which has now stretched to beyond the intended start date of the rehab assignment.

As recently as Thursday, McLain “was having some progress and feeling better,” as Bell relayed about a text message sent to him from the infielder.  The short timeframe of the initial shutdown period would seem to suggest that the rib injury isn’t as serious as it might sound, yet basically any setback at this point adds extra doubt about McLain’s ability to return to action before the 2024 season is over.  He’ll need a pretty lengthy rehab period to get fully ramped up after his layoff, so even if McLain is able to start playing relatively soon, his return to the majors looks like it’ll be in September at the earliest.  The 57-61 Reds are on the outskirts of an NL wild card race that is still relatively compact at the moment, so the team will need all the help it can get (including whatever McLain can provide) if Cincinnati has a shot of leapfrogging the field and snagging a playoff berth.

Reds Activate Emilio Pagán From 60-Day IL

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The Reds have activated Emilio Pagán from the 60-day injured list, the team announced today. To free up a spot on the active roster, Yosver Zulueta was optioned to Triple-A Louisville. The team had two open spaces on the 40-man roster, so no additional corresponding move was necessary.

Pagán, 33, signed a two-year, $16MM contract with the Reds this past offseason. Before reaching free agency, he spent the first seven seasons of his career pitching for the Mariners, Athletics, Rays, Padres, and Twins. Despite being traded four times in less than five years, Pagán put up solid numbers, pitching to a 3.71 ERA and 3.39 SIERA across 369 appearances. What’s more, although he compiled 22 wins, 32 saves, and 60 holds – and a 1.80 ERA in 11 postseason appearances – his most impressive accomplishment in that time was, perhaps, his durability. From 2017-23, he only took one trip to the injured list: a brief stint on the 10-day IL with right biceps inflammation in 2020. He pitched at least 50 innings in every full season. Only five players threw more innings in relief over those seven years: Raisel Iglesias, Héctor Neris, Miguel Castro, Adam Ottavino, and Kenley Jansen.

Unfortunately, the injury bug finally caught up to Pagán in his first season with Cincinnati. The veteran righty landed on the IL with a right lat strain in mid-June, and he was transferred to the 60-day IL later that month.

Results-wise, Pagán has had his ups and downs throughout his career. He put up a strong performance in his walk year last season, tossing 69 1/3 innings for Minnesota with a 2.99 ERA. Yet, there were warning signs that his success wasn’t entirely sustainable. His 23.8% strikeout rate was a career-low, his 5.3% HR/FB was well below his career average, and his 4.01 SIERA was more than a full run higher than his ERA. Nonetheless, he managed to secure a $16MM guarantee from the Reds. He is making an $8MM salary this season, and he has an $8MM player option for 2025.

Pagán looked solid but unspectacular over his first 22 appearances with Cincinnati. His strikeout rate climbed back up to 29.9%, but his home run rate jumped up too; he gave up four long balls in just 22 games. His 3.06 SIERA is a marked improvement from last season, but his 4.43 ERA is not. Most concerningly, his velocity is down by at least one and a half miles per hour on all three of his pitches (a four-seam fastball, a cutter, and a splitter). He has also allowed hard-hit balls (95+ mph EV) at the highest rate of his career. Then again, his SIERA, xERA, and xFIP are all significantly better than the league average, and pitch modeling systems like Stuff+ and PitchingBot agree that Pagán remains an above-average arm. Ultimately, what this tells us is that 20 1/3 innings is a pretty small sample size with which to evaluate a pitcher. With seven weeks remaining in the season, it will be interesting to see if Pagán performs well enough that he might choose to reject his player option this offseason and return to free agency.

Cincinnati has had one of the better bullpens in baseball all season, and Nick Krall bolstered that group with Jakob Junis at the trade deadline. Even so, the Reds will need all the help they can get if they want to stay alive in the NL Wild Card race; they’re currently five games back of the third Wild Card spot, with six teams standing in their way.

The Reds claimed Zulueta off of waivers from the Blue Jays on Opening Day, and he made his MLB debut with Cincinnati in late June. The 26-year-old has already been recalled and optioned several times this season, pitching to a 3.09 ERA and 3.63 SIERA over eight low-leverage appearances. He will return to the Louisville Bats, with whom he has pitched 40 1/3 innings this year with a 2.23 ERA and 3.24 FIP.

Reds Sign Casey Kelly To Minor League Deal

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The Reds have signed right-hander Casey Kelly to a minor league deal and assigned him to Triple-A Louisville, per an announcement from Louisville. Kelly, the son of Bats manager Pat Kelly, was released by the Korea Baseball Organization’s LG Twins last month.

Kelly, 34, was once a first-round pick by the Red Sox back in 2008. Included alongside Anthony Rizzo in the trade that brought Adrian Gonzalez to Boston, the righty was a consensus top-30 prospect in the sport prior to his big league debut with the Padres in 2012. Unfortunately, Kelly’s career in stateside ball didn’t take off the way his prospect status might have suggested. He struggled badly in his rookie season with a 6.21 ERA and 4.78 FIP in six starts for the Padres, and wouldn’t resurface in the big leagues until 2015. He struggled in brief cups of coffee for the Padres and Braves before eventually finding some small-sample size success with the Giants in 2018. In San Francisco, the righty pitched to a solid 3.04 ERA with a 4.22 FIP in seven appearances (three starts) that totaled 23 2/3 innings of work.

That performance wasn’t enough to earn him more playing time in the majors, but it did grab attention overseas, and Kelly signed his first contract with the KBO’s LG Twins prior to the 2019 season. Kelly turned in an excellent season in his first year overseas as he posted a sterling 2.55 ERA in 180 1/3 frames across 29 starts despite a strikeout rate of just 16.9%. Kelly remained with the club for more than half a decade and posted excellent numbers as a stalwart of the Twins’ rotation, with a 3.08 ERA in 875 2/3 innings of work entering the 2024 season.

While some reporting indicated that there was stateside interest in Kelly’s services this year, the right-hander remained with the Twins on a one year deal during the offseason. His results took a turn for the worse this year, however, and he surrendered a lackluster 4.51 ERA while striking out just 13.9% of opponents in 19 starts before he was eventually cut loose to make room on the club’s roster for newly-signed righty Elieser Hernandez. That’s opened the door for Kelly to return to stateside ball for the first time since 2018, though he’ll do so with a Reds organization where he faces some stiff competition to make it to the major league level.

Cincinnati is currently deploying a rotation of Hunter Greene, Nick Lodolo, Andrew Abbott, Nick Martinez, and Carson Spiers with Jakob Junis in a multi-inning relief role. Of that group, Junis’s 108 ERA+ is the weakest, leaving no obvious weak link to be replaced. An injury or two could open up spots with the big league club, of course, but even then Kelly would have to put himself ahead of not only fellow non-roster veterans like Justus Sheffield but also pieces already on the club’s 40-man roster like Lyon Richardson in order to crack the big league roster. Still, it’s certainly possible to imagine a strong showing from Kelly in the minors down the stretch leading to further interest in his services in affiliated ball headed into the 2025 campaign, even if he doesn’t receive an opportunity in the majors this year.

MLBTR Podcast: Fallout From The Trade Deadline And Mike Trout Injured Again

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

Reds Sign Tucker Barnhart To Minor League Deal

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The Reds have signed catcher Tucker Barnhart to a minor league deal, per Jon Heyman of The New York Post on X. Barnhart was released by the Diamondbacks almost a month ago. He will presumably report to Triple-A Louisville at some point in the coming days, though he may also report elsewhere for a tuneup after having a few weeks off.

Barnhart, now 33, returns to the organization that he has spent most of his career with. He was drafted by the Reds in 2009 and played in the big leagues with them from 2014 to 2021. He got into 744 big league contests in that time, hitting .248/.324/.371 for a wRC+ of 82. He generally received strong grades for his blocking and work with the running game. His framing grades were poor early in his career but improved significantly starting in 2019.

Since leaving Cincinnati, his offense has fallen off from what was already a fairly low baseline. He was traded to the Tigers going into 2022 and hit .221/.287/.267 that year for a 61 wRC+. Despite that lackluster performance at the plate, the Cubs signed him to a two-year deal with a $6.5MM guarantee going into 2023. He hit .202/.285/.257 with the Cubs for a wRC+ of 53 and was released by August. He joined the Diamondbacks this year, with the Cubs still on the hook for the second year of his deal, but slashed .173/.287/.210 for a 51 wRC+ and got released last month.

All told, Barnhart has hit .208/.286/.255 in 527 plate appearances since the start of 2022 but his defensive work continues to get decent grades. There’s no real cost to the Reds, as the Cubs are still paying him for the latter portions of that two-year deal, so the Reds would only have to pay him the prorated portion of the league minimum salary for any time he eventually spends on their roster.

The club has Tyler Stephenson and Luke Maile as their catching duo at the moment but lost a bit of depth recently. Austin Wynns has been the club’s third catcher for much of the year and he was recently up with the Reds while Maile was on the IL, but then Wynns himself hit the IL with a lat strain. Eric Yang was briefly added to the roster to cover for Wynns but then Maile came off the IL and Yang was outrighted.

With Wynns hurt, Stephenson and Maile are the only two healthy catchers on the 40-man. Barnhart will join Yang and P.J. Higgins as non-roster depth options who could be called upon if either Stephenson or Maile need to miss time again.

Reds Outright Eric Yang

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The Reds have sent Eric Yang outright to Triple-A Louisville, according to his transaction log on MLB.com. The team selected his contract last Monday, and the catcher made his MLB debut two days later. He was optioned back to Triple-A on Friday and, evidently, removed from the 40-man roster at some point between then and today. There was no prior indication he had been designated for assignment. Yang does not have the right to reject an outright assignment, so he will remain with Louisville.

Now 26, Yang joined the Reds organization at 21 when the club selected him in the seventh round of the 2019 draft. The UC Santa Barbara alum quickly made a strong impression, batting .290 with an 11.0% walk rate and a 135 wRC+ across 51 games of Rookie ball during his first professional season. He was not a highly-regarded prospect across the industry, but Eric Longenhagen of FanGraphs ranked him among his top 30 Reds prospects in 2020. That same year, Keith Law of The Athletic included Yang among the “others of note” below his top 20 Reds prospects, describing him as “a solid catch-and-throw guy who rarely struck out in college.”

Following the canceled minor league season in 2020, Yang began to rise up the ranks in the Reds organization. He played for the High-A Dayton Dragons in 2021, and since then, he has bounced back and forth between the Double-A Chattanooga Lookouts and Triple-A Louisville Bats. According to Charlie Goldsmith of the Cincinnati Enquirer, Yang developed a reputation in the system as a catcher who builds great relationships with his pitchers. However, he failed to make much of an impression with the bat at any of those three levels, producing a .613 OPS and 76 wRC+ across 192 minor league games from 2021-24.

Nonetheless, Yang earned his first call to the show last week as a roster replacement for veteran backstop Austin Wynns, who suffered a teres major tear in his right shoulder. Wynns himself was only on the MLB roster as a replacement for Luke Maile, who landed on the IL earlier in July with a herniated disc in his back. Thus, the Reds optioned Yang back to Triple-A when they reinstated Maile on Friday. Presumably, they decided they did not need to carry four catchers on the 40-man roster, so they must have designated Yang for assignment shortly thereafter.

Yang made it into one game during his brief stint with the Reds, pinch-hitting for Tyler Stephenson in the ninth inning of a blowout loss to the Cubs on July 31. He struck out swinging against Cubs righty Porter Hodge.

Reds Made Offer For Trevor Rogers Before Deadline

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It was a relatively quiet trade deadline in Cincinnati, with the Reds dealing away veteran righties Frankie Montas and Lucas Sims while acquiring Jakob Junis (in the Montas deal), young outfielder Joey Wiemer (also for Montas), veteran first baseman Ty France (for minor league catcher Andruw Salcedo) and pitching prospect Ovis Portes (for Sims). President of baseball ops Nick Krall and his staff generally dealt from the fringes of a contending roster and brought in some complementary veterans. Via Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer, Krall said after the deadline that he didn’t want to sell “just to put younger players on the roster” and cited the team’s run differential and looming returns (e.g. Matt McLain, Emilio Pagan) as reasons to be optimistic of a run down the stretch.

That said, it seems Krall & Co. took at least one more substantial buy-side swing. Barry Jackson and Craig Mish of the Miami Herald report that the Reds, Mets and Orioles all made offers that the Marlins liked in exchange for left-hander Trevor Rogers. The Mets’ interest in Rogers was already known, and the Orioles of course acquired the lefty in exchange for what many considered a surprisingly strong package of second baseman Connor Norby and outfielder Kyle Stowers. Jackson and Mish report that the Reds offered “one of their top pitching prospects” to the Marlins, but Baltimore ultimately topped that offer by agreeing to part with a pair of MLB-ready position players. The Mets also made a formal offer, per the report.

The level of interest in Rogers is reflective of the lack of pitching that was available on this summer’s market. Though the 26-year-old southpaw finished second in NL Rookie of the Year voting back in 2021, he’s since dealt with shoulder and biceps injuries that have greatly reduced his arsenal and his effectiveness. Rogers’ fastball has dropped about two miles per hour since that rookie showing, while his slider has flattened out and misses far fewer bats than it did in ’21.

After finishing the ’21 season with a 2.64 ERA, 28.5% strikeout rate and 8.4% walk rate in 133 innings, Rogers has combined for a 5.02 ERA, 20.3% strikeout rate and 9.6% walk rate in 234 2/3 innings. He was sitting on a 4.53 ERA with a career-low 18% strikeout rate at the time of the trade and has since been tagged for five runs through 4 1/3 innings in his lone Orioles start.

Cincinnati’s reported interest in Rogers comes at a time when in-house arms like Graham Ashcraft and Brandon Williamson are facing notable injury concerns. The former has been out since early July with an elbow strain. The latter hasn’t pitched in the big leagues this season and only has 10 2/3 minor league innings on the year. He last pitched on June 2 and has been down since due to a shoulder strain. Both are on the 60-day injured list.

The Reds aren’t lacking when it comes to high-end pitching prospects — particularly not after selecting Wake Forest righty Chase Burns with the No. 2 pick in this year’s draft. Burns isn’t eligible to be traded until the offseason, and fellow top prospect Rhett Lowder (last year’s first-round pick and a consensus top-50 prospect in the sport) surely was off limits. Prospects Connor Phillips, Lyon Richardson and Chase Petty have all struggled to varying extents in the upper minors this season, but all are still generally well-regarded even if their respective values are down from peak levels. Righty Julian Aguiar has notably upped his stock this season as well and likely isn’t too far from a big league look.

Rogers is controlled by the Orioles for another two seasons, so this isn’t a case where their deadline interest could portend offseason free-agent interest (although Cincinnati could certainly take a run at prying Rogers from the O’s this winter if the interest remains strong and/or the Orioles sour on the lefty). But it’s still a relevant footnote to keep in mind, both when Rogers is next available via trade/free agency and because it could foreshadow a Reds pursuit of some controllable arms this offseason.

Right-hander Hunter Greene and lefties Nick Lodolo and Andrew Abbott are all generally locked into long-term rotation spots. Twenty-six-year-old righty Carson Spiers is attempting to solidify his own rotation status down the stretch. Even with a decent stock of upper-level arms, the Reds could look to deepen that group via the trade or free-agent markets this winter.

Orioles Acquire Austin Slater, Livan Soto

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Today: Roch Kubatko of MASN Sports reports that the Reds will receive cash considerations in the deal, not a player to be named later.

July 30: Just before the deadline, the Orioles have picked up Austin Slater and infielder Livan Soto and cash considerations in a trade with the Reds, per announcements from both clubs. The Reds receive cash considerations or a player to be named later.

Slater is on the move for the second time this month, as Cincinnati acquired the outfielder in a deal with the Giants only three weeks ago. But the Reds recently nabbed Ty France from the Mariners, perhaps leading to Slater being squeezed out of their plans.

He has long been a solid defender with a right-handed bat that performs well with the platoon advantage. He’s hit just .226/.316/.334 against righties in his career for an 84 wRC+ but his slash against southpaws is .274/.364/.433, which leads to a 122 wRC+.

On the defensive side of things, Slater has close to 3,000 outfield innings on his ledger, with almost 1,200 of those in center field. Defensive Runs Saved and Ultimate Zone Rating consider him subpar in center but good in a corner, while Outs Above Average considers him to be strong in all three spots.

The O’s traded Austin Hays for Cristian Pache and Seranthony Domínguez but were reportedly looking for a right-handed hitting outfielder to take some of the at-bats that were available in the wake of Hays’ departure. It would appear that Slater will be the one to step up for that job.

Soto, 24, is clearly a favorite of the Baltimore front office. They claimed him off waivers from the Angels in February, but the Angels claimed him back later that month. The O’s claimed him a second time back in April but then also quickly put him back on waivers, when the Reds claimed him.

He has a small sample of major league experience, with 23 games scattered over this season and the previous two. He’s hit .280/.378/.376 in Triple-A this year for a 101 wRC+. He’s capable of playing the three infield spots to the left of first base and even has a small amount of center field experience. He can still be optioned for the rest of this year and an additional season as well.

C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic first reported on X that Slater was going to the O’s. Mark Sheldon of MLB.com relayed Soto’s inclusion on X. Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer first relayed the cash on X.

Reds To Acquire Davis Wendzel From Rangers

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The Rangers traded infielder Davis Wendzel to the Reds for cash considerations, reports Jeff Wilson of Rangers Today (X link). The infielder had been designated for assignment by the Rangers yesterday.

Wendzel, 27, was selected with the 41st overall pick back in 2019. As a prospect, he was considered to have a strong hit tool but questionable power. Moving up to the Triple-A Pacific Coast League seemed to help him put balls over the fence. In 2022, he got into 85 games in that league and hit 17 home runs. Last year, another 124 games led to another 30 homers.

This year, he finally got up to the majors but didn’t do much in his first taste of the show, with a line of .128/.163/.234 through his first 49 plate appearances. But he also added another six home runs in 34 more Triple-A contests this year.

Though he got squeezed off the roster in Texas, it’s understandable why the Reds were interested. Between last year and this year, he has 36 homers in 158 Triple-A contests while also drawing walks at a 13.3% clip. That’s in the super-charged offensive environment of the PCL but his .248/.366/.480 batting line still leads to an above-average 105 wRC+.

Since Wendzel has played all four infield spots in his career, he has various paths to get into the lineup. But since he has a full slate of options, he also might find himself serving in a depth role until he’s needed.

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