Under no circumstance should Elly De La Cruz be on the Reds 2023 Opening Day roster

Okay, take a deep breath, Reds Country. Everyone throughout baseball is now aware of just how good Elly De La Cruz is. However, under no circumstance should the shortstop prodigy be part of the Cincinnati Reds 2023 Opening Day roster.

Everyone's excited, right? If you're fortunate enough to have MiLB TV, you probably have a more enjoyable time watching the Chattanooga Lookouts on a nightly basis than you do watching the Cincinnati Reds.

De La Cruz, Matt McLain, Andrew Abbott, Joe Boyle, Daniel Vellojin, Allan Cerda, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, and Mike Siani is are taking the field night-in and night-out for Double-A Chattanooga. It's basically a preview of what the Reds lineup will probably look like in a few years. But don't get ahead of yourself just yet.

Elly De La Cruz should not be on the Reds 2023 Opening Day roster.

Elly De La Cruz did it again. The Chattanooga Lookouts had a doubleheader on Friday evening against the Biloxi Shuckers. Chattanooga won Game 1 by a final of 4-2 and lost the nightcap as Biloxi poured it on in an 11-5 victory.

But the story for the Lookouts every night is Elly De La Cruz. The Chattanooga shortstop went 3-for-4 in Game 1 and fell a triple shy of the cycle. In Game 2, the talented infielder went 1-for-3 with an RBI single that he tried to stretch into a double, but was tagged out a second base.

De La Cruz has stirred up the Reds fanbase and looks to be the most exciting young prospect Cincinnati has had since Jay Bruce. But De La Cruz has yet to set foot in Triple-A, and while he's an explosive young talent, there are some areas of his game that could use some fine tuning before he makes his major league debut.

Furthermore, there's no need to accelerate De La Cruz's service time clock. If the 20-year-old has the same impact at Triple-A next season that he's had in the minors this year, of course he should make his major league debut in 2023. But not on March 30th versus the Pittsburgh Pirates.

The window for the Cincinnati Reds to become a competitive team will not be next season, so let's hit the pause button on talks of Elly De La Cruz being part of next year's Opening Day roster.