Four Reds who won't return article

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

Everyone is so quick to move on from India, but he is a proven MLB-caliber average starter on a team lacking them.

Putting McLain at 2B means then you have to put DLC at SS and DLC is NOT a SS, no matter how much we might wish him to be. He had 13 errors in under 600 innings at SS. For comparison, McLain had 1 error in a little over 450 innings at SS. DLC had -5 defensive runs saved at SS, McLain had +4.

I know DLC will get all the chance in the world as a starter next year because of his talent, but he hit .191/.272/.355 (.627 OPS) while striking out 36% of the time after the All-Star break, which was 2/3rds of the time he was in the majors. You can't both pencil his bat into the lineup where he's a liability AND pencil his glove into SS where he's a liability. He did pretty well at 3B, so maybe you find an OF spot for Marte.

Or, maybe DLC just starts 2024 in AAA. There WILL be an injury (there always is) and he can be the first called up. Once there's an injury and you have already traded India away, then you're going to end up with a Stuart Fairchild, Kevin Newman, or Henry Ramos starting every day. Heck, we had Spencer Steer playing 2B for awhile this year.

Henry Ramos, Kevin Newman, Hunter Renfroe, Wil Myers, Jose Barrero, Nick Senzel, and Luke Maile all had games at DH for the Reds this year.

This year....
Nick Senzel had 330 PA, 85 OPS+, 0.0 WAR
Stuart Fairchild had 255 PA, 90 OPS+, 0.4 WAR
Kevin Newman had 253 PA, 81 OPS+, -0.4 WAR
Jose Barrero had 149 PA, 67 OPS+, -0.5 WAR
Wil Myers had 141 PA, 46 OPS+, -0.6 WAR
Curt Casali had 96 PA, 36 OPS+, 0.1 WAR
Henry Ramos had 86 PA, 80 OPS+, 0.2 WAR

That's 1,310 PA totaling -0.8 WAR... injuries will happen again in 2024. It's sports, there's no such thing as having an entire starting lineup top-to-bottom staying healthy all year.

We don't have such an overflowing talent and abundance of depth problem that we can just get rid of Jonathan India while he still has 3 years of team control left. They just need to keep him out of batting 3rd, where he was terribly miscast and left to flounder.

India 2023 batting leadoff: .266/.374/.408 (.781 OPS)
India 2023 batting third: .211/.296/.404 (.700 OPS)
India career average: .255/.350/.419 (.769 OPS)

When batting leadoff this year (281 of his 529 PA) he was exactly what the back of his baseball card says he is. A slightly above average hitter with a good OBP.