The Red Sox are looking to acquire the All-Star catcher before Monday’s trade deadline, and they’re not messing around.
The “cincinnati baseball team” is a professional baseball team based in Cincinnati, Ohio. The team has been around since 1869 and has won the World Series twice. In 2018, Nick Castellanos fired a direct shot at ownership for not spending on players and not winning games.
The Cincinnati Reds have been the subject of the bulk of the MLB headlines this week.
Following a laughable summer in which the Reds traded away a slew of talented players, club president Phil Castellini — the son of owner Bob Castellini – issued a challenge to Cincinnati fans. He effectively derided their understanding of baseball’s economic context, claiming that the only way for the club to become more lucrative would be to move it.
Nick Castellanos, a former Reds player, came out against Cincinnati’s ownership this week, by coincidence. It wasn’t in reaction to Castellini’s remarks, but rather the time was ideal.
His message was simple: Reds supporters deserved more.
Nick Castellanos took aim at the Reds’ owners.
Nick Castellanos, a former Cincinnati Reds player, during a game against the Philadelphia Phillies on June 28, 2021. | Getty Images/Dylan Buell
In Cincinnati, Nick Castellanos rapidly became a fan favorite. After a COVID-19-shortened 2020 season (in which the squad made the playoffs for the first time since 2013), Castellanos had a fantastic year in 2021.
With a.309 batting average, 34 home runs, and 100 RBIs, the outfielder was named to his first All-Star team. On a regular basis, he showed off his confident and lovable nature, and he and his family welcomed the team’s fan base.
So, once Castellanos chose to opt out of the last two years of his contract this winter, Reds fans yearned for him to return to the Queen City. The team, on the other hand, effectively refused to pay him what he was owed.
The 30-year-old then joined the Philadelphia Phillies on a five-year, $100 million contract.
It was just one of the Reds’ many dubious selections this summer. Gold Glove catcher Tucker Barnhart, All-Star outfielder Jesse Winker, former All-Star third baseman Eugenio Suarez, and starting pitcher Sonny Gray were all moved. The Reds also declined to take up starting pitcher Wade Miley’s contract option.
They went from a possible playoff squad to a laughingstock in the National League.
“It’s simply a textbook case of ownership profiting from organizations,” Castellanos told ESPN recently. “You are not held responsible for your performance when… there are no penalties for losing.”
He went on to say that supporters are entitled to more than what ownership has provided.
“What stinks is that it’s suffocating in a fantastic city like Cincinnati, where the fan base is flawless,” he continued, according to ESPN. I’m not implying that they’re awful individuals. “The system is a disaster.”
The ownership of the Cincinnati Reds should be ashamed of themselves.
Since 1995, the Reds haven’t won a postseason series. Since 2006, when Bob Castellini became owner, Cincinnati has only had five winning seasons and four playoff berths.
Fans have been asking for the Castellini family to sell the franchise after the team’s bizarre offseason decisions. Instead of attempting to win back die-hard fans, Phil Castellini challenged the Reds’ fan base ahead of the team’s home opener this week.
“Well, where you gonna go? Let’s start there. Sell the team to who?” he said to 700 WLW “… If you want to have this debate, if you wanna look at what would you do with this team to have it be more profitable, make more money, compete more in the current economic system that this game exists, it would be to pick it up and move it somewhere else. So, be careful what you ask for.”
Phil has apologized since then, but the harm has already been done.
The Castellini family will never provide a winner to the Reds’ faithful. They are getting Tommy Pham and Jake Fraley instead of Nick Castellanos and Jesse Winker, who they deserve.
Castellanos was correct in criticizing ownership, and maybe other former Reds players will do the same. It’s past time to evict the Castellinis from Cincinnati.
Baseball Reference provided the statistics.
RELATED: Hunter Greene, Baseball’s LeBron James, Makes a Thunderous Debut for the Cincinnati Reds
