TORONTO – The last time Eugenio Suárez stood in this room talking to reporters, it was late October at the doorstep of the World Series.
Now he’s just trying to figure out what comes next in a 13-year career filled with home runs, good vibes (only), and, more recently, six months of perhaps the most disappointing season of his career both personally and from a team standpoint.
“It wasn’t the year that I wanted it to be,” said the veteran slugger, who signed with the high-expectation Cincinnati Reds as a free agent less than four years after they traded him as part of a youth-centric rebuilding process.
Suárez wasn’t the only part of what went wrong in 2026 for a team that had major breakdowns in every area of the game.
But he was a symbol for it
all if only because he was the high-profile acquisition of the offseason and the team’s highest-paid player.
“The ‘whys’ you never know in this game,” he said.
Coming off a 49-homer season that finished with the Seattle Mariners in Game 7 of the ALCS in Toronto, Suárez got off to a slow start, then got hurt, then produced too little too late to help a last-place team.
He finished strong. “I’m very happy where I am right now,” Suárez said.
But as the Reds finished their worst season since they tanked in 2022 – and most disappointing season in decades relative to expectations – one of their most popular players in the clubhouse approaches one of the biggest crossroads of his career.
Suárez, who hit 15 of his 26 home runs in the 58 games he played after the All-Star break (with an .823 OPS), has a $15 million mutual option for 2027 on the contract that paid him $15 million this season.
Unless the Reds suddenly decide to reallocate some of the $23 million they once thought they’d commit to Brady Singer in a qualifying offer, Suárez will become a 35-year-old free agent during a winter fraught with the specter of a Dec. 1 labor lockout and potentially lengthy shutdown.
If anything, the Reds made clear their intentions last month when Suárez was included among a number of players the club put on outright waivers, to give him a shot to finish with a contender and to clear a spot to give some prospects playing time with an eye toward next year.
“I don’t know what’s next,” said Suárez, who has hit 215 of his 351 home runs as a Red over eight seasons. “I’m just grateful for everything Cincinnati gave to me. It’s one of those years that I learned − I learned how to be who I am and never change my game.
“This game is tough on us. But I am tougher than this game,” added Suárez, whose oblique injury in the first half limited him to the fewest number of games (125) for any full season of his big-league career. “My mentality was to come here with a smile, be happy, be a good teammate and try to be my best on the field.”
He was clear again about his desire to return to Cincinnati next year, as he spoke before the Reds’ final game of the season, Sunday (Sept. 27) in Toronto.
“You always want to be back. I’m not going to change my thoughts on that,” he said. “Obviously, they know that I want to be back. But we never know. I just let them do their job, and I’m ready to come back if they give me the opportunity to be back.”
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Failed reunion with Reds leaves Eugenio Suárez mulling what comes next
