Left-hander Evan Kravetz and infielder Davis Wendzel both went unclaimed on waivers and were sent outright to Triple-A Louisville, according to Mark Sheldon of MLB.com on X. The Reds designated both players for assignment during the last week.
Kravetz, 27, was added to the roster last week and is making his major league debut. He appeared in one game, pitching two-thirds of an inning without allowing a run, before being designated for assignment. He cannot refuse this assignment because he has only a few days of service time and no previous career outrights.
As a result, he will return to Louisville as a non-roster player, providing the club with some left-handed depth. He has now pitched 42 1/3 innings for the Bats this season, with a 3.40 earned run average. His walk rate of 11.7% was high, yet he struck out 25% of hitters faced.
Wendzel, 27, was previously a relatively well-known talent in the Rangers’ organization. That team took him 41st overall in the 2019 draft, but his bat never quite lived up to expectations. From 2021 to the present, he has appeared in 338 minor league games, posting a combined slash line of.232/.338/.426, for a 91 wRC+.
He got off to a solid start this year and was promoted to the Texas roster in April. In his first 47 major league plate appearances, he hit.128/.163/.234 while dealing with various optional assignments. His blazing start in the minors has cooled, and his triple-A line for the season is now.266/.361/.407. That includes stops with the Rangers’ and Reds’ Triple-A organizations, as Texas designated him for assignment at the end of July and traded him to Cincinnati for cash.
This time, no trade was conceivable because the deadline had past and none of the other 29 teams were willing to claim him off waivers. He, like Kravetz, will report to Louisville and provide the club with non-roster depth. Wendzel has played all four infield positions in his career, thus he can provide coverage throughout the field.
