Noelvi Marte is the most interesting Red right now

It’s usually pretty straightforward to tell what you’re going to get from Noelvi Marte. When he’s swinging hard, driving the ball the other way, laying off low and away pitches and when he physically looks lean and twitchy, Marte has been a good player. When he hasn’t been able to check those boxes, he has really struggled.

In the 19 big league games that Marte played during the early portion of his season before he went on the IL, he showcased his ability to be a game changer for the Reds. Marte has shown several good signs recently, but he has more work to do.

Marte has the tools to lift a Reds team that needs more at third base. He has already done that this season. In late April and early May, the offense was desperate for some more punch and for more aggressiveness. The Reds were also getting very little production at the third base spot, and Santiago Espinal’s defense was the only saving grace that the team had that that position. Marte’s resurgence was a catalyst for the entire team.

Marte landed on the IL in early May with a Grade 2 oblique strain, and he returned last weekend. He’s checking a lot of the boxes that have typically been telltale signs for his ability to produce. But there’s still more than he needs to show.

Marte is the biggest wild card for the second half of the Reds’ season. If he’s a quality third basemen, then he addresses that statistical biggest position of weakness for the Reds this season, balances out their lineup as another right-handed power threat and also steps back into a prominent long-term role as a key piece of the young core.

Marte isn’t all the way there yet. If he struggles even over the next few weeks and the Reds keep winning, then trading for a third baseman should be on the table.

There’s no Reds player with a bigger gulf of short and long-term possibilities. Marte has all of the tools to be an All-Star third baseman down the road. But first, he has to be able to reliably make the routine throws from third base to first base.

“The key is my grip,” Marte said. “When you have the grip you want, you can throw it. The other issue is the long (movement) with my shoulder. You have to keep yourself short. With the work I’ve been doing with Freddie, every time now that I feel the ball and the grip that I want, I immediately go into it. I’ll just keep working.”

Marte’s throws were his undoing last season, and they created a negative momentum that led to him being benched for a lot of games last September. Throwing errors can chip away at anyone’s confidence, and they also led to the more reliable Espinal getting playing time ahead of him.

Former Reds manager David Bell stuck with Marte for a while during the summer and hoped that Marte’s tools would translate like they did in 2023, but Marte wasn’t in the physical shape to do so. This year, teammates and coaches revealed that Marte was struggling under pressure last season coming off of his suspension.

Terry Francona told Marte in spring training this year that he’d have to earn everything he got this season. Marte quickly earned his way back to the big leagues, and then he earned the third base job back with how he looked in the 19 games he played in MLB earlier this season. He earned the third base job again with a strong rehab assignment this summer.

When Marte came off the IL last weekend, Francona stressed how significant it was to have Marte back with the way his right-handed bat balanced the lineup. Overall, Marte’s last week at the plate has been encouraging. He had his best game yet on Wednesday with a single, a homer and a walk in a victory over the Marlins.

“(My swing) feels good,” Marte said via interpreter Tomas Vera. “I have a good rhythm with my swing. I wasn’t having the contact point that I want, but I think I found that today.”

The swing did look good before Wednesday’s game even though he wasn’t getting results. Marte was still elevating opposite field fly balls and hitting rocket ground balls down the line. But he recognized what he had to get better at.

“When you spend too much time without playing, you add too much into your swing that’s not related to what you want,” Marte said. “Sometimes, you have to keep working and working until you find that specific spot. You lose a lot of momentum when you spend time without playing. I’m fine now. I think I got it.”

He’s avoiding the low and away strikeouts that he constantly struggled with last season, which is critical.

Marte also looks great athletically, carrying a similar presence that he did in the summer of 2023.

It all comes back to his throws at third base. Marte had a few more off-target ones on Wednesday, and Francona pulled him from the game for the final few innings.

“He has plenty of arm strength as we’ve seen,” Francona said. “He’s just fighting his accuracy a little bit. He’s working his rear end off with Freddie (Benavides). He’ll be ok.”

On Tuesday, Marte made a play that was as good as any from a Reds third baseman this season. His defensive tools, including his arm strength and his range, are very impressive.

Marte has the ability to be an above-average offensive third basemen with more upside than that during the second half of this season, and he also has the ability to be a well-above average defensive third baseman right now. That’s a very valuable player. To get there, he has to avoid the pitfalls that he faced last season. It’s been an encouraging but inconclusive start offensively for him, and the defense is clearly a work in progress. If the pitfalls continue, then he’ll be fighting for playing time.

The Reds’ options at third base right now are Marte, Espinal and Christian Encarnacion-Strand. Espinal has a slick glove and puts the ball in play, but he has a -1 WAR and a .585 OPS and lacks the same range as Marte. CES has essentially been benched due to his own defensive shortcomings at third base (he’s much better at first base) and his tendencies to chase and whiff when he’s at the plate.

It’s still too early to talk about Sal Stewart here, but there’s a path for him to be the Reds’ third baseman in 2026. Actually, he’s kind of in the exact same spot right now that Marte was in the summer of 2023 (shining in Double-A, on the verge of getting called up to Triple-A. Marte actually got called up on June 27, 2023, to Triple-A, but it’s the same idea).

The best version of the 2025 Reds has Marte shining at third base, and the Reds need to figure out how much runway they’re going to give him. I’m bullish on where he’s at as a hitter, but the throws were still the story on Wednesday even though he homered.

Marte’s work ethic and pinpointed areas of focus with his throws give the Reds more confidence in letting Marte work through his throwing development in the short term. He’ll be sticking in the lineup, but the work on his throws has to produce results.