The Reds have declined their 2027 mutual options for third baseman Eugenio Suárez and right-hander Pierce Johnson, the team announced. Both players are now free agents, leaving the Reds with five openings on their 40-man roster.

Neither decision comes as a surprise, especially considering it has been over a decade since both a team and a player triggered a mutual option. Suárez’s $16MM option did not come with a buyout. Meanwhile, the Reds chose to pay Johnson a $1MM buyout in lieu of the $8MM they would have owed him had both sides exercised the option.

Unless the 35-year-old Suárez sticks around on a new deal, this will wrap up his second stint in Cincinnati. The right-handed slugger previously played there from 2015-21, when he put together three seasons of at least 4.0 fWAR and two with 30-plus home runs. He also earned his first of two All-Star nods during that stretch.

The Reds first moved on from Suárez when they sent him (and outfielder Jesse Winker) to the Mariners in a blockbuster trade three weeks before the 2022 season opened. He then spent two seasons with Seattle before going to Arizona for one and a half. The Diamondbacks traded him back to the Mariners ahead of the 2025 deadline. Between the D-backs and pennant-contending Mariners last year, Suárez swatted 49 homers for the second time in his career and slashed .228/.298/.526. Despite a low batting average and on-base percentage, he put up a solidly above-average wRC+ of 125.

The Reds likely expected more of the same from Suárez when they guaranteed him $15MM last offseason, but the move didn’t pan out as hoped. When the All-Star break rolled around in mid-July, Suárez owned a dismal .208/.285/388 line. Thanks in part to his struggles, the Reds were sitting on a 43-52 record then. Suárez turned it on in a big way from August onward, as he recorded an .852 OPS that month and a .935 mark in September, but the Reds finished 75-87 and fell miles short of a second straight playoff berth. In late August, a month before their season ended, the Reds placed Suárez on revocable waivers. They would have saved around $2.5MM had somebody claimed him, but the rest of the league passed.

While Suárez was productive over the final two months of the season, he could only muster an overall line of .212/.307/.433 in 498 plate appearances. He racked up 26 homers, but his output was only 2% better than league average. A career-worst 33.9% strikeout rate didn’t help his cause. Suárez offered even less at the hot corner, where he earned negative grades (minus-7 Outs Above Average, minus-6 Fielding Run Value and minus-4 Defensive Runs Saved) over 50 games and 401 innings of work. For the first time in his career, most of his action came at designated hitter.

Ke’Bryan Hayes, who was one of the least valuable players in the game this year, was the Reds’ main option at third. Hayes is still under contract, and the Reds added Oswaldo Cabrera via waivers last month, but they could look for a better option in free agency or on the trade market if they don’t bring back Suárez.

A year ago at this time, Johnson was fresh off a season in which he gave the Braves 59 innings of 3.05 ERA ball. He parlayed that into a $6.5MM guarantee with the Reds in free agency, but it was another signing that didn’t go in the team’s favor. Despite averaging 95.8 mph on his fastball, Johnson struck out just 19.9% of hitters (against a roughly average 9% walk rate) and yielded a 4.62 ERA with similar underlying numbers across 48 2/3 frames. The 35-year-old is now on track to join 2026 bullpen mate Emilio Pagan, who declined his player option on Saturday, on the open market.

Photo courtesy of Katie Stratman, Imagn Images