With the firing of manager David Bell, some of the players have now had a chance to speak with the media about the move, as well as the franchise. On a young-ish team, there aren’t many guys who have been around for all that long now that Joey Votto has moved on. One of the players who has been around the longest is 2021’s National League Rookie of the Year. Jonathan India didn’t exactly hold back.
“We’re tired of losing. It’s the same thing every year here. We just float around .500 and try to make the push, but we just don’t have enough. We need to make a move. I know what it is, but I just want to say it to the media.”
That’s what he told Charlie Goldsmith of the Cincinnati Enquirer.
He seems to feel the same way that a lot of fans feel about the team. That the club has been constructed to be around a .500 team and that’s that. If things go right for them, then they can contend. And he doesn’t think that’s enough and that they need help. And he’s right.
Look no further than 2023. As the team approached the trade deadline they were in first place and the only thing they did was add a middle reliever. As you now know – the Reds had a losing record after the trade deadline, didn’t make the playoffs, and almost all of the prospects that they held onto who were “an overpay” and a “part of the future” took steps backwards this year.
As noted the other day on the digital pages here at Redleg Nation – Bob Castellini and his ownership group bought the team prior to the 2006 season. We’re now 19 seasons in to their ownership. The Reds have finished better than 3rd place two times.
Lately, the team’s front office has really gone full into the “we’re a small market” line of public talk whenever questioned about why they don’t win more, try more, add more talent via trades or free agency, etc. Look around the National League Central. Finished doing that? How many of the five teams in it are “large market” clubs? The answer is one. The Chicago Cubs. And yet they are not the team that’s been running through the division with 1st place finishes year after year after year.
Jonathan India can see at least part of the problem. The team simply doesn’t have enough talent to truly compete. And he wants that to change. A new manager might make a small difference here or there, but a manager can only do so much with the talent that they have in the clubhouse and the Reds haven’t had enough of that in a long time.
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