Reds acquire another outfielder in a trade with the Miami Marlins

Earlier today the Cincinnati Reds signed outfielder JJ Bleday to a 1-year contract for $1,400,000. Six hours after that move was made the team made a trade to acquire another outfielder, this time picking up Dane Myers from the Miami Marlins. Cincinnati sent minor league outfield prospect Ethan O’Donnell to Miami in the deal. The Reds also designated Lyon Richardson for assignment in order to clear a spot on the 40-man roster for Myers.

There’s a lot to unpack here, but let’s start by taking a look at the newest Reds outfielder. Dane Myers will be 30-years-old next year and has 511 career plate appearances in Major League Baseball. He’s hit .245/.299/.354 in those plate appearances. That’s good for an OPS+ of 80 (which means he’s been 20% worse than the league average once we account for park factors).

All three of his seasons in MLB have come with the Marlins. He played in 22 games in 2023, 44 more in 2024, and then 106 games last season. Myers has played all three spots in the outfield, with 77 of his 121 starts in his career being in center. Given that he hasn’t hit in the big leagues you may expect that he’s a good defender, but that likely isn’t the case either. Baseball Reference has him as an average defensive player for his career, while Fangraphs has him below-average. Baseball Savant has him as a slightly above-average defender in his career. You can see his career stats here.

The move leaves one asking a lot of questions. The first one may be how many outfielders do you need on the 40-man roster? While the season certainly isn’t close to starting, Cincinnati has the following players as outfield options from the 40-man roster: Noelvi Marte, TJ Friedl, Will Benson, Gavin Lux, Spencer Steer, JJ Bleday, Tyler Callihan, Blake Dunn, Rece Hinds, Hector Rodriguez, and now Dane Myers. The Reds could literally start an outfielder at every position, including pitcher and DH, and still have an outfielder sitting on the bench wondering when their time is going to come.

The next question is why? Not only do the Reds have a ton of outfielders, but why are you acquiring a 30-year-old outfielder who has barely played in the big leagues who has a career OPS of .653? Not only that, he required not only you to trade someone for him but also required you to designated an entirely different player for assignment. It’s one thing to trade for someone and DFA someone to make room for a player who could be expected to contribute, but what is Dane Myers on the depth chart? The 4th outfielder in Louisville? At age 30?

Ethan O’Donnell hasn’t exactly lit the minor leagues up since being drafted by the Reds in 2023. He’s got a career .735 OPS in the minors and it’s gotten worse at each level he’s played at. Last year he hit .236/.327/.325 for Double-A Chattanooga as a 23-year-old in 125 games. He did steal 20 bases and he’s a good defender, but the likely upside is that he’s a fringy starter/4th outfield type if just about everything goes right for him.

Lyon Richardson pitched in 34 games for the Reds last season. He threw 37.2 innings with a 4.54 ERA while walking 21 (four intentionally) and striking out 30. Things really went south for him in late June, though. From June 28th through the end of the season with Cincinnati he pitched in 14 games and had an ERA of 9.45 with 13 walks and 10 strikeouts in 13.1 innings. In Triple-A he had an ERA of 4.22 with Louisville while throwing 32.0 innings with 13 walks and 32 strikeouts during the year.