Over the final 54 games in which he played during the 2024 season, Santiago Espinal hit .311/.361/.446 with 55 hits for the Cincinnati Reds. The utility infielder, never a huge source of offense, chipped
in enough to be counted on in 2025 as a pretty valuable depth piece on the roster.
At least, that was the hope. The reality was that he was more or less an abject disaster with the bat (.243/.292/.282 in 328 PA) and even his defense began to slip. After the Reds made the move at the trade deadline to acquire 3B Ke’Bryan Hayes from Pittsburgh to up the defensive acumen on the dirt, Espinal got just 32 PA before season’s end, starting only 8 times (none of which came in September).
Espinal was set to be arbitration eligible for the third and final time this winter, with estimates suggesting he’d take home a $2.9 million salary for 2026. I say ‘was’ here, however, because the Reds chose to outright Espinal off the roster and down to AAA Louisville on Friday afternoon, removing him from the 40-man roster altogether.
As MLB.com’s Mark Sheldon noted on Bluesky, Espinal has enough service time to reject the AAA assignment and become a free agent should he so choose, though either way he’s now off the roster.
The 2025 MLB season could well end tonight if the Toronto Blue Jays dispatch the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 6 of the World Series, and that would start the administrative clock on all offseason transactions. That includes returning guys on the 60-day IL to the 40-man roster, and the Reds have the likes of Rhett Lowder, Brandon Williamson, Julian Aguiar, Carson Spiers, and Tyler Callihan in need of spots. With Espinal a pretty clear non-tender candidate anyway, the Reds seem to be getting a jump on cleaning out their roster before those moves become mandatory.
