Texas Rangers: This trade with the Reds would help both sides

The Cincinnati Reds have a need for a shortstop. The Texas Rangers have one to spare.

You couldn’t ask for better trade circumstances, wherein both sides would have a chance to benefit from a swap.

After losing out on Didi Gregorius in free agency to the Phillies, Marcus Semien to the Blue Jays, Andrelton Simmons to the Twins, former incumbent Reds shortstop Freddy Galvis to the Orioles and with few alternatives remaining on the free agent market, the Reds are beginning to enter desperation territory in their search to plug a glaring shortstop vacancy.

The Texas Rangers and Cincinnati Reds make sense as trade partners.

Some big name shortstops could be available via the trade market, including Rockies’ superstar Trevor Story, but would the Reds want to part ways with major assets for potentially one season of Story’s services? This is unknown.

What isn’t unknown, however, is the Texas Rangers’ desire to off-load one or both of Elvis Andrus and Rougned Odor‘s contracts.

Both veteran infielders have struggled mightily over the last few years, and really haven’t been effective Major League-caliber starters since the last playoff runs of 2015 and 2016.

In fact, both Andrus and Odor posted negative WARs in 2020, further attesting to their recent futility.

But perhaps a change of scenery could do Elvis Andrus some good.

Like maybe a change of scenery up north to Cincinnati and its hitter-friendly Great American Ballpark.

Andrus has two years remaining on his eight-year, $120 million contract signed back in 2014.

The Rangers would be looking to offload at least some of that remaining salary in any potential deal.

Knowing that most teams aren’t in position to take on more salary in 2021, though, Texas would have to be willing to eat some money in a potential Andrus trade.

Perhaps a trade that sends Andrus and cash to the Queen City in exchange for a lower ranked Reds prospect like a Jared Solomon could make some degree of sense.

In this exchange, Cincinnati finally acquires the shortstop it’s been seeking all off-season, and has the player for multiple years, with the possibility of a bounce-back campaign from Andrus in a new environment as well.

For the Texas Rangers, they off-load some of Andrus’ nagging contract and pick up a depth piece for his services, while also clearing the way for some of their younger talent to receive opportunities in 2021 and beyond.

In our opinion, this trade would be the true definition of what we’d call a “win-win” scenario for both sides.

What say you, Blog Red Machine?