It is admittedly easy to find yourself questioning just about every single inch of the process that got the Cincinnati Reds to their current position in last place in the National League Central. It’s even easier to do so when they got outscored 34-1 across a two-game span (and allowed another 13 runs the following day).
Last place. A whopping -145 run differential.
The astonishingly bad decision to acquire Ke’Bryan Hayes last trade deadline, the use of funds on Eugenio Suarez and Brady Singer and the rest
of the bullpen, the continued inability to develop hitters aside from Elly De La Cruz and Sal Stewart. Giving up Mike Sirota and a comp pick for one famished season of Gavin Lux.
The poor moves that have been made tend to add up in a hurry. That’s how a team ends up not only in last place, but projected to remain there if and when baseball actually gets to playing next year, too, through the looming lockout.
Despite all of that, it appears the Cincinnati Reds don’t have many plans to make changes. In fact, they’re leaning hard into the same continuity that has led them through an era of zero division titles, zero postseason wins, and more last place finishes in the division than one can remember.
So says Gordon Wittenmyer of The Enquirer, who reportedly earlier on Sunday that the Reds don’t appear to be intent on making changes to the group who’s in charge of making decisions on how to run this baseball franchise.
That means Nick Krall and Brad Meador are expected to still sit atop the hierarchy. That means that future Hall of Fame manager Terry Francona isn’t going anywhere. While we’ve not seen pitching guru Derek Johnson for months during the season, it seems as if the Reds would like to make sure he sticks around, too.
The Reds entered play on Sunday ranked dead last in defensive runs saved. They ranked third-worst in collective FIP (ahead of only the lowly Athletics and Colorado Rockies). They ranked fourth-worst in team wRC+ offensively at 93, just a hair above being in dead last – that’s 91.
Fielding, pitching, and hitting seem to rank pretty highly on the list of things baseball teams should try to do well if they’re intent on winning games. Fielding, pitching, and hitting are three areas where the Reds are either the worst, or nearly the worst, in the entire sport. And it now appears as if the same group who assembled this team from the ashes of the 2022 rebuild is going to get another chance to rebuild it in their image – or, even more shockingly, will get to run it back with no changes whatsoever.
The Cincinnati Reds!
