The Cincinnati Reds sign 20-40 players on the international market every single year. Most of them go unnoticed at first. That wasn’t the case on May 30th back in 2016. That’s when the team signed a 17-year-old Fidel Castro. For non-baseball reasons, the signing stood out. When you share a name with a world famous dictator, it’s going to grab attention. Castro signed in late May of 2016, but he didn’t play until the following year. In 2017, as an 18-year-old, he struggled with the Dominican Summer League Reds, hitting .167/.253/.205, but he was moved to the Dominican Summer League Rojos in the second half and he turned things around quickly. In 20 games with the Rojos to end 2017 he hit .279/.375/.443.
The 2019 season began for Fidel Castro back with the Dominican Summer League Reds. And he got out to a great start on the first day of the season. The outfielder went 2-2 with a walk, triple, was hit by a pitch, scored three runs, and he drove in three more. Over the first two weeks of the season he was picking up where he had left off the year before. He hit .258 in that stretch, but posted a .378 on-base percentage and slugged .516. That carried forward in the final two weeks of June, too. In 10 games played he added five more extra-base hits, leading to a .600 slugging percentage, to go along with a .419 on-base percentage. Castro would finish June with a .273/.400/.561 line in 19 games played with 12 walks and 24 strikeouts.
July began with another strong week for Fidel Castro as he just continued to hit. With two more extra-base hits and a .313 average his assault on DSL pitching kept going. He did slump the next week, though, going 1-12. The slump didn’t last long. Over the next 11 days he would go 8-28 (.286) with five extra-base hits and seven walks, posting a .980 OPS. July 27th would be the last game he would play in the Dominican Republic as he was promoted to stateside to join the Arizona League Reds. He would debut on the final day of the month, going 1-4. In 17 games during July he would hit .250/.400/.450 with 13 walks and 19 strikeouts in 75 trips to the plate.
Now in the United States, Fidel Castro didn’t hold back at the plate. The outfielder went 5-15 with three extra-base hits in the first week of August. He also stole two bases. He only played in three games the second week, but hit .333 once again, and added two more extra-base hits to go with three walks. In his final seven games of the year he racked up seven more hits – including a triple – in 24 at-bats. The 19-year-old finished the month with a .320/.424/.540 line that included seven extra-base hits in 59 plate appearances. That did come with 22 strikeouts, though. He added in eight walks in that span.
For all 2018 Season Reviews and Scouting Reports – click here (these will come out during the week throughout the offseason).
Fidel Castro Spray Chart
Fidel Castro Scouting Report
I have never seen Fidel Castro play in person, and the number of people I’ve talked to about him can be counted on a few fingers – so the report below may be a little bit vague compared to some others in this series.
Hitting | The good thing with Fidel Castro is that he seems to use the entire field, and at least at this point in his career, he’s capable of doing damage to all parts of the field.
Power | The power may look a little better in the stats than it projects in the future. That’s more of a point that he had 26 extra-base hits in 52 games than anything else. He’s got a little bit of pop in his bat, but the numbers may be a bit better than the future projection does.
Speed | He’s an above-average runner.
Defense | Castro can play all three outfield spots, and is an above-average defender overall. In center he’s more average-ish, but handles the corners well.
Arm | He has an above-average arm.
Fidel Castro has some tools to work with. And in 2018 he certainly performed on the field where he posted a .924 OPS between the DSL Reds and the AZL Reds. There was power and there was patience.
There were also a whole lot of strikeouts. In the Dominican Summer League he struck out nearly 28% of the time. That jumped up to nearly 35% in his 17 games with the AZL Reds. When he made contact the left-handed hitter did a whole lot of damage, but moving forward he’s going to have to make more contact. His batting average on balls in play during the season was .421 and that simply won’t continue to hold up. To counteract the drop that’s coming there, more contact is going to have to be made. We’ve got the proof that when he makes contact, he’s capable of outstanding things. Cutting back a little bit on the aggressiveness could go a long way.
Interesting Stat on Fidel Castro
He showed pretty big splits in 2018. He hit .302/.406/.584 against right-handed pitchers. But he really struggled to hit lefties. In 39 plate appearances (and this should be noted as an extremely small sample size) he hit just .148 without a single extra-base hit, and struck out 12 times. But, he did walk nine times, giving him an on-base percentage of .410 against lefties.
Well I hope Fidel makes it to the Reds someday. With Harvey signing elsewhere another option gone looks like we are not going to get the pitching but I have to say he is not worth 11mil plus options of up to another 3 million in incentives. If that Dodger rumor was real they need to try and get that done or if not happening then get the best outfielder available Jones or Pollack and try to bolster the hitting. Trade scooter for lottery pick in Gray and go with Senzel from day 1 at 2b.
Yeah $11m is too rich for my blood. I had thought $6-8m would have been reasonable. I’m glad someone else has taken him off the table.
I know they have Senzel and all but im in no rush to trade the 2018 team leader in WAR for a 1 WAR pitcher. If someome where to take on his salary and give up real prospects, maybe. Maybe an Alex Wood straight up, but your still losing some serious offense.
I agree with you Nate and Ryan. However, I think though if you get either Adam Jones or A J Pollock for CF to go along with Senzel at 2B you would have more offense generated than you did the last few years with Hamilton and Scotter respectively. This may end up being a situation where you need to get the hitting instead of pitching almost at this point unless you can make a trade for pitching for instance with LA or Cle. If you can’t then the hope there in lies that the new coaches, specifically the pitching coach would be able to help teach and coach up some of our talented young arms like Sims and Reed like he was able to do apparently in Milwaukee the last few years.
I agree with you Ryan. I would not be against this trade if in included more the the Reds. For instance:
To the Reds: Realmuto, Gray
To the Marlins: Siri, Gutierrez, (Albert Abreu or Florial)
To the Yankees: Gennett
Gennett has real Value. I am not sure that Gray has more value than Roark. I think they are similar.
I think Jones would be a downgrade in CF for the Reds. From 2016 – 2018 Jones had a WAR of 4.2. Over the same period Billy Hamilton had a WAR of 5.4. Last year Jones had a WAR of 0.5 vs. 1.3 for Billy Hamilton. Jones’ WAR peaked in 2013 but has gone down in each of the 5 years since then.
If we are going the cheap route I would much rather sign Troy Tulowitzki at the ML minimum and promise him everyday AB at SS. Move Peraza to CF and hope Tulo is healthy again.
Everyday AB at SS and playing in GASP may be enough to bring him here. But alas, 11 teams made it known they were scouting him and the Reds were not on the list.
I would trade Scooter for Gray as long as the Yankees threw a little something else in, but the domino effect it would have on the team as a whole makes a lot of sense. A SP who has legit upside to rebound as a TOR or at least middle of the rotation guy, and Senzel plays 2B providing better up the middle defense and also an above average bat for the position. I wouldn’t want a multi-year signing for CF because we have one of Trammell/Siri/Freidl hopefully just a year out. Just need a 1 year stop gap for that spot this year, which means it shouldn’t be as expensive.
I’m not mortgaging the future for ONE year of Gray and TWO years of Realmuto.
Hang on to Gutierrez. He’s got a plus FB and a plus Curve, with a solid changeup and control. I’d rather have him for six years, starting in 2020, than three years total for the other two. Let Senzel learn CF (he couldn’t be much worse than Choo) and then if Gennett moves on after 2019, he can slide back to 2B. In 2020 you give Siri a shot in CF. If that doesn’t work out, you can bring up Trammell in September of ’20. If Senzel grows into CF, in 2020 Shed Long could man 2B. Siri or Senzel, both have strong arms and could handle CF and RF, perhaps interchangeably, as they progress or fail to do so.
As I said in another post, if the Reds goal is to win 81 games in 2019 and 2020, woohoo, let’s trade for Realmuto (but Gray and Realmuto alone won’t get you to 81 wins in 2019). If the goal is to contend for the playoffs for several years, Realmuto is fool’s gold.
Spend any serious resources you have on a TOR pitcher, period. If it’s not for at least 3 years, pass. Myself, give me Keuchel for 4-5 years. Let Santillan, Gutierrez, and Greene join Keuchel and Castillo in the rotation over the next few years. Hold on to Senzel, Trammell, Greene, India, Gutierrez, Santillan, etal and contend for many years.
Doug,
Just seeing the two most recent articles on the site…I have to ask this question.
Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist party?
LOL. God bless the Red, White, and Blue.
I think Fidel will dictate his own progress. Also of note, his brother Raul works well with him and is a prospect as well.
booooooooooooooooo lol
Nicely done Mort.
Raul is deep in his decline phase, though.
But won’t they have to dig him up to play? Or summon him from his perch in Hades?
I’m impressed with how Doug knows how 2019 will start for Castro
lol
Missed that. What really surprises me is that he is headed back to the DSL.
Doug, Great timing on story following yesterday’s Cuba story.
Reds have stated they will invest 30M additional for this season.. they have spent bout a 3rd of this on Roark, a number 4 type starter who is an innings eater.
Don’t see any moves that have improved Reds so far for 2019.
President of Baseball Operations has done a lot of big talking BUT not doing any action. I beleive the talk was just.BLUSTER to try and stop additional hemorrhaging from season ticket holders.. The reality appeats to be that Reds ownership and front office
Don’t have a plan to build team or organization..
When u rush u get ripped off. W Brantley off the market for so little reds are in a great spot w pollock and right there on Keuchel. Be patient friend. Spring is a while away still
I think everyone is waiting on Harper and Machado. Multiple teams have set aside money for these two and once they sign the remaining teams are going to have to react. So, I think until these two sign the market will remain pretty stagnate. Outside of those two, I think there are multiple players waiting for the losers, and their deep pockets, to spend the money they set aside. In order to get one of these players the Reds would have to throw stupid money at them, and I think the current FO isn’t comfortable being that aggressive, especially since guys like Kuechel aren’t without flaws. To me, this seems pretty shrewd.