{"id":515948,"date":"2026-01-11T23:42:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T23:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/515948\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T23:42:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T23:42:12","slug":"reds-adding-a-veteran-arm-to-their-bullpen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/515948\/","title":{"rendered":"Reds adding a veteran arm to their bullpen"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cincinnati.com\/sports\/reds\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:The Cincinnati Reds;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">The Cincinnati Reds<\/a> are in agreement on a one-year deal with free agent <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/baseball\/mlb\/players\/pierce-johnson\/501771\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:relief pitcher Pierce Johnson;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">relief pitcher Pierce Johnson<\/a>, a source told The Enquirer&#8217;s Gordon Wittenmyer on Jan. 11.<\/p>\n<p>The deal is pending a physical, the source said.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Relief pitcher Pierce Johnson went 3-3 with a 3.05 ERA in 65 games for the Atlanta Braves last season. Pierce, 34, had 59 strikeouts in 59 innings pitched with 19 walks.\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"640\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"standard-img\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/22e7e09266839053d6ac33846bed231f.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Relief pitcher Pierce Johnson went 3-3 with a 3.05 ERA in 65 games for the Atlanta Braves last season. Pierce, 34, had 59 strikeouts in 59 innings pitched with 19 walks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">More: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cincinnati.com\/story\/sports\/mlb\/reds\/2026\/01\/09\/what-we-know-about-cincinnati-reds-tv-revenue-turmoil-impact-on-team-fanduel-sports-network\/88107038007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:What we know about Cincinnati Reds TV revenue turmoil, impact on team;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">What we know about Cincinnati Reds TV revenue turmoil, impact on team<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Johnson is an eight-year veteran who <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/j\/johnspi01.shtml\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:pitched for the Atlanta Braves for the past 2 1\/2 seasons;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">pitched for the Atlanta Braves for the past 2 1\/2 seasons<\/a>. Last season, Johnson posted a 3-3 record with a 3.03 ERA in 65 games. He struck out 59 batters in 59 innings, finishing 13 games and posting one save.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson was one of the Braves&#8217; key setup men for closer Raisel Iglesias.<\/p>\n<p>In his career pitching for five teams, Johnson has posted a 3.79 ERA over 330 games, going 21-24 with 16 saves.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson, 34, had a 2.91 ERA in 2 1\/2 seasons with the Braves, pitching 139 innings over 147 games with three saves.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson joins a remade Reds bullpen that lost swingman Nick Martinez and workhorse relievers Scott Barlow and Brent Suter.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>The Reds began the rebuild by re-signing closer Emilio Pagan and then reaching a deal with free agent left-hander Caleb Ferguson. Johnson and Ferguson should be high-leverage relievers along with Tony Santillan.<\/p>\n<p>Other bullpen options are Graham Ashcraft, Connor Phillips and lefty Sam Moll with youngsters Luis Mey and Zach Maxwell potentially making the team.<\/p>\n<p>This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cincinnati.com\/story\/sports\/mlb\/reds\/2026\/01\/11\/reds-pierce-johnson-relief-pitcher-bolster-bullpen\/88132991007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Pierce Johnson signing with Reds to bolster bullpen;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Pierce Johnson signing with Reds to bolster bullpen<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cincinnati Reds are in agreement on a one-year deal with free agent relief pitcher Pierce Johnson, a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":515949,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[46,5,1549,9097,50,25546,1105,1178,1627,4,761,1133,104,9611,11148,40422,12475,42335],"class_list":["post-515948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-atlanta-braves","tag-baseball","tag-brent-suter","tag-caleb-ferguson","tag-cincinnati-reds","tag-connor-phillips","tag-emilio-pagan","tag-graham-ashcraft","tag-luis-mey","tag-mlb","tag-nick-martinez","tag-pierce-johnson","tag-raisel-iglesias","tag-sam-moll","tag-scott-barlow","tag-the-enquirer","tag-tony-santillan","tag-zach-maxwell"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115879120266615145","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515948"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515948\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/515949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}