Costly Reds' trade trend keeps ending in disaster

When you're a team with a limited budget like the Cincinnati Reds, your margin for error is slim. The trade market could be an excellent way to improve the club without having to commit big dollars, but there are pitfalls with this strategy. Recently, the Reds have fallen into several of those traps.

A handful of the club's more high-profile trade acquisitions have looked more like anchors than the complementary pieces Cincinnati envisioned when it pulled the trigger on these deals. Continuing down this road will not only limit the Reds' ability to make other necessary maneuvers down the road but will also impact their ability to retain cornerstone pieces for the long haul.

In particular, we're looking at the deals for Ke'Bryan Hayes, Jose Trevino, and Brady Singer. That trio comprises three of the top five highest salaries on Cincinnati's 2026 books, and combined for $27.25 million, which is 18.3% of the Reds' $149,172,440 luxury tax payroll.

Spending nearly one-fifth of your total payroll on three players who, through early-May, have subtracted 1.0 fWAR from your ball club is horrible efficiency. It's the type of business that can sink an otherwise promising team. And it needs to stop.

The Reds need to pivot to a more prudent trade strategy

Let's look at why these three players were available to begin with. The Kansas City Royals might have liked Jonathan India, but the reality of the situation is that by swapping Brady Singer for him, they saved about $4 million against 2025's payroll and are saving another $4.75 million this season.

The New York Yankees' motivation for trading Jose Trevino to the Reds wasn't necessarily to get Fernando Cruz, a reliever who coincidentally would look nice in Cincinnati's pen right about now, but rather to take a superfluous piece from their roster and save nearly $3 million. The Reds then compounded that mistake by extending Trevino, committing serious money to a luxury item at backup catcher.

The deal for Hayes was straightforward from the Pittsburgh Pirates' perspective. They were going nowhere last year so shedding veteran salary made all the sense in the world. The Reds taking him off their hands might have helped facilitate Pittsburgh's spending spree and return to relevance this offseason.

Hayes was the most egregious of the moves, because while Trevino and Singer were both relatively short-term commitments, the former Pirate is signed through 2029. He fit an immediate need down the 2025 stretch, but now the Reds could easily live without him thanks to Sal Stewart's emergence.

All told, we're looking at a third baseman who could easily be on the bench when the Reds are at full strength, a number four starter, and a backup catcher. These aren't true difference makers. Going back to the $27.25 number, that's less than $3 million shy of the AAV it took to land Kyle Schwarber. Imagine a world where Cincinnati had the funds to bring the Philadelphia Phillies slugger home and sign Eugenio Suarez in the offseason. Without making these three trades, they would have had the financial might to make this happen.

The Reds need to trade their trade focus to follow two distinct paths. One, follow these other teams' leads and trade away extraneous pieces to free up payroll. Two, target younger, cheaper players who might be change-of-scenery candidates or otherwise blocked from getting regular playing time and reaching their full potential.

Doing so will increase their ability to utilize their financial resources in free agency, while providing additional flexibility to make the occasional big splash. Low-risk, high-reward moves need to be how they operate moving forward, because too many whiffs like these and they'll end up sunk.

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