"This was very difficult to do," Reds president of baseball operations Walt Jocketty said on a conference call with reporters. "It was a difficult phone call to make, but as we move forward, what we set out to do here is to try and get this team back into contention as quickly as we can. We felt this was part of the process to get to that point."
After making the postseason three times from 2010-13, Cincinnati slipped to 76 and 64 wins the past two seasons.