As of the morning of May twenty ninth, there have been 171 gamers who’ve logged no less than 120 plate appearances at the AAA stage thus far this season. Noelvi Marte is one in every of them, and none of the different gamers in that group has hit for the next common (.371) than him.
He ranks fifth amongst that group with a 1.005 OPS, surrounded on the leaderboard by acquainted names like Rece Hinds (1.045, 4th) and Edwin Arroyo (.960, 14th). Unlike Hinds, although, his 15.8% strikeout price ranks amongst the hardest to fan amongst that pattern, rating as the fifteenth lowest.
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These are good numbers. Very good, excellent numbers, certainly. They aren’t in any respect the numbers the Cincinnati Reds are on the lookout for, nonetheless, as they gauge whether or not or not to carry Marte back into the huge league fold.
At the huge league stage to start the 2026 season, Marte struggled mightily with these conventional manufacturing stats, however greater than something he struggled with lots of the underlying ones hitting coaches in every single place break down on movie every day. In specific, Marte posted a forty five.8% O-Swing% in his time with the Reds, a mark that measures how typically a participant swung at pitches that had been situated outdoors of the strike zone. Among the 309 gamers who logged no less than 30 PA by April 14th – the day Marte was optioned back to AAA due to his struggles – that ranked 9th highest in the sport.
The prevailing sentiment about the hole between huge league pitching and the pitching in AAA ball proper now isn’t a lot about ‘stuff’ as it’s about ‘command.’ In AAA, a ball two inches outdoors the zone is usually a trackable supply that’s merely lacking its spot, a pitch supposed to be a strike that merely wasn’t correct sufficient. That’s the sort of pitch the place increasing the zone doesn’t harm a lot, as chasing a four-seamer with a little bit of an extended swing can nonetheless produce glorious contact. Pitches two inches outdoors the zone at the huge league stage, although, are so typically there by design – pitches with sufficient motion to appear to be they’re going to be in the meat of the zone solely to dive simply out of attain at the final.
The fear early with Marte was that whereas he was producing at the AAA stage after being despatched down, a number of that was nonetheless coming by swinging at pitch areas that might penalize him, and the Reds offense, if he saved that up upon returning to the bigs. So far with the Bats, although, Marte has begun to rein in these tendencies, and thus far sports activities only a 35.4% O-Swing% at the AAA stage this 12 months. That’s rather more in-line with the place he was at the huge league stage in 2025 (33.0%) and at AAA final 12 months (35.1%), suggesting that he’s starting to goal the proper sort of pitches at which to swing in lieu of free-swinging in a way that merely gained’t work at the highest stage.
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That’s half the equation for Marte preventing his way back onto the energetic roster of the Reds. The different, in fact, is the place the heck he’s going to play, one thing the Reds have been making an attempt to work out since the second they acquired him from the Seattle Mariners.
The Reds picked him up as a SS, and promptly started working him there, at 3B, and even at 2B for a time. We all know their insistence on upgraded protection over his at 3B final summer season led to the fateful choice to purchase Ke’Bryan Hayes, a transfer that shifted Marte to a nook outfield spot the place he’d by no means performed earlier than. He’s nonetheless getting run in RF thus far this season, but in every of his most up-to-date appearances with the Bats he’s began and performed solely in CF – one thing that has coincided with the AAA outfield shedding Rece Hinds to the Marlins and Blake Dunn to the huge league roster.
Clearly, Reds brass is doing their greatest to equip him to be the most versatile model of himself defensively so as to get him back on the roster in some type, in some unspecified time in the future. The extra positions he can play, the fewer pitches he chases will proceed to inch him nearer to a return to the Reds, one thing that appears inevitable if he continues to carry out at this sort of stage.
The greatest downside for him now, although, is that the Reds have seemingly discovered a lineup at the huge league stage that’s producing properly sufficient with out him. Dunn has change into the apple of Terry Francona’s eye atop the order and in CF, his velocity and protection calling playing cards being buttressed by extra offense (particularly towards RHP) than most anybody anticipated. That’s beside JJ Bleday carving out an important on a regular basis function in a single outfield nook, whereas Spencer Steer has had maybe the hottest bat on the membership apart from Bleday for the final month whereas, most of the time, occupying the different outfield nook – that’s as a result of 3B/1B/DH have been seized by Sal Stewart, Eugenio Suarez, and Nathaniel Lowe.
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Even if the Reds had been to name time on Matt McLain at 2B for a bit, sliding Steer to 2B and calling up Marte for a nook OF spot won’t be the most direct transfer. Arroyo has hit so rattling properly and is deserving of his personal shot at huge league pitching, and he’s a extra pure match for 2B in that alignment. And if Dunn begins to battle as huge league pitching will get extra of a e-book on him, there’s an actual probability he nonetheless sticks round as the twenty sixth man due to his protection and velocity whereas the membership turns CF back over to TJ Friedl as soon as extra in hopes that the latter can absolutely shrug off the hunch he started the 2026 deeply inside.
So, the 24 12 months previous Marte certain appears to be like like he’s going to have to marinate with Louisville for some time longer, barring some disaster. And if that’s nonetheless the case come July, we’ll discover out if there’s one other crew on the market who, throughout commerce season, might need larger eyes for the way forward for Marte than the Reds do – particularly if it means the Reds get one thing for a playoff push they’ll extra readily use in 2026.