With a year and a half remaining on his three-year, $45-million contract, Jeimer Candelario has been designated for assignment by the Cincinnati Reds.

The Reds signed the switch-hitting first baseman and third baseman on the heels of their surprising 2023 season to help bring veteran leadership and a steady offensive presence to the young team. Candelario hit just .207/.265/.394 with 22 home runs in 134 games with the Reds over the last two seasons. He played in only 22 games this season before going on the injured list with a lumbar spine strain.

“We felt this gives us our best chance to win games to keep the guys we had here versus activating him,” said Nick Krall, the Reds’ president of baseball operations.

Candelario was placed on the IL on April 30. On Saturday, he completed his minor-league rehab assignment but hit just .211/.318/.333 in 15 games at Triple A, including one home run. He didn’t have a hit in his final two games with Louisville.

With Christian Encarnacion-Strand off the injured list, Noelvi Marte on a rehab assignment and Candelario not producing enough to serve as a designated hitter, there just wasn’t a spot for Candelario on the Reds’ active roster.

“At the end of the day, you have to look at it as a sunk cost because you can’t bring a player that’s not going to help his team win,” Krall said.

The 31-year-old Candelario hit 22 home runs and 39 doubles in a 2023 season split between the Washington Nationals and Chicago Cubs before the Reds signed him. He led the big leagues in doubles with 42 in 2021, when he hit .271/.351/.443, adding 13 homers for the Detroit Tigers that year. He struggled in his walk year with the Tigers in 2022, hitting just .217. The Nationals signed him to a one-year deal worth $5 million ahead of the 2023 season and then sent him to the Cubs at the trade deadline.

Candelario’s contract with the Reds paid him $13 million last season, $16 million this season and $13 million next year, with a $3 million buyout of an $18 million mutual option for 2027.

“I think this is a statement of intent. I think bringing Chase Burns is a statement of intent,” Krall said, referring to the imminent promotion of their top pitching prospect. “We want to win games, we felt that these are the moves that give us the best chance to win games.”

(Photo: Patrick Smith / Getty Images)