As of right now the Reds have $66,500,000 tied up in Harang, Arroyo, Cordero, Rolen, Phillips, Taveras, Lincoln, Rhodes, Hernandez ($1M buyout if they don't take his option) and Weathers (if they pick up his $3.7M option for 2010... given that they are paying him 3.5 this year, I bet they pick it up). Lets assume those guys are on the roster next year, here is what we are looking like:
Starting Pitchers
Bronson Arroyo
Aaron Harang
Relief Pitchers
Francisco Cordero
Arthur Rhodes
David Weathers
Mike Lincoln
Infielders
Brandon Phillips
Scott Rolen
Outfielders
Willy Taveras
That is 9 players taking up about all of our current payroll thats estimated to be in the 70-75 million limit.
Lets assume these guys will also be on the pitching roster for sure: Cueto, Owings, Volquez, Bailey, Masset, Herrera. Lets just round their numbers off at $500,000 each. Thats $3M. We are now at $69.5M in payroll.
Lets assume these position players will be on our roster for sure: Votto, Bruce, Dickerson and Hanigan. Lets call it $500,000 each for them as well. Now we are sitting at $71.5M for this roster:
Starting Pitchers
Edinson Volquez
Aaron Harang
Bronson Arroyo
Johnny Cueto
Homer Bailey
Bullpen
David Weathers
Francisco Cordero
Arthur Rhodes
Mike Lincoln
Micah Owings
Nick Masset
Danny Herrera
Infielders
Ryan Hanigan
Joey Votto
Brandon Phillips
Scott Rolen
Outfielders
Jay Bruce
Chris Dickerson
Willy Taveras
So we need to fill a starting shortstop and an entire bench with about 0 to 3 million dollars unless Bob is going to increase the payroll. Unless the Reds go with something like Cozart at SS and a bench made up of Sutton, Rosales, Stubbs, Heisey and Tatum its going to be really tough to keep this team at a budget of $70-75M next year without some other move coming where we dump salary. It also means that we shouldn't even expect a splash of the Willy Taveras proportion this offseason because the money just isn't there.