Cincinnati Reds: Lack of left-handed depth must be addressed

For some odd reason, Wandy Peralta came on in relief last night against the Philadelphia Phillies. The Cincinnati Reds need more left-handed options.

We’ve seen it all season long. The Cincinnati Reds lack left-handed depth in their bullpen. While Amir Garrett is one of the better left-handed relievers in the National League, he can’t pitch every inning. One of the biggest areas of concern as the we near the end of the 2019 season and focus on 2020 has to be finding quality left-handed depth for the bullpen.

Wandy Peralta toed the rubber last night in the ninth inning after the Reds had closed the gap to just two runs. Why David Bell turned to Peralta with a right-handed batter in the box, we’ll never know. But, with an 0-2 count, Peralta promptly served up a four-seam fastball down the middle and Scott Kingery deposited it into the right field seats.

Adam Haseley followed with a double to left field, and after successfully recording an out, Peralta surrendered back-to-back hits. Corey Dickerson doubled in another run and J.T. Realmuto singled. Peralta struck out Bryce Harper, and after an intentional walk to Rhys Hoskins following a foul ball that barely missed getting out of the park, he induced a ground ball from Jean Segura to end the inning.

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Peralta’s final line for the game was two runs on four hits with one strikeout and one walk in one inning of work. This was after Peralta, with two outs in Monday’s game, gave up a single and then back-to-back homers, turning a three-run deficit into a six-run deficit and putting the game out of reach.

In case my feelings on Wandy Peralta aren’t jumping off the page, let me be more direct. He doesn’t belong in the major leagues. On the season, Peralta owns a 6.09 ERA and, for his career, Peralta’s ERA is 5.00. For those interested in the more advanced metrics, his career FIP is 5.03 and his xFIP is 4.84.

Bell is turning to Peralta because, outside of Amir Garrett, he has no other left-handed options in the bullpen. Cody Reed is out for the season due to injury and Zach Duke was designated for assignment. However, Peralta is serving up a .266 average to left-handed hitters. Robert Stephenson (.246) has better success against lefties than Peralta.

The same cannot be said for the vast majority of the Cincinnati Reds relief corp. Sal Romano (.400), Kevin Gausman (.272), Matt Bowman (.326) and R.J. Alaniz (.300) do not offer solid options to opposing left-handed batters. This is a problem that needs to be addressed by Nick Krall and Dick Williams during the offseason.

The Reds have no viable left-handed relief options in the minor leagues to promote to bigs next season. The highest-rated prospect in the farm system is, aside for last year’s first-round pick Nick Lodolo, is Packy Naughton. Naughton is ranked No. 13 in the Reds system, according to MLB Pipeline, and is still at least a year away from competing at the major league level.

Even Amir Garrett has struggled of late. The southpaw has surrendered five walks in his last seven games and only struck out eight. Over his last 15 games, Garrett has a 6.17 ERA with 10 walks. Garrett has seen some command issues as the season’s progressed.

The Cincinnati Reds need to invest in left-handed relievers during the offseason. With pitchers being mandated to pitch to at least three batters next season, left-handed specialists will soon be a thing of the past. Any pitcher who hopes to play in the majors will need to be successful against both lefties and righties.