{"id":420140,"date":"2026-01-18T00:22:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T00:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/420140\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T00:22:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T00:22:08","slug":"reds-receiving-trade-interest-in-starting-pitchers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/420140\/","title":{"rendered":"Reds Receiving Trade Interest In Starting Pitchers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Reds\u2019 excellent rotation was the biggest reason behind the team\u2019s return to the playoffs in 2025, and rival teams have taken notice of this talent and depth.\u00a0 The Athletic\u2019s Ken Rosenthal<\/a> writes that Cincinnati is still getting trade inquiries about its starters, and while the Reds \u201cremain open to the possibility if the return improves them for the present and future,\u201d this high asking price might scare off a number of suitors.<\/p>\n

Indeed, it might be that not much has changed on the pitching front since October<\/a>, when president of baseball operations Nick Krall said he \u201cwouldn\u2019t say no\u201d to the idea of dealing from the rotation.\u00a0 As Krall added, however, \u201cwhen you trade pitchers you\u2019ve got to go (back)fill them somehow.\u00a0 We all know how it works, where you run out of innings at some point in the season, guys get hurt, things happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few weeks later, both Krall and manager Terry Francona further downplayed the idea that Hunter Greene<\/a> in particular would be available at the right price, with Krall noting<\/a> \u201cThat\u2019s a hard one to actually say, \u2019Hey, we\u2019re going to trade the guy that has a chance to be the ace of your staff and top-of-the-rotation guy going into the postseason.\u2019\u00a0 We\u2019re looking to figure out how to get better, but right now that\u2019s not on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continuing that thread, Rosenthal writes that \u201crival clubs doubt their big arms are truly available,\u201d in reference to Greene, Nick Lodolo<\/a>, and Andrew Abbott<\/a>.\u00a0 Greene is signed to an extension through at least the 2028 season, Lodolo has two years of arbitration control remaining, and Abbott is controlled through 2029 and is still a year away from reaching arbitration eligibility.\u00a0 Brady Singer<\/a> has been more widely mentioned as a potential trade chip since he is a free agent next offseason, but Rosenthal feels the Reds would want both a MLB-ready starter and a bat for Singer\u2019s services, which seems like a tall order.<\/p>\n

As good as Cincinnati\u2019s rotation was in 2025, the group is already down a couple of arms since Nick Martinez<\/a> and Zack Littell<\/a> are free agents.\u00a0 Chase Burns<\/a> is one of baseball\u2019s top pitching prospects and is penciled into the fifth starter\u2019s role for 2026, and another top-100 prospect in Chase Petty<\/a> is in the mix.\u00a0 Beyond these top six starters, however, the Reds have more young depth but a lot of injury-related question marks.\u00a0 Forearm and oblique problems limited Rhett Lowder<\/a> to 9 1\/3 minor league innings and no time in the majors last year, and Julian Aguiar<\/a> and Brandon Williamson<\/a> missed all of 2025 while recovering from Tommy John surgeries.<\/p>\n

Like Krall implied, the \u201cyou can never have enough pitching\u201d mantra might alone be enough to make the Reds wary about trading any of their starters and depleting the team\u2019s clear strength.\u00a0 On the flip side, moving a starter (even one of the top three arms) for a premium return would allow Cincinnati to address multiple roster holes, particularly within the team\u2019s lineup.<\/p>\n

The Reds haven\u2019t done a ton to upgrade their average-at-best offense, as the team has added JJ Bleday<\/a> and Dane Myers<\/a> while trading Gavin Lux<\/a>.\u00a0 Cincinnati\u2019s pursuit of Kyle Schwarber<\/a> was an outlier based on Schwarber\u2019s status as a local product, so the team\u2019s limited payroll will likely preclude any more major expenditures unless some other money is moved off the books (i.e. Singer\u2019s $12.75MM salary for 2026).\u00a0 For now, the Reds are primarily counting on internal improvements for lineup help, which is a risky endeavor in an NL Central that keeps getting more competitive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Reds\u2019 excellent rotation was the biggest reason behind the team\u2019s return to the playoffs in 2025, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":420141,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[37578,64,63,91950,591,7634,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-420140","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-andrew-abbott","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-hunter-greene","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-nick-lodolo","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=420140"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420140\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/420141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=420140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=420140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=420140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}