In losing Gavin Lux to the Tampa Bay Rays in last night\u2019s three-team deal (that looped in the Los Angeles Angels), the Cincinnati Reds did not really lose an infielder. They did not really lose an outfielder, either.<\/p>\n
They lost a left-handed bat.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what Lux had become on this particular Reds roster – no more, no less. His decline defensively was readily evident when given time at 3B and 2B, and the idea of trying to hide him in LF showed he simply didn\u2019t have the instincts required there. It\u2019s impossible to blame him for that, of course, since he\u2019d simply never played out there before, but the reality became that the one (and only) thing he provided to club with was a left-handed bat against right-handed pitching.<\/p>\n
A DH who only hit right-handed pitching.<\/p>\n
His move to Tampa is the latest in a pretty decent overhaul of the position-player corps on the roster since last July\u2019s trade deadline. Ke\u2019Bryan Hayes came in to claim 3B, and Noelvi Marte was shifted to RF where he\u2019ll presumably get a pretty long leash there. Lux is out, as is Jake Fraley, subtracting a pair of left-handed platoon bats. Santiago Espinal, too, was jettisoned when he simply became far too expensive for his niche role, while lefty JJ Bleday and righty Dane Myers were brought into the outfield mix on the very same day.<\/p>\n
Despite all that moving and shaking, up until yesterday it was Lux who at least – on paper – profiled as the guy who\u2019d play a little 2B on days when a right-handed pitcher was on the mound and when Matt McLain would shift over to play SS to give Elly De La Cruz a break. The Reds clearly didn\u2019t really want him in that role – they just traded him, after all – but if the roster froze and that\u2019s who they had, that\u2019s the role he\u2019d have been forced to play. Bleday, though, is a pure outfielder only, as is lefty Will Benson, and while both seem to be the benficiaries offensively from Lux\u2019s move, there appears to still be two clear and obvious voids on Cincinnati\u2019s roster now.<\/p>\n
There is no left-handed hitting infielder (aside from Elly, their switch-hitter). There is also no other clear-cut middle infield option, as each of Spencer Steer, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, and even Sal Stewart (despite his 2B experience in the minors) look the part of 1B\/3B only guys.<\/p>\n
The \u2018backup\u2019 shortstop is the everyday 2B, and there is no backup 2B. All that after the Reds said publicly earlier in the offseason how much they want to bake in more rest for Elly after he was ground to a pulp in 2025.<\/p>\n
They never actually backfilled the role Espinal had been tasked with last year, and now they have another \u2018infield\u2019 void without Lux. The question, though, is whether they can find one guy who can do both, or if they\u2019re still on the hunt for two separate players this late in the offseason.<\/p>\n
In house options aren\u2019t exactly the most obvious. They\u2019ve got both Garrett Hampson and Michael Chavis around on minor league deals, though it\u2019s been years since either was really trusted with 2B\/SS duties at any level, let alone the big leagues. Edwin Arroyo has the chops for it defensively right this minute, but everyone\u2019s still waiting for the power in his bat to return after a lost 2024 due to shoulder surgery – and he\u2019s still not yet had a single PA at AAA yet. He might be the most logical candidate for that role as early as mid-year, but it would be foolhardy to expect that role to just be etched in stone for him come Opening Day.<\/p>\n
So, the Reds have some serious shopping to do, and as we all know they\u2019re going to have to do it with the slightest of budgets.<\/p>\n
Luis Rengifo ticks some of the boxes as a free agent, though he\u2019s two years removed from legitimate offensive production (and he, a switch hitter, typically hits lefties from the right side much better than righties from the left side). Luis Arraez is available and a much more known quantity, but he\u2019s years removed from being a legit option on the left side of the infield and will come at a much, much steeper cost. Beyond those two, there\u2019s what remains of Adam Frazier and literally nobody else in free agency who hits from the left side and plays SS\/2B.<\/p>\n
The trade market, however, opens up a ton more doors for the Reds, and I\u2019m beginning to wonder if the latest series of free agent dominos might have lined one up for them perfectly. Late last night – while the Reds, Angels, and Rays were striking their deal – the Los Angeles Dodgers swooped in to sign star free agent Kyle Tucker away from the New York Mets, who were the presumptive favorites for his signature. The Mets pivoted almost immediately, though, and landed Bo Bichette on his own gargantuan deal this morning. The shift still means the Mets got a star, but the move off Tucker (an outfielder) to Bichette (a shortstop who\u2019ll now play 3B) means New York\u2019s already existing logjam of infielders just got even jammier.<\/p>\n
Each of Mark Vientos, Brett Baty, and Luisangel Acu\u00f1a just watched their paths to playing time get a lot less clear, though none profiles perfectly for what I\u2019ve laid out as a Reds need already. Baty is a 3B primarily with some 2B chops (and none at SS), while both Acu\u00f1a and Vientos hit from only the right side. It\u2019s former top prospect Ronny Mauricio, though, who now looks like he\u2019d fit on the Reds quite perfectly.<\/p>\n
Mauricio will turn 25 in April and hit just .226\/.293\/.369 in 184 PA with the Mets last year, one year after missing the entire 2024 season at all levels after tearing his ACL in Dominican Winter League action after the end of the 2023 season. He did hit .323\/.384\/.508 in a small 19 game sample across the minors in 2025 as he worked his way back into form, but irregular playing time never really saw him take off at the big league level despite a swing from the left-side, in particular, that often wows you.<\/p>\n
(Technically he\u2019s a switch-hitter, though it\u2019s become pretty clear he\u2019s a guy who should only be leaned on hitting lefty against righties.)<\/p>\n
Ronny came up as a shortstop, but with Francisco Lindor entrenched as New York\u2019s future Hall of Famer at the position, the Mets began to move him all over the place. He\u2019s got extensive experience at 3B and 2B, and even logged 26 starts in LF at the AAA level with Syracuse prior to his knee injury. And, most importantly, he\u2019s still cheap as a pre-arb guy (who even has an option remaining if need be). And if the Mets aren\u2019t going to play him, they run the risk of depleting his value even further by simply parking him at AAA once again, leading one to wonder if this winter – especially now that Bichette is around – will be the time they finally deal him elsewhere in exchange for something that fits their roster better.<\/p>\n
The question, as it always is, would be just how much it would cost off the Reds farm – or off their active roster. In many ways there is a decent parallel between Mauricio and Arroyo – both ranked routinely on Top 100 overall prospect lists, both with a 2024 totally lost to injury, both still hoping to show a lot more as they move beyond said injuries – and it\u2019s a decent thought process to consider what kind of return would be needed for you to want to deal away Edwin. Mauricio should, in theory, be a little cheaper given that he\u2019s already burned two options and not exactly established himself as a big leaguer, but that\u2019s the same realm of value we\u2019re talking here.<\/p>\n
Cincinnati may simply hedge in a cheaper way that\u2019s less impactful to their own roster. That seems like something they\u2019d do, after all, leaning into one of Hampson\/Chavis and simply hoping there\u2019s no significant imbalance created. Still, it seems like they\u2019ve got a chance to pounce on someone else\u2019s disjointed roster to directly benefit their own, and it sure would be nice to see them be that aggressive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In losing Gavin Lux to the Tampa Bay Rays in last night\u2019s three-team deal (that looped in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":524153,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2400],"tags":[5,535,50,4259,29427,4,536],"class_list":{"0":"post-524152","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cincinnati-reds","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-cincinnati","10":"tag-cincinnati-reds","11":"tag-cincinnatireds","12":"tag-hot-stove","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-reds"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115907022311683789","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524152","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=524152"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524152\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/524153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=524152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=524152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=524152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}