A new report has put a spotlight on the Reds’ decision-making at the top, and it does not flatter the organization. The Athletic’s joint piece from C. Trent Rosecrans and Ken Rosenthal describes a tense exchange earlier this season between Cincinnati owner Bob Castellini and baseball operations chief Nick Krall, with the bigger picture centering on how the club has tried - and, in some cases, failed - to build sustained success.
Per the report, Castellini asked why the Reds could not match the kind of long-term consistency the Milwaukee Brewers have found. Krall, according to multiple unnamed sources cited in the story, laid out a “laundry list” of trades that Castellini did not sign off on. The implication is clear: Krall had a plan to deepen the organization with younger talent, but that approach would have required moving some of the club’s more established players.
That’s where names like Hunter Greene, Nick Lodolo, Spencer Steer, and Graham Ashcraft enter the picture. The report suggests those are the kinds of players Cincinnati may have been reluctant to move, which would fit a pattern Reds fans know all too well.
Before the club hit the reset button in 2014, Cincinnati held on to productive players too long. Todd Frazier, Jay Bruce, Aroldis Chapman, and others stayed until their trade value had already faded.
If Krall really has brought ownership forward-looking ideas only to have them rejected in favor of keeping familiar names and veterans around, then he can’t be pinned as the main reason for the Reds’ lack of success over the last decade. But that doesn’t clear him either.
The report does not say Castellini ordered the trades Krall has made. It’s hard to imagine ownership marching into the front office and demanding, “Bring me Ke'Bryan Hayes!”
Krall still has to answer for the moves he did make. That includes sending Mike Sirota to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Gavin Lux, dealing Luis Castillo for the now defunct package of Edwin Arroyo, Noelvi Marte, Levi Stoudt, and Andrew Moore, and last year’s trade that brought Hayes to Cincinnati in exchange for shortstop prospect Sammy Stafura.
So yes, Castellini may have been a roadblock on certain deals. But Krall is still on the hook for the transactions he pushed through.
And no matter whose version of events is closest to the truth, Reds fans are the ones left dealing with the fallout. This report only adds another ugly layer to a situation that was already hard to look at.
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