CINCINNATI - The Reds’ recent draft approach has started to look a lot smarter in hindsight, and Chase Burns is the biggest reason why.
Two years after Cincinnati used the second pick on Burns - instead of taking the player many expected them to land - the right-hander is an All-Star and one of the National League Cy Young Award favorites. That kind of outcome gives a front office plenty of cover, especially when the alternative, Charlie Condon, is also making noise after a slower start to his pro career.
Burns’ rise has been quick enough to change the conversation around that draft decision. Condon, who went third to the Colorado Rockies, will be in Philadelphia this weekend for the MLB Futures Game after breaking out in Triple-A. Burns, meanwhile, reached the majors on an accelerated path and has broken out there.
“For us, if you’ve got a chance to take a No. 1 starter, go after that guy,” Nick Krall, the Reds’ president of baseball operations, said. “We liked him where we (were drafting).
Our scouts liked him. Our analytics department liked him.
There was a chance to get a guy who was an anchor to your staff, and you can never have too many of those guys.”
That philosophy has shaped a lot of what Cincinnati has done in the draft. The Reds pick 18th this year, so they won’t be sitting in the same kind of dream spot they had when Burns was available. And when you’re drafting that far down, Joe Katuska said, the board tends to flatten out.
“The differences between the players get smaller and smaller the further you go down on the draft board,” Katuska, the team’s director of amateur scouting, said. “It will often turn into the types of players we generally go after and the type of players we feel we can develop, we tend to lean toward those guys.”
Even with that shift, the Reds’ identity hasn’t changed much. Katuska said the club will take the player it believes fits best, and while that doesn’t always mean a pitcher, the organization clearly puts a premium on starting pitching.
“I think everyone knows our philosophy at this point - it’s starting pitching profiles, it’s up-the-middle (position players),” Katuska said. “That’s all the stuff we’re looking for - start with athletes and pure hitters that are playing up the middle and build it out from there. That doesn’t mean you have to come from one of those buckets.”
Cincinnati has leaned on the draft to build its rotation, and the list is a strong one. Burns is in there, along with Hunter Greene, Andrew Abbott, Nick Lodolo and Rhett Lowder. Brady Singer is the exception in the current regular rotation, though even he came to Cincinnati via a first-round pedigree after the Reds traded Jonathan India to Kansas City for him before the 2025 season.
The Reds have also shown they’re willing to go in different directions depending on the class. Last year, they used the ninth pick on high school shortstop Steele Hall after taking Burns and Lowder with their first pick in the previous two seasons. In 2022, Katuska’s first year in his current role, Cincinnati went with a pair of corner infielders: Cam Collier and Sal Stewart.
Collier arrived with a reputation as one of the best hitters in the class despite being one of the youngest players available. Stewart came in on the compensation pick the Reds received after losing Nick Castellanos to free agency, and he’ll be in Philadelphia next week with Burns at the All-Star Game.
The earlier draft history tells the same story: the Reds took the best college hitter on the board, Nick Senzel, with the second pick in 2016. A year later, with the second pick again, Minnesota passed on making Greene the first high school right-hander selected first overall, and Cincinnati grabbed him.
This year’s class gives the Reds another set of choices, and Katuska said the strength is in high school pitching, especially in the middle of the first round, through the second round and into the competitive balance rounds. Cincinnati has five picks on the first day, starting with No. 18 and followed by Nos. 58, 70, 94 and 122.
The Reds have not taken a high school pitcher with their first pick since Greene in 2017. Before that, their last prep arms taken with their first pick were Robert Stephenson in 2011 and Homer Bailey in 2004.
Still, Katuska made it clear that history won’t block the team if the right pitcher is sitting there.
“If they are the most talented player there, we are comfortable taking that player,” Katuska said. “We have to show that we’ve done all the work on it, for sure. But if that player lines up in the position where we think they’re the best player we can get with that pick and it’s how we maximize the total draft class, then yes, we would take a high school pitcher with the first pick.”
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