The Cincinnati Reds gave away Tucker Barnhart just after last year’s World Series, turning over the full-time catching duties to Tyler Stephenson. Stephenson, however, endured a miserable season health-wise in 2022, and the end result was the exposure of an extreme lack of quality depth at the catching position within the organization.
When you have five catchers, you have no catchers, as the saying doesn’t go (but kinda should). It’s a concept I looked at deeper earlier this week.
With a glut of players on the 60-day IL who need to get back onto the active roster, the Reds made a handful of players available on waivers upon the completion of their regular season, and today it was announced that several had been claimed - and that several had not been claimed, and therefore were booted off the 40-man roster and back to AAA.