Anthony DeSclafani

Cincinnati Reds Rumors - Seattle Mariners call about Anthony DeSclafani and Dan Straily

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 1:30 p.m. ET

Fansided, Nick Vorholt/FanSided via Blog Red Machine

The Cincinnati Reds have fielded calls from the Seattle Mariners on Anthony DeSclafani and Dan Straily.

The Cincinnati Reds really need to get the focus off of Anthony DeSclafani and Dan Straily. Next time the Seattle Mariners call the Reds should ask them about their interest in Raisel Iglesias. The Reds only have three somewhat reliable starters and DeSclafani and Straily are two of them.

Of course, maybe the Reds should look a bit more deeply. Using Baseball-Reference’s similarity score system, DeSclafani and Straily may be tradable. It depends on what you want to get out of them.

DeSclafani is similar to Mark Clark and Tomo Ohka. What do those two have in common? They both pitched effectively early in their careers, but were essentially done around age 30.

Straily comes out a lot better. He is similar to Mike Krukow, Mike Harkey, and Roberto Hernandez. Both Krukow and Hernandez pitched into their late-30s.

Signing Straily to an extension seems to make sense. Flipping DeSclafani could make sense, but when would the flipping end? Sooner or later the Reds need to maintain a core of pitchers to keep the Reds in games. DeSclafani may be that guy that the Reds need to keep.

Who are the Seattle Mariners offering to the Cincinnati Reds for the duo of young starting pitchers?

Maybe Seattle knows something that the Reds don’t. They are offering outfielders Nelson Cruz, Seth Smith, and Leonys Martin in conversations with the Reds. They are respectively the starting DH, right fielder, and center fielder for the Mariners.

Any of the three could provide some help to the Reds’ outfield options. Smith is the one most often mentioned in rumors. He could provide back-up to Duvall and be an elite bench player.

Cruz would be a huge addition in right field, but he would come with a high price tag. He would also require the Mariners go out and get a new DH. Martin only makes sense if Hamilton is on the move.

Of course, Iglesias for Smith and prospects makes some good sense. The Mariners are looking for starting pitching competition and an upgrade at closer over Steve Cishek. Iglesias is both of those.

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Iglesias could compete for the fifth spot in the rotation and then back fill the bullpen if he didn’t make the rotation. The Mariners are most interested in rebuilding the bullpen, but that changed when they sent Tijuan Walker to Arizona. Now the Reds have to see what they can get from the Mariners with Smith for Iglesias or stop answering the calls.