Skeptical about the chances for a Cincinnati Reds World Series championship anytime soon in an MLB world of $765 million outfielders and the relentlessly spending Los Angeles Dodgers?

Get in line behind a large majority of MLB executives.

That might sound as obvious as it does pessimistic. But even with a Hall of Fame-caliber manager and coming off a playoff berth, a poll of executives representing more than two-thirds of MLB teams gave the Reds little chance of becoming the next World Series champ from among even the teams in its own division – a National League Central in the midst of its longest collective World Series drought since the division was formed in 1994.

Next fall will mark 10 years since the Central division from either league had a team in the World Series, since both did in 2016, with the Cubs beating Cleveland – long enough ago that nobody’s left from the Cubs’ roster or field staff and the other team goes by a new nickname.

In two trips to the National League Championship Series the past seven seasons, the NL Central hasn’t won so much as a game.

Meanwhile, the Dodgers have won five of the last nine National League pennants (and three World Series) by themselves.

So we asked baseball insiders from across both leagues during the recent general managers meetings at The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas for a prediction: Who will be the next World Series winner from the National League Central?

“If I happen to be in Las Vegas, and I was betting on it?” said one MLB executive. “I would say the Cubs just because of the payroll capacity and the market size and the maturation of the front office and operation.”

How long that might take, considering the roiling economic landscape and labor-contract turmoil, is another, more nebulous, question.

As one exec quipped, “That include realignment? Realignment is my answer.”

The comment about the Cubs roughly summed up the majority opinion in the survey of executives from 21 teams, conducted by two baseball writers from the Cincinnati Enquirer and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch over two days of conversations with baseball operations leaders.

The Reds got one vote because “they have a good foundation with good pitchers.”

The Cubs received the most votes, 11, with most citing their financial resources. And the 97-win, small-spending Brewers got seven. Neither the Cardinals nor Pirates received a vote. 

Two AL execs declined to vote.

All voters were given anonymity to incentivize candor. Of the 21 polled, 11 were from the National League, and all five NL Central teams were represented (with the stipulation that no one was allowed to vote for his own team).

Whether the results underscore the growing economic reality in the sport that sent only teams with top-four payrolls to the last two World Series, that revenue and payroll disparity between markets is why the question was asked in the first place.

Four of the bottom five teams in MLB’s “market score” rankings used to calculate revenue sharing are in the NL Central. The fifth NL Central team – the Cubs – are in the top five.

“The dynamics for winning in small markets continue to be more and more challenging as the years pass just given the resource gap between where the largest markets are and the revenues they generate and what they’re able to spend vs. the revenues smaller markets generate and what they’re able to spend,” one survey respondent said.

“There’s a massive gap in that.”

So that makes the Cubs the obvious choice when predicting the next World Series winner from the NL’s flyover division?

“They have the most money. They can dwarf anybody with resources,” one respondent said.

Three more who voted for the Cubs:

  • “A combination of resources, great people and great young talent.”
  • “They do a good job. They have smart people there and they’re going to have a little bit more resources.”
  • “The Cubs are a really strong team, really good defensive team; they’re position players are good. They have resources; they’re going to make moves. They’re going to be right back at it.”

And yet the Brewers have won the last two division titles and won more games than anyone in the majors during this season.

“It’s hard to bet against them. They keep doing it,” said one who voted for the Brewers.

Three others: 

  • “They’ve got it rolling.”
  • “I’m going to go with that as the safe choice until proven otherwise.”
  • “They’ve been winning it, and I don’t see them getting worse. They may only be getting better. They’ve got a lot of young players. Jackson Chourio is going to get better. Brice Turang is going to get better. Jacob Misiorowski is going to get better. It’s tough to bet on anyone else right now, given their base of young talent.”

So what does any of this mean for the Reds, who bring back one of the best starting rotations in the game almost in its entirety, one of the best managers in the game (Terry Francona), one of the most dynamic young position players (Elly De La Cruz) and a payroll that remains flat from its sub-$120-million level of 2025?

Team president Nick Krall shrugged when told the results of the survey, apparently unsurprised by the big-money Cubs getting the most votes as he sets out again this winter try to beat the odds.

“We’re doing the best we can to figure out how to build a sustainable team to get to the postseason,” he said, “and trying to win a World Series.”