{"id":403709,"date":"2026-01-12T01:49:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T01:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/403709\/"},"modified":"2026-01-12T01:49:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T01:49:07","slug":"reds-sign-garrett-hampson-josh-staumont-brandon-leibrandt-to-minors-contracts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/403709\/","title":{"rendered":"Reds Sign Garrett Hampson, Josh Staumont, Brandon Leibrandt To Minors Contracts"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Reds signed utilityman Garrett Hampson<\/a>, right-hander Josh Staumont<\/a>, and left-hander Brandon Leibrandt<\/a> to minor league deals in December, as per each player\u2019s official MLB.com profile page.\u00a0 Hampson\u2019s deal was also announced today on the Reds\u2019 official X feed<\/a>, with the added detail that Hampson has been invited to the club\u2019s big league Spring Training camp.<\/p>\n

This is Hampson\u2019s second go-around in Cincinnati, after appearing in nine games for the team in 2025.\u00a0 Hampson began the season on a minor league deal with the Diamondbacks and made the Opening Day roster, but was then released in May.\u00a0 Cincinnati inked Hampson to a MLB deal a few days later but designated the utilityman near the end of June, with the Cardinals then claiming Hampson away on waivers.\u00a0 Hampson has been a free agent since he was DFA\u2019ed again and then released by St. Louis in September.<\/p>\n

Over 62 games and 91 plate appearances spread out over his three teams, Hampson hit just .143\/.250\/.169.\u00a0 It was a tough showing even for a player who carried a modest .240\/.301\/.362 career slash line into the 2025 season, though Hampson\u2019s versatility has been far more important than his bat in carving out an eight-year MLB career.\u00a0 Hampson has played at least eight games at every position on the diamond besides catcher, with the bulk of his coming as a second baseman and center fielder.\u00a0 Even over just those nine previous games with the Reds, Hampson appeared at second base, third base, shortstop, and center field.<\/p>\n

Cincinnati already has a number of multi-position players on the roster, so Hampson may have a tricky time winning a spot on the Reds\u2019 roster.\u00a0 Hampson is also out of minor league options, while Staumont has one option year remaining and Leibrandt has two.<\/p>\n

Staumont is back for what is technically his second season with the Reds, though a preseason injury kept Staumont from getting any game action in either the majors or minors.\u00a0 Staumont had pitched in each of the previous six big league seasons, posting a 3.97 ERA over 192 2\/3 innings with the Royals and Twins.\u00a0 Once a key leverage reliever and potential future closer for Kansas City, Staumont\u2019s production started to drop off in 2022 as injuries impacted his career, culminating in a thoracic outlet syndrome surgery in 2023.<\/p>\n

After averaging 98 mph on his fastball in 2020, Staumont\u2019s velo dropped to 94.3mph by the 2024 season, and his strikeout numbers also sharply dropped off.\u00a0 Control had been an issue for Staumont even in his best years, so it is anyone\u2019s guess as to how he\u2019ll now look entering his age-32 season and after a full year away from pitching.\u00a0 The Reds already have first-hand knowledge of Staumont\u2019s health situation, however, and a minors deals represents no risk for the team in bringing Staumont to camp and seeing what can still contribute.<\/p>\n

Leibrandt is yet another former Red, as he posted a 9.95 ERA over 6 1\/3 innings (two appearances) for the team in 2024.\u00a0 This brief stint and five games (nine IP) with the Marlins in 2020 represent Leibrandt\u2019s entire MLB resume, and the rest of his career has seen the southpaw pitch in the minors, with independent league teams, and with the Chinese Professional Baseball League\u2019s CTBC Brothers in 2025.<\/p>\n

Leibrandt had good results over approximately half a season in the CPBL, posting a 1.94 ERA and 5.37% walk rate over 83 1\/3 innings with the Brothers, albeit with a 16.45% strikeout rate.\u00a0 This was enough to get Cincinnati\u2019s attention for another contract, and Leibrandt figures to act as Triple-A rotation depth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Reds signed utilityman Garrett Hampson, right-hander Josh Staumont, and left-hander Brandon Leibrandt to minor league deals in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":403710,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[170217,49,48,71044,170218,462,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-403709","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-brandon-leibrandt","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-garrett-hampson","12":"tag-josh-staumont","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/403710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}