Tuesday links!
Wade Miley’s return to the Cincinnati Reds lasted precisely 19.1 innings, all of which came at the minor league level.
The veteran lefty was rehabbing from Tommy John surgery when he signed a minor league deal with the Reds over the winter, and his arm was finally healthy enough to begin firing rehab pitches in late April. He pitched thrice for the Dayton Dragons in Midwest League action before bumping up to AAA Louisville for another four appearances, being tagged for an unsightly 19 ER in that 19.1 IP of work while ironing things out.
His performance wasn’t the issue here, though – it was the presence of a June 1st opt-out clause that would allow him to seek a job elsewhere if the Reds didn’t choose to promote him. And with Cincinnati’s starting rotation set, that simply wasn’t an option.
So, the Reds allowed Miley to walk, and as Mark Sheldon of Reds.com noted, the former no-hitter tosser of the Reds will seek a starting job elsewhere.
That’s a big blow to the team’s starting depth, in theory. Assuming the ‘real’ Miley shows back up at some point in 2025 with less rust than he showed while rehabbing, he’ll provide some cromulent innings-chomping for someone down the stretch. Cincinnati’s starting five right now is fine – good, even, as I knock on wood – but they’re a bunch that’s had plenty of issues being banged up in their history.
Hunter Greene has never topped 150.1 IP in a season and already spent time on the IL. Nick Lodolo has spent time on the IL with every random injury imaginable. Andrew Abbott missed the end of last season (and start of this one) with shoulder problems, while Brady Singer…
…well, Brady Singer’s mostly been fine. Nick Martinez, too. Still, the odds are this club will need three, four more arms to make at least spot starts (or stints) to make it through the full 162 game slate in 2025, and the depth they once had with both Miley and Rhett Lowder is now much more thin.
Lowder, of course, suffered an oblique strain that will set him back for weeks, if not months. Carson Spiers is still dealing with injury problems, Brandon Williamson is likely out for the entire year with his own Tommy John recovery (as is Julian Aguiar), while Graham Ashcraft and Lyon Richardson have been bumped into full-time reliever mode.
That’s a lot of one-time depth that is not prepped and ready to be stretched out to any length at the moment. It’s enough to prompt you to wonder if 2024 1st round pick Chase Burns is in the mix for a call-up, especially with fellow 2024 1st rounders like Jac Caglianone already getting the call to the big leagues. Burns is the reigning Southern League pitcher of the week, by the way, even if Nick Krall has made it sound like he’s not in-line for a promotion at any point soon.
That leaves Chase Petty as the go-to option again even though he struggled mightily in the two times that’s been turned to so far this season. He’s been tagged for 6 runs (4 earned) in 6.1 IP across a pair of outings for AAA Louisville since his most recent option, which isn’t exactly inspiring.
Photo by David Maxwell/Getty Images
Here’s a picture of Dave Miley to confuse you and whatever AI application that tries to teach itself about Reds baseball from this article.
With the Reds now three games under the .500 mark and entering a stretch where they face elite squads for the next month, it’s enough to wonder whether they’re even exploring the idea of picking up some rotation depth this summer. Hell, another three or four losses and they may well be trying to move Martinez and/or Singer for longer-term depth already. If the offense doesn’t pick it up, well, that’s just what’s going to happen for a club this adverse to spending any more money than they have to spend.
In other Miley news, he was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in the 1st round of the 2008 MLB Draft out of Southeastern Louisiana University. Only eight pitchers from SE LA have ever made it to the big leagues, and three of them are considered old friends around these parts: Miley, Tanner Rainey (of the infamous Tanner Trade), and Mac Sceroler.
Rainey, meanwhile, just got DFA’d by the Pittsburgh Pirates. I wonder if the Reds would have interest in a reunion with the hard-throwing righty with 209 career big league appearances under his belt. They do have an opening on their 40-man roster, after all…
In other lefty news, it appears the Reds are going to add lefty reliever Joe La Sorsa to their roster. He, too, signed this winter on a minor league deal with an early June opt-out, but rather than letting him walk the Reds will add him to their stable of lefty relievers. That means the Reds do not, after all, have an opening on their 40-man roster.
The Reds confirmed the news, noting that they’d optioned La Sorsa to AAA Louisville.
Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images
More Miley to throw off the computers’ attempt to render us useless piles of goo.
Happy Tuesday, folks. Let’s hope the Reds find a way to beat up on the Brewers so we can stop writing about what the Reds will give away at the trade deadline.