Circle this Sunday night on your calendar if you haven’t already. Our old friend Joey Votto will be in the broadcast booth, providing analysis for NBC’s Sunday Night Baseball coverage of the Redlegs against the Cubbies at Wrigley Field. It’s the only Reds game on the national network this season, and it marks Votto’s first time analyzing one of his old team’s games from the national stage. Inject this into my veins.
Votto announced the assignment as only he would. “I’m doing Reds/Cubs next Sunday,” he posted on X The Everything App. “Tell me something I didn’t need to know about the game.” Then: “Give me one SFW (safe for work) word I need to sneak in on air.” The internet responded enthusiastically. Votto later announced the winner of his poll to determine the word he should sneak onto the air: “Bangs.”
Never forget that Votto still bangs.
He’s also been asking his followers for inside baseball on the 2026 Reds, whether an MVP-level Elly De La Cruz season would push the Reds into “clear-playoff tier,” wondering about the team’s identity, checking in on how the casuals in the city are feeling about the 2026 club, and even offering practical advice to one devoted fan who needed a hat: “Stand outside the stadium with a sign explaining your plight. I would be shocked if over days and weeks of standing outside someone doesn’t come out and hand you a hat.”
Oh, how I’ve missed Joseph Daniel Votto.
I’ve said before (in Cincinnati Magazine, in fact!) that Votto is the greatest player in the history of the Cincinnati Reds. Sure, this was intentionally a somewhat-hot take, but I stand by it. Seven times he led the National League in on-base percentage, putting him in company with Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Barry Bonds, Rogers Hornsby, and Ty Cobb. His career production at the plate rivals or exceeds Bench, Larkin, Morgan, Robinson, and Rose. I know, I know: He has no World Series ring to show for any of it. That’s not his fault.
What’s interesting to me now is not what Votto did in his 17 seasons as the face of the franchise. It’s what Votto does next.
His NBC debut came July 26 for a Yankees-Phillies game, and he drew strong praise for many of the things we liked about Votto as a player: sharp hitting insight, dry humor, and complete honesty. He broke down lefty-lefty matchups with the same meticulous care he once applied in the cage. Most importantly, he was clearly prepared. Some former players, including at least one former player in the Cincinnati broadcast booth in recent years, think they can get by on the fact they were a famous player or on sheer charisma alone, with no need to prepare like the professional broadcasters around them.
That’s not Votto. He was always the most prepared player on the field, and I expect that he’ll be the most prepared broadcaster in the booth. He carried around Ted Williams’s The Science of Hitting while in the minor leagues. Perhaps he’s carrying around a Vin Scully book these days.
I’m happy to watch Votto analyze baseball for the rest of his career. I would love for him to be on the Reds broadcast team some day. Full-time broadcasting suits him. He’s one of the most naturally compelling people this sport has produced in a generation, and that hasn’t changed, even in retirement.
But then there’s this other thing. Last week, on MLB Network, Brian Kenny asked Votto about coaching or managing. He dispatched those questions quickly and decisively; the travel and the daily grind didn’t appeal to him after doing that his entire career. Fair enough. But what about the front office? “Yeah, if they want to give me the Reds job, I’ll take it. Just give me the GM, I’ll take it.”
He delivered it with his familiar half-smirk, but the interwebs lit up. Would Votto really consider it? Would he make a good general manager? Let’s ignore for a moment the fact that current ownership would never hire an independent thinker like Votto in this role; I’d bet the ranch that they haven’t even reached out to talk to Votto since he retired a couple of years ago.
And, yes, he has no front office experience, and his personality seems to prefer deep study over the constant politicking the job would require. And Votto would still have an ownership group that consistently demonstrated throughout his career (and beyond it) that they have limited interest in doing what it takes to win. (I could go on.) The idea of Joey Votto as Reds general manager, taken literally, is a fantasy. A single tear just rolled down my cheek.
But here is where I dare to dream. Votto has a curious baseball mind unlike anyone we’ve seen in Cincinnati in more than a generation, and maybe two. No one in the organization ever understood the craft of hitting more deeply. He lived through some good years and many lean ones. He knows what a winning culture feels like and what a lost one looks like. Mostly, he’s a baseball columnist’s dream: the greatest Red of his generation coming home to try to fix what he spent his career trying to elevate. Imagine the content this would inspire!
I’m not going to pretend the 2026 Reds are providing much of a backdrop for optimism. They’re 62-69, last place in the division, 19 games out. Hunter Greene is done for the year, facing another Tommy John recovery. The young core isn’t quite there but still shows some flashes; Elly, Chase, and Sal are looking like long-term stars. But this season just feels so … familiar. Another lost season. Votto watching from the booth, asking the questions most of us are asking and being honest about the problems, feels exactly right. I hope we get to see some of that brutal honesty on Sunday night.
I don’t know whether he ends up a full-time broadcaster, a front office executive, or simply a world traveler who’s the most entertaining part-time analyst in baseball. What I do know is, to me, he’s still the most interesting man in baseball. The shy Canadian who became a Reds legend is now becoming something different, and rarer: a former star who makes the game more interesting after he stops playing it.
Sunday night at Wrigley. The game starts at 7 p.m. Don’t miss it.
Chad Dotson helms Reds coverage at Cincinnati Magazine and is co-author of “The Big 50: The Men and Moments That Made the Cincinnati Reds.” His newsletter about Cincinnati sports can be found at chaddotson.com.
