The A's and Reds are Building a History of Mutually Beneficial Trades

The trade that the A's and Reds made at the deadline has worked out well for both clubs

Jul 23, 2025; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; General view of Cincinnati Reds hat during the game against the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park. Mandatory Credit: Brad Mills-Imagn Images | Brad Mills-Imagn Images

The Athletics and Cincinnati Reds made a deal at the Trade Deadline that went under the radar on a busy day of transactions, with the A's sending Miguel Andujar to the Reds, and receiving right-hander Kenya Huggins in return.

Cincinnati has made out well from this deal, adding a big-time impact bat to their lineup. Over the course of August, the free-agent-to-be went 24-for-65 (.369) with a .431 OBP and a 1.031 OPS, belting three homers and driving in 13 RBI. That's solid production for the amount of playing time he received.

He's been injured the majority of September, however, dealing with a quad issue, and has gone just 2-for-7 in his limited number of at-bats. In that span of games, they've gone just 5-7 while the New York Mets have absolutely imploded, so despite the losing record, the Reds have still gained ground and currently sit 2.5 games back of the NL Wild Card, though they now have company.

Both the San Francisco Giants and Arizona Diamondbacks are ahead of them, sitting at 1.5 and two games back entering play on Monday.

While the A's sent over a big, productive piece for the Reds, they also just completed a sweep of Cincy over the weekend, maximizing the long ball over the three-game set. They also received an introduction to Nick Kurtz, who crushed the longest grand slam in the Statcast Era (since 2015) at 493 feet and over the batter's eye.

The weekend series against the A's have put the Reds a game under .500, but they're still in the race.

In moving Andujar, the A's also freed up some playing time for Carlos Cortes and Colby Thomas, and the duo combined to go 7-of-12 with four homers and five RBI over the weekend. Each is fighting for a spot on next year's roster, or perhaps to be part of a platoon in the outfield.

Kenya Huggins is a work in progress with upside

The A's piece in the return, Huggins, reported to Hi-A Lansing after the trade and made six "starts," sitting between two and three innings of work each time out. It's basically the same role he'd had in the Cincinnati system in the month of July, but instead of coming on in relief, he was pitching at the beginning of the game.

Huggins ended up accumulating 14 2/3 innings of work in Lansing and holding a 4.30 ERA (4.36 FIP). While the results immediately flash as fine but not great, there were two things that he seemed to improve upon in his small sample of work.

The first was that he was striking out more batters, going from a 22.4% strikeout rate to a 23.8% rate with the Lugnuts. It's a small difference, but more strikeouts are always a plus. It could also be because he was pitching in shorter bursts, which often leads to a bump in velocity. That will certainly be something to keep an eye on.

The second is that his ground ball rate skyrocketed, going from 39.5% to 52.4%, which is a big jump. We're of course dealing with a small sample size, but this will also be something to keep an eye out for heading into 2026.

With the A's playing in West Sacramento, one of MLB's most hitter-friendly ballparks, and potentially in Las Vegas in 2028, park factors could lead to a more offensive environment, and ground balls don't turn into home runs.

Huggins was also tagged for a couple of long balls in his 14 2/3 innings, which inflated his ERA a bit. Across his 63 1/3 innings of work in the Reds' system, he'd allowed just three, and given the larger sample size, that one is likely the more real version of what we can expect moving forward. Even taking off one run allowed from his total would lower his ERA with the A's to 3.80.

Report on Huggins

The 22-year-old is certainly a work in progress, so Athletics on SI reached out to Lansing broadcaster Jesse Goldberg-Strassler, for a bit of a scouting report from what he saw.

"His 96-97 mph fastball is lively and his slider is interesting and hard (91), but he profiles as a relief arm without a change. He's big, strong, and athletic."

Given that both the Reds and A's were limiting his workload down the stretch, one could think that the clubs were preparing him for a relief role already, but he also finished with 78 total innings after maxing out at 34 2/3 back in 2023, and tossing just eight last season. That could have been more workload management than setting him up for a bullpen role.

Huggins is an intriguing arm to keep an eye on. While the A's have had a difficult time acquiring pitchers in trades in some deals (mainly with Atlanta), they have also had success with Jacob Lopez (Rays), and the big piece of the deal that landed Lopez and Jeffrey Springs, Joe Boyle—who also came from the Reds.

What makes Huggins especially interesting is that he will be Rule 5 eligible this offseason. Typically that signifies that a player would need to be added to the 40-man roster in the coming weeks, but that's not likely to be the case with Huggins.

Since he is still pitching in the lower minors, the A's just need to protect him from the minor-league portion of the Rule 5 Draft. With that all said, Huggins will be an arm to keep an eye on next season, and if he ends up as a relief pitcher, he could move quickly.