Caption: Jonathan India makes a play

By Ryan Harless

Ryan Harless is a fourth-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and Professional Wrestling are his primary interests but he is also interested in golf, hockey, and football

Reposted: March 10, 2024

The 2024 Major League Baseball season is underway which means it is time for me to run through all of the moves my Cincinnati Reds made and decide whether or not I think they had a productive offseason.

First and foremost, the Reds did indeed make moves this offseason which is more than can be said about a lot of the recent off-season’s. Reds fans like myself had grown accustomed to quiet winter months with the only noise coming when Cincinnati lost a young star in free agency because they were afraid to spend money.

The elephant in the room for me is the fact that my favorite baseball player of all time, Joey Votto, is no longer a Cincinnati Red. That makes me want to puke. I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that Votto gave his entire Hall of Fame caliber career to this team, and they never got him to a single World Series and rarely even looked like they cared to.

I still am holding out hope that Votto will sign back with the Reds in a coaching capacity because I can’t fathom seeing him play baseball in any other jersey.

Now onto the baseball.

Nick Senzel elected for free agency and found a home with the Washington Nationals. I think this was needed for both sides. Senzel never was able to live up to his potential in Cincinnati due in part to his proclivity to injury. I hope he can find his footing with the Nationals and carve out a path for himself.

On the first of December, Cincinnati picked up a pair of good relief arms in Emilio Pagan and Nick Martinez. Pagan has made a name for himself as a reliable bullpen arm who averages more than one punchout per inning pitched. Martinez started his career as a starter but has found more success recently coming out in relief. Although he has stated that he would prefer to start, I don’t see that as a realistic possibility on this Reds team.

I like the thought of bringing in better bullpen guys as in 2023, once the starter was out of the game it felt like a grab bag of what happens next. I do think Cincinnati is overpaying for Martinez who is slated to make $14 million this year. For a guy with a career ERA over 4.00 and a team who has been adamant about not spending money, this is an odd deal.

Just 10 days after the signing of Pagan and Martinez, the Reds were in the news again. This time it was the signing of 30-year-old third baseman Jeimer Candelario. Candelario got a pretty penny inking a three-year contract worth $45 million.

I’m going to be entirely honest. I don’t like this deal whatsoever. The Reds have a PLETHORA of young homegrown infielders. This entire offseason we were wondering if Jonathan India would get traded as they didn’t look to have room for him. The Reds drafted India AS A THIRD BASEMAN!! I don’t know why we needed to drop $15 million a year on someone who has such similar stats and projections to India when we already have him on the team.

The Reds also re-signed free agent pitcher Buck Farmer for $2.25 million. Yet another arm who can reliably come out of the pen in most situations.