Jay Bruce Could End up Being a Solid Trade Chip For Cincinnati Reds After All

When an MLB team decides to strip down their roster and rebuild from the bottom back up, the front office normally has a certain vision for how everything is supposed to go.

For the Cincinnati Reds, it’s safe to say their rebuilding process hasn’t gone as planned so far. Trading Johnny Cueto to the Kansas City Royals for Brandon Finnegan, John Lamb and Cody Reed was a solid start, but many wonder about what they’ve accomplished since.

When it came to shipping their top MLB talent out of town to re-stock the organization with young and controllable players, here’s how it went over the winter:

• They had a trade in place with the Los Angeles Dodgers for Aroldis Chapman, until his off-field issues emerged. Then, they had to sell lower than expected by sending him to the New York Yankees for Eric Jagielo, Tony Renda, Rookie Davis and Caleb Cotham.
• They tried trading second baseman Brandon Phillips at least twice, but he didn’t let that happen, and probably won’t unless he gets an extension.
• Instead of being able to hold onto Todd Frazier, the Reds traded him in a three-team deal where some think the Dodgers got a better prospect haul.
• An attempted three-team deal that would’ve sent Jay Bruce to the Toronto Blue Jays was nixed because of another player’s medicals.

http://gty.im/525747796

Not exactly how they drew it up. After a surprising 5-1 start, Cincinnati has fallen back down to Earth, currently sitting at 9-13 before starting a road series against the Pittsburgh Pirates on Friday. As they continue playing top NL Central teams like the Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals and Pittsburgh, it’ll most likely keep getting worse.

The first 22 games have included a number of disappointments – mainly the bullpen and a really slow start from Joey Votto – but a pleasant surprise has been outfielder Jay Bruce. Cincinnati probably anticipated getting a good chunk of what they needed for a successful rebuild by dealing Cueto, Frazier and Chapman, but it didn’t happen and there’s still some work to be done.

The Reds have been trying to trade Bruce for a while, and it seems like something will finally happen this summer – especially if he continues producing like he has through his first 68 at-bats.

Despite two years of lackluster performances in 2014 and 2015 (when compared to what he did from 2011-13), Bruce has been involved in trade talks for a while due to a couple different reasons:

• He’s a corner outfielder with power at the plate. While his yearly strikeout totals hover around 150, a manager can anticipate him hitting at least 20 homers in a season (has done it seven times since debuting in 2008).
• He has a great contract situation for those in need of a short-term jolt. Now in his age-29 season, Bruce is in the final guaranteed year of a $51 million deal, and has an affordable $13 million team option for 2017.

One of the things seemingly blocking a deal from actually getting done was his declining production, which has been spurred by his approach at the plate. Through the years, he’s been swinging at more pitches out of the strike zone, along with whiffing at more pitches in general. Instead of remaining a 30-double, 30-homer threat, the slugging outfielder turned into an all-or-nothing kind of hitter.

Where was the production from Bruce we were accustomed to seeing before he underwent knee surgery in 2014? While he’s likely past his prime and it’d be unfair to expect those pre-knee surgery numbers again, his approach at the plate has greatly improved despite the small sample size of at-bats.

Eric Roseberry of SB Nation’s Red Reporter noted Bruce is pulling pitches at a much lower rate in 2016 than he has throughout his career, which is one welcome change. Another is his improved plate selection. Thanks to FanGraphs, here’s a look at what he did last year, compared to what he’s been doing so far this season:

Just from glancing at these stats, nobody wants to see a hitter’s O-Contact% (percentage of balls he connects with outside the strike zone) go up that much from one year to the next, but it’s actually not a big deal. Why? Well, look at the significant decrease in pitches he’s swinging at outside the strike zone compared to 2015 (O-Swing%).

Since he’s swinging at fewer pitches out of the zone, it means he’s attacking those he can actually cause some damage with. His current line drive rate of 30.8% (it was 18.7% last year) is evidence that this is true.

Expecting a 30% line drive rate to stand up for the next five months is unrealistic, but a return to somewhere between the 20.7% he posted in 2014 and the 23.9% he posted in 2013 isn’t asking for too much. If he continues using the whole field, it’s entirely possible.

However, while this all seems to be in favor of Bruce and the Reds selling higher on him than originally anticipated, he’ll have to continue proving himself as the sample size grows. He’s been generally seeing the same diet of pitches, but has been in control of the count more often. His first-strike percentage has dropped from 58.9% last year to 53.3% so far this year.

It’s a little easier to lay off pitches out of the zone if a hitter is in control of the count. If that number creeps back up to around 60% like it’s been in recent years, it’ll be interesting to see if he’s able to maintain the same approach and results.

While the Reds will do the best they can with the players they have in 2016, the organization isn’t concerned with this season. So, even though it’s only been a month, they must be thrilled about Bruce’s .265/.320/.500 line with four homers, 15 RBI and that improved approach at the plate only because his trade value will get a boost.

After dealing with a number of failed proposed trades in recent months, selling higher than originally anticipated on Bruce is exactly what Cincinnati needs while in the beginning stages of this rebuilding process.

Thanks for reading! Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter so we can chat about baseball: @mmusico8.