Reds know Chase Burns' extension was worth the risk despite Braves cautionary tale

The Cincinnati Reds kicked off the second half in celebratory fashion, reportedly handing All-Star starter Chase Burns a seven-year, $105 million extension, which marks the largest guarantee ever given to a pitcher with less than three years of service time in the major leagues.

The landmark deal locks the right-hander into the team's plans for the foreseeable future, giving them an ace to build around no matter what happens to Hunter Greene or Andrew Abbott down the line.

Of course, setting a precedent is always a little more terrifying than following it, and the Reds surely know the risk they're taking with this contract. As we've seen with Greene this year, no matter how good of a pitcher you are, it's difficult to provide any value when you're not available to step onto the mound.

But perhaps there's another cautionary tale we can take some lessons away from, in the form of Spencer Strider and the Atlanta Braves.

Reds took calculated risk with Chase Burns extension, knowing the reward could be huge

Strider's six-year, $75 million contract is actually a rather perfect point of comparison for Burns. They were both 23 at the time of their deals, with two years of pre-arbitration left. Strider put pen to paper over the offseason (after placing second for NL Rookie of the Year voting), but the timing works well enough for our purposes.

In the first season of that new contract, he continued his quick ascent up the MLB pitching hierarchy, earning an All-Star nod and leading the league in strikeouts. He may not have been the best pitcher in baseball, but he was working his way into that conversation.

Then the injuries came. An internal brace procedure basically wiped out all of his age-25 season, and he was far less effective in his return to the mound the following year. Now in 2026, more setbacks have crushed his production (5.31 ERA) and kept him from finding any sort of rhythm on the field. And still, the Braves are on the hook for his $20 million salary this year and the $22 million salaries that will follow in 2027 and 2028.

That's the risk the Reds are taking with Burns, though it's also why the reward could be huge. The right-hander now has a sizable guarantee to work with regardless of what happens to him or his body. But if he stays healthy and maintains the All-Star level he's shown this year, he'll be one of the best bang-for-your-buck pitchers in the league.

The good news is that the organization will seemingly do everything in its power to keep Burns healthy. They plan to keep him on an innings limit in the second half, which is the right thing to do since he's already close to surpassing the total workload he handled last year. The Reds will surely hold up their end of the bargain in trying to keep their young star healthy.

Of course, some things just wind up outside our control. There's no guarantee the Reds can keep him off the injured list no matter how many precautions they take. But, much like the Braves' decision to bet on a rising star in Strider, it was smart to take this gamble now, before Burns became too expensive to keep around for the long haul.

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