Why the Reds Shouldn’t Trade Elly De La Cruz Yet

The Cincinnati Reds closed out a forgettable 2026 campaign with little to show for it beyond the continued rise of Elly De La Cruz.

The 24-year-old shortstop delivered a career-best season, batting .283 with 30 home runs, 30 doubles, 30 stolen bases and an .880 OPS while posting roughly 6.4 WAR.

His combination of power, speed and athleticism has made him one of the most dynamic young position players in baseball.

Yet the club around him fell well short of expectations and finished outside the postseason race.

Chris Landers of FanSided sees a realistic scenario in which Cincinnati at least listens to offers on its franchise player this winter.

The Reds’ lineup still has clear holes, ownership has shown little willingness to open the checkbook, and earlier extension discussions appear to have stalled after De La Cruz turned down a deal that would have surpassed Joey Votto’s previous club-record contract.

In that environment, trading the shortstop for a transformative package of young talent is not an outlandish idea on paper.

At the same time, Landers notes that the Reds hold the leverage: De La Cruz remains under team control for three more seasons before free agency.

Without an extraordinary return, Cincinnati can simply keep him and reassess later.

That three-year runway is the central reason any deal remains unlikely.

De La Cruz is entering his first arbitration year and will not reach the open market until after the 2029 season.

Small-market clubs rarely surrender that kind of cost-controlled production unless the incoming talent is overwhelming.

Reports have already linked him to clubs such as the Dodgers and Red Sox, and former executives have suggested the Reds would at least field calls.

Still, the asking price would have to resemble the historic packages that have moved other pre-free-agency stars, not a conventional collection of mid-tier prospects.

For now, the most probable outcome is that De La Cruz opens 2027 in a Reds uniform.

Cincinnati’s front office can continue shopping for complementary pieces while waiting to see whether a true blockbuster emerges.

If no such offer appears, the club retains one of the sport’s most exciting players at a fraction of the price he would command on the open market.

Only a return that fundamentally resets the organization is likely to change that calculation.

There is another layer to this story that makes the timing of any trade particularly tricky.

A Sports Illustrated analysis of the situation argues that the Reds should wait to trade Elly De La Cruz, not rush into a deal this winter.

The reasoning begins with team control.

The Reds currently control De La Cruz until 2030.

Although the future of Major League Baseball is up in the air, Elly should still be with the Reds whenever the 2027 season begins.

If the Reds do decide to move on from Elly, why not wait until at least 2029, see where they stand competitively, and get the most out of him while he’s in their uniform?

Simply put, if the Reds want any chance of being a winning team in 2027, they will need Elly to be on their roster.

While many think this is unlikely, and understandably so, the team should be willing to roll the dice with him on the roster.

You’ll be hard-pressed to fill that roster spot, even with the abundance of shortstops in the organization.

The other issue is depth.

The Reds have drafted a group of middle infielders over the years, but the few who have had chances to play at the big league level have left a lot to be desired.

Edwin Arroyo was called up this year when Elly went on the IL, and had a .549 OPS in 160 plate appearances.

Matt McLain is naturally a shortstop but has made a solid double-play duo with Elly as the Reds’ everyday second baseman.

Also, since his shoulder injury in 2024, he has struggled at the plate over the last two seasons.

Noelvi Marte has been moved to right field, and while he has shown glimpses of his talent, he hasn’t shown much reason for hope for his major league future.

The Reds’ farm system has talented shortstops, but none of them are particularly close to being Major League ready.

The Reds selected Steele Hall and Justin LeBron with their first-round picks in the last two MLB Drafts.

Both guys have given reasons for hope, but are currently in Single-A ball.

Tyson Lewis, Eric Becker, and Liberts Aponte also identify as shortstops, but none of them have reached the upper minors yet.

This lack of near-term replacement options makes trading De La Cruz now a gamble that could leave the Reds without a competent shortstop for the next several seasons.

A FanGraphs analysis of the offseason trade market adds another dimension to the discussion.

Unlike the 2022 ultra-free-agent class that included Corey Seager, Carlos Correa, and Trevor Story, the pickings are quite slim at shortstop this year.

Mauricio Dubón and J.P. Crawford — useful, but not building-block players — are the best the position has to offer.

As such, any team with a shortstop-sized hole on its roster would be wiser to peruse the trade market, where two young players with immense talent but without long-term contracts could aptly fill in: Gunnar Henderson of the Orioles and Elly De La Cruz of the Reds.

Henderson, the onetime wunderkind, has had an alarming decline in production since putting up 7.9 WAR and a 154 wRC+ as a 23-year-old in 2024.

That season — which also came with a .281 batting average, 21 stolen bases, and a fourth-place MVP finish — serves as a reminder of what he is capable of.

But a quick check of both his traditional stats and the peripherals shows that he has not been the same hitter since.

Part of that, as Henderson revealed after this season, Baltimore’s second straight below .500, has been the result of shoulder and wrist injuries.