The Cincinnati Reds bullpen may have just lost a little bit of depth for the early part of the season. Caleb Ferguson is dealing with a strained oblique and will be off of the mound for several weeks as reported first by Mark Sheldon of Reds.com. With his being out it looks like that will open up a spot in the bullpen that wasn’t there for the taking just a few days ago.
Back in December the left-handed reliever signed a 1-year deal with the Reds for $4,500,000. He was coming off of a season in 2025 that he split between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Seattle Mariners, throwing 65.1 innings with a 3.58 ERA across 70 games.
For Cincinnati the bullpen seems to have plenty of locks at this point. The closer role is going to go to Emilio Pagan. After that spots are going to Tony Santillan, Graham Ashcraft, Pierce Johnson, and Brock Burke. That leaves three spots open for now.
Two weeks ago when we looked at the bullpen battles in our position previews the team had not yet acquired Kyle Nicolas from Pittsburgh in a trade. He’s not likely guaranteed a spot, but he’s probably one of the favorites to grab one of the remaining spots along with Connor Phillips and Tejay Antone. The wild cards here could be one of the starting pitchers who doesn’t win a spot in the rotation – which seems down to Chase Burns, Rhett Lowder, and Brandon Williamson, or a guy like Sam Moll who struggled last year but has performed this spring and is also out of options. That latter part may buy him a little extra time to show what he can do with an extra spot now up for grabs.
A true wild card that could be in the mix is Hagen Danner. The 27-year-old was a non-roster invite to spring training. He’s never reached the big leagues and last year in Triple-A he struggled, posting a 5.59 ERA in Tacoma (he was better in Triple-A in 2024). A former catcher who moved to the mound in 2021, he’s allowed two runs in 6.0 innings this spring to go along with six strikeouts and two walks. He’s also out there averaging 97 MPH with his fastball and is the only reliever with more than two or three innings who has an ERA under 6.00.
There are still two weeks left in spring training and a lot could change between now and then. How guys look over that time could play a big role in how the final few spots in the bullpen play out.
If Moll has anything left, being a LH is a plus. Otherwise, looks like Nicolas arrives just in time.
Barring a meltdown, I think they keep Moll to have another LHRP.
I feel confident they’ll give Nicolas a spot as the shiny new traded for player.
Will Nicolas be ready to start the season?
He only threw 2 G 2 IP and 25 P with Pit. before the WBC and then only 1 G 0.1 IP and 15 P with Italy in the WBC since.
I suppose if Italy gets knocked out this weekend the Reds might be able to get him 3 or 4 for IP before opening day.
With no other injuries, my guess now will be going north with Pagan, Santillan, Burke, Johnson, Ashcraft, Moll, Nicolas and whoever loses out on the starting rotation spot as a multiple inning reliever. All 3 candidates will be on pitch or innings count limits and having them use pitches in the minors does not help the Reds in any way.
Looks like it will be Abbott, Lodolo and Singer for the good guys going against most likely Crochet, Suarez and Gray. Will be interesting to see if Myers gets starts against the lefties to begin the season. Crossing fingers for the players to stay healthy in the final 2 weeks of ST. Go Reds!
These kind of injuries are pretty frequent now too. Wonder what’s up with that. I’ll take this for an injury over the un-mentionable though.
Really don’t like Vi’s stance with bat hanging down parallel to his bat. He brings it up to proper launch position after pitcher releases the ball but the less movement you can have in the swing process the betterI imagine he goes opposite field a lot as the extra movement has to bring his hands through the zone a little late. And, he ended up getting a hit the other way.
Who are you talking about here, MK?
He can confirm, but I believe he is referring to Reds 22 year old OF prospect Kien Vu. The Reds drafted him in the 9th round last year and he hit .273/.371/.532/.903 in 91 PA at low A Daytona. He entered last nights game for Hinds in LF and went 1 for 1 with a single.
Comment below.
This is obviously a really bad news…At this moment, the more logical thing is Moll getting this spot. I’d give to Danner a shot if he continues performing as of now… Kyle Nicholas seems to be the other arm ahead of Phillips, Antone and Mey/Maxwell
I hope Williamson makes the squad. The BP needs a long guy especially with Lowder and Burns in the SP lineup now
Anyone with an update on how Suarez is doing in the WBC?
Also somehow the Reds seem so snakebit with their pitchers. Major injuries every year it seems. Not sure we can ever count on Hunter Greene going forward.
Reds are probably like most teams with pitchers these days. The trend is to push for more and more velocity and spin. Pitcher injuries seem to be increasing (I don’t have numbers), but as it is an unnatural motion to begin with and that is to be expected. Thankfully, for Hunter Greene and the Reds modern medicine is a lot better at treating arm injuries. TJ surgery, see Tejay Antone, is now routine and very common. I would not write Hunter Greene off yet. He is still in his 20’s and may surprise going forward. He still has ace qualities which the Reds need very much. Hoping to get through rest of ST without any more injuries. First series vs. Red Sox will be a tough one.
Last year, the Reds used fewer pitchers than all ML teams but four, with 29 (including one a catcher).
The Cards used 24, the Guardians, 26, the Royals, 27 and the Padres used 28.
The ML leaders in pitching used were the Braves and Mets with 46, the D-backs with 43, the O’s with 42 and the Angels with 41.
The World Champions used 40 pitchers. The runners up used 38, and arguably the third best team, the Mariners, used 34.
Pitching injuries are rampant. But the Reds were much healthier than most last year, and not bad at all the year before, either, when they used 32. They did struggle through 2023 with 40, second most in MLB.
Using even 29 pitchers for a pitching roster of 13 seems a lot but using a number in the low 40’s seems to be the disaster it can appear to be with even a lower number of these guys getting hurt.
There are a ton of factors. MLB did a study on pitching injuries a few years back and it’s interesting. Too broad a topic for me today, though. If i can dig up a link of a Baseball America article, I’ll post it.
It does look like a stance that might spell trouble as he moves up. But his numbers in Daytona showed some decent power (8 doubles, 4 home runs in 23 games), which kind of surprised me as i was imagining just what you described, a slap hitter with on base skills.
Vu, in 23 games at Daytona: 273/.371/.532 (OPS .903)
Should be a good challenge for him at Dayton this year.
Comment to MK above.