Tomorrow is September 1st, the time of year for young players to get a “cup of coffee” at the big league level with a chance to catch the GM’s or manager’s eye and hopefully get themselves an opportunity to win a big league job in spring training.
Since the Reds are out of the playoff hunt (and everyone seems to know this except the manager) and the AAA Louisville Bats aren’t going to the playoffs this year either, there is an opportunity for the Reds to get a look at some players in September.
These are the players currently on the Reds 40 man roster in the minor league system.
Jared Burton
Carlos Fisher
Juan Francisco
Yasmani Grandal (AA)
Jeremy Hermida
Jeremy Horst
Matt Maloney
Kris Negron
Jordan Smith
Daryl Thompson
Chris Valaika
Edison Volquez
Travis Wood
In this AM’s Enquirer, Jocketty said, “It’ll be quite a few”, so…
I think with the recent struggles of the bullpen, that Fisher, Burton, Horst, and Smith should all get called up. Burton is an interesting decision. They’ll need to decide if they want to see how his arm is or whether they want to allow him to recover more over the winter and see how he is in spring training. He’s on a one year deal and, I believe, would be arbitration eligble (if it’s offered), so that would probably influence whether he’s called up or not.
I don’t see them calling up many starters. It’ll be interesting to see if they call Volquez back up and what they do with him if they do. I think this could give a clue as to what the team sees as his future. Start him in September and see if he’s learned anything in AAA. If he performs well, is his future here or as trade bait?
They might call up Maloney or Wood, as they could probably work out of the pen and/or take a spot start if the team needed one.
Position player-wise, I think Hermida and Francisco will absolutely get called. I think Valaika should, and probably will.
But I don’t think that ends the list.
Devin Mesoraco (.289/.372/.486/.858) should be an obvious call up, but he’s not on the 40 man roster. You might might even want to reward players like Neftali Soto (.274/.328/.580/.907), who leads the Reds minor leagues in homers or Denis Phipps, who has had a breakthrough season (.339/.385/.525/.910 at 2 levels).
So, agree? Disagree?
What about Mesoraco? If you want him up, who do you take off the 40?
Who would YOU call up? Who WILL they call up? Who SHOULD they call up?