Reds top prospect Nick Senzel lost much of the 2018 season due to injury, and it seems another health issue will cost him an opportunity to play in the Arizona Fall League. Senzel tells Bobby Nightengale of the Cincinnati Enquirer that he’ll undergo surgery to remove two bone spurs from his left (non-throwing) elbow and be sidelined for up to six weeks as a result.
It’s the latest setback for Senzel in a year that has featured all too much unwelcome injury trouble. The former No. 2 overall draft pick (2016) was out for nearly half the 2018 season owing to vertigo symptoms and a fractured finger that required surgical repair earlier this summer. On the plus side, Senzel still expects to be ready to go when Spring Training rolls around.
Still, Senzel’s absence from the AFL isn’t without consequence. With Eugenio Suarez now locked up as the Reds’ long-term third baseman following last spring’s seven-year extension, and Scooter Gennett possibly in line for an extension of his own, the Reds have shifted Senzel from the infield to the outfield. Senzel got some outfield work during instructional league play, and there’s general optimism that he’s athletic enough to handle the outfield; farm director Shawn Pender told C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic yesterday (Twitter link), “I don’t think there’s a position on the field he couldn’t play.”
Nonetheless, the AFL would’ve given Senzel the opportunity to accrue some valuable outfield experience in advance of Spring Training 2019. “…I wanted to get out in the outfield and do some reps,” Senzel tells Nightengale. “That was the plan to play in the Fall League. I couldn’t further risk more injury because I knew my elbow has been bothering me for the last 10 months. I played through it for as long as I could. “
To his credit, the 23-year-old Senzel didn’t play like someone whose swing was hampered by elbow pain. He raked at a .310/.378/.509 clip through 193 plate appearances in his first exposure to Triple-A earlier this season, despite the fact that he was facing considerably older competition. That marked a followup from Senzel’s terrific age-22 season in 2017, during which he hit a combined .321/.391/.514 while splitting the year between Class-A Advanced and Double-A.
Given his offensive upside, it’s not surprising to see Senzel’s name included in most top 10 overall prospect rankings from around the industry. The upcoming procedure will deprive him of some outfield experience, potentially delaying his path to the big leagues, but it still seems likely that he’ll have the opportunity to impact the Reds at the Major League level in 2019.
The Reds just need to move on from this kid
A 23-year-old, top prospect with superstar potential? Sure, they should just give up and move on.
I can’t imagine why they would do that. He’s 23 and a top prospect!
Move on from a near consensus top 10 prospect who performed well at both AA and AAA, and has position flexibility? Why?
Lol, yes lets move away from the #4 prospect in baseball. Let’s just stick with him a while longer to see if this kid can get it together.
Why? He cost basically nothing, and he’s a top 10 (arguably top 5) prospect in baseball. You clearly know absolutely nothing.
This is silly – move on from a cheap, super-prospect with a hit-tool like his? He was the best pure hitter of his draft and owns a .390 OBP/.904 OPS through the minors with power and speed (40-65 SBs). CIN has been shuffling him around until they extended Suarez at 3B. I wish he fell to my Braves at #3. I’m sure PHI wish it picked differently (Moniak).
Move on from him? Haha
you’re all biting on such obvious bait smh c’mon reds nation
Hopefully he’s healthy come spring. He should be a super utility until a permanent position comes available. That will afford him, and the team the ability to see him all over the diamond to see where he fits best. The infield is locked up, unless they trade Senzel, but I’d be happy to see Herrera get a shot at 2B. He’s got nice pop, a good glove, and has shown he can bat for a good average. He just needs the AB’s.
I’ve been saying this for two years… The Reds should move Suarez back to shortstop.
I don’t think he could still play SS. He has bulked up, lowering his quickness, and increasing his power.
Peraza had a very nice season at SS and proved he’s an everyday player…
agreed. Perazas trajectory is moving up and up. There’s 200 hit seasons in that bat
Yep!!
Why didn’t he have this surgery when he had his thumb surgery?
HMOs man. :/
Because surgery is not a good thing. And because he probably didn’t mention anything. He was raking all season so it wasn’t effecting his performance so there was no reason for him to cause alarm
He did say it has been bothering him for about 10 months. If he failed to say something, well then that’s on him, but that certainly wasn’t the right thing to do. If he did say something and the org put it off, they should be ashamed of the mishandling of this situation. I really like Senzel and want to see him with the Reds as soon as possible, so it’s just disappointing that for whatever reason this surgery wasn’t decided on much sooner so he can get the extra defensive experience he needs.
I’m going on the assumption that he was mum on the subject. They most certainly would’ve done an MRI and seen the spurs. Considering a 6 week layoff he would’ve been on roughly the same schedule as his thumb
What a mess this organization is. Just when you think they have one guy that could help, he becomes injury prone.
I think zachary was just trying to get a rise out of y’all and it worked
I dunno, there are plenty of reactionary idiots with Hot Takes® when something like this happens so I’m guessing he was sincere
I think Zachary was not
He was not kidding
I think once Senzel gets comfortable in the outfield, they could very well deal Winker for pitching. With his stick he could bring a good return from the right AL team…
Senzel could net them pitching, so there’s that.
Senzel isn’t the defense of liability that winker is…
Nah. Never trade a top MLB ready multi-position playing prospect for pitching. Especially one rated top 5 by everybody in the business.
Senzel will be fine and be up by early May. Can play multiple positions until a trade determines his full-time spot.
Log jam in that outfield though. If no deal is made Hamilton is gone after ’19 I believe. Could we see Winker LF/Senzel CF/Schebler RF in ’20?