Reds fire manager David Bell one year after contract extension with team underachieving

The Reds rang the Bell.

Cincinnati fired manager David Bell and appointed bench coach Freddie Benavides as the interim manager for the five remaining games of the season, the team announced late Monday night.

Bell led the Reds to a 409-456 record over the course of six seasons at the helm and they are fourth in the NL Central this season at 76-81, an underwhelming enough record this year that the organization felt the need to make a change. 

“David provided the kind of steadiness that we needed in our clubhouse over the last few seasons. We felt a change was needed to move the Major League team forward. We have not achieved the success we expected, and we need to begin focusing on 2025,” Reds president of baseball operations Nick Krall said in a statement. 

The organization had just extended Bell’s contract last summer when they gave him a deal that kept him under contract through the 2026 season. 

Bell had been hired in October of 2018 and led the ballclub to a postseason appearance during the abbreviated 2020 COVID season. 

The Reds suffered a 100-loss season in 2022, but Bell and the Reds turned it around the following year as the team managed to remain in the playoff hunt right up until the final week of the 2023 season. 

However, things didn’t go as planned this year and in his final game as manager of the Reds, Cincinnati lost 2-0 to the Pirates, who sit in last place in the NL Central. 

A possible replacement for Bell emerged on Sunday night shortly after the news of his firing became official. 

The Reds are looking at Marlins manager Skip Schumaker as a potential candidate for the job, according to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. 

Schumaker played for the Reds from 2014-2015 and was named National League Manager of the Year in 2023.