Nick Krall’s status with the Cincinnati Reds may be trending toward continuity, but the lack of an official confirmation has left just enough room for skepticism - and a whole lot of fan frustration.
Earlier this week, it surfaced that Krall is expected to keep his job as the Reds’ president of baseball operations. That immediately lit up a fanbase that has grown weary of the club’s failures under his watch and had been hoping for a front-office shakeup this winter. Still, beyond Krall’s own word, there hasn’t been a definitive announcement from ownership.
The discussion really took off last Sunday, when Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer asked Krall whether he felt good about where he stood with ownership. Krall answered, "Yeah, I do. We’ve had some conversations."
Buster Olney later backed up that sentiment. In his latest ESPN column, Olney reported that league sources view Krall as being on solid ground, and that Terry Francona is expected to enter his third season with the Reds next year.
With a little more than a week left in the 2026 season, there is still a sliver of time for Cincinnati’s ownership group to react to the backlash. The response from fans has been loud, and it has been unmistakably negative.
Even so, the expectation is that Krall will be back in 2027. The reasoning, according to the source material, is less about confidence in what he’s done and more about the Reds’ belief that they don’t have a better option available right now - even though alternatives exist.
One complication is the looming Collective Bargaining negotiations, which are expected to lead to a lockout on December 1. If Cincinnati waited until the end of the season to dismiss Krall, the search for a replacement would stretch deep into October, possibly beyond.
That timing would matter. By the time a new president of baseball operations got up to speed, the offseason would already be in full swing, and it figures to be a frantic one as players rush to land free-agent deals before the lockout arrives.
The Reds could also choose a more internal path by moving GM Brad Meador into the top baseball-operations role. But Meador, like Krall, has been with the organization for more than 10 years, and that move would not bring the kind of sweeping change many fans want.
If the Castellinis are swayed by the anger from the fanbase and decide to make a change, the Reds’ supporters deserve credit for making their displeasure impossible to ignore.
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