OnlyBucs

The Reds do have 4 of the top 51 prospects on MLB.com and the Bucs have 2.



If they deal for Realmuto they will need to give up at least one if not two.



I think the Pirates are still a little better than Reds (plus why not be at least a little optimistic in January).



I'm almost hoping that the Reds do decent this year so that they don't deal players for prospects to beef up their farm system.



If they do poorly this season they may have a chance to reload (or load).

536E707D72787351796E7F79781C0 wrote: The Reds are better than the Pirates assuming that Suarez and Gennett perform like MVP candidates again, and somehow three middling pitchers improve upon moving to one of the most offensive friendly home parks in all of baseball.  Roark, Wood and Gray are all improvements to what the Reds would have had in the rotation, but this is the equivalent of adding three Mike Leakes to your rotation. It's great that you can plop these guys in there and know your going to get 5 pretty good innings, but you don't want a rotation full of Mike Leakes when you have no bullpen. That is why you have to look at the totality of the roster, yeah, any of these Reds guys would make the Pirates' rotation in the 5 spot, but the strength of the Pirates rotation is that they can comfortably hand the game over to the bullpen anytime into the 6th inning.




Well Alex Wood would not be in the 5th spot in our rotation as constructed. His projections are actually better than almost all of our starters.

I think the Reds offense in that small ballpark will really be strong. Puig may hit 35 homers this season, and he along with Votto, Suarez and Scotter make that lineup very good. I hope we win at least one out of the first three when we open the season.

Just my two cents, but I believe the Bucs are still a bit better than the Reds. It’s not much, but I’d still take our rotation, which is worth quite a bit.

666E6D5A4C694E412F0 wrote: Just my two cents, but I believe the Bucs are still a bit better than the Reds. It’s not much, but I’d still take our rotation, which is worth quite a bit.
Reds rotation last year was a disaster. They were 1-19 just in Homer Bailey's starts. Wood, Gray and Roark will upgrade that rotation. Taillon and Williams were very good last year. We expected it of Taillon and were pleasantly surprised by Williams. Let's see if Williams' success is sustainable. I hope it is. Time will tell. Archer hasn't been a dominant pitcher in 4 years. Let's hope he turns it around this year but maybe we should realistically expect the Archer of 2016, 2017 and 2018. Which is ok as long as we just want to avoid a below average pitcher. Musgrove had some very impressive stretches last year but is coming off an injury. Let's hope he pitches up to his potential. The 5th spot seems to be an uncertain mess right now.



Based on potential, the Pirate rotation should be better than the Reds but the Reds have improved theirs enough that it won't be horrible this year. The Pirate pitchers will be undermined by a bad defensive infield and lack of run support. I think the Bucs will take last place away from the Reds. I hope I'm wrong.

The Bucs won 14 games against the Reds last year. That won’t happen this year. The Reds have upgraded their rotation and they now have 5 guys in their lineup capable of 30+ homers.

Hopefully the Reds don’t get Realmuto or it would be a slam dunk that they will be better than the Bucs. I like our rotation, bullpen and catching but otherwise we have a very weak lineup in comparison. I think the Reds take the series with the Bucs this year.