CINCINNATI — Julio Rodriguez bounded out of the visitors' dugout, skipped over several steps onto the field and practically tackled Noelvi Marte just outside the batting practice cage.
"That's my brother," Rodriguez had just told a small group of reporters Monday afternoon, a few hours before first pitch at Great American Ball Park. "He's a hardworking kid. Really humble. Really dedicated. I know he has a ton of talent."
The Reds knew it too, which is why they insisted that the Mariners include Marte as the centerpiece of the trade package for Luis Castillo last year.
The Mariners, initially, weren't too keen on trading Marte. They had signed him as a 16-year-old out of the Dominican Republic, where he grew close with Rodriguez — two top prospects who made a rapid rise through the Mariners' minor league system.
The Mariners were invested in Marte. They remain invested, emotionally, in his development here in Cincinnati, 13 months after the blockbuster trade.
The 21-year-old Marte made his major league debut with the Reds last month, and he started at third base Monday in the series opener against the Mariners.
"Anybody who says they don't follow the players that they trade away is lying," Mariners general manager Justin Hollander said. "The personal side is always very hard. When you sign or draft players at a very young age, and you watch them grow up and you see the very best of what they can be, there is always going to be an emotional attachment to them. And it's just very hard to get over that."
Having Castillo atop the rotation certainly assuages many of those feelings.
The high cost of acquiring a ready-made ace at the 2022 trade deadline was worth it for the Mariners.
Castillo was brilliant down the stretch, helping the Mariners erase a 21-year playoff drought. He was even better in two starts in the postseason and he signed a five-year, $108 million contract extension to remain in Seattle through the peak of his career.
The 30-year-old right-hander is now a Cy Young candidate in his first full season with the Mariners.
"There's only one Luis Castillo," Hollander said, coincidentally just as Castillo walked by in the visitors' clubhouse Monday afternoon. "And when you have a chance to get him, you're willing to do whatever you can to go get him, and there's probably going to be some angst, some burn to do it."
The burning point in the Mariners' negotiations with the Reds came when Jerry Dipoto, the team president of baseball operations, walked into Hollander's office at T-Mobile Park. Reds GM Nick Krall had been "adamant, adamant, adamant," Hollander said, that both Marte and shortstop Edwin Arroyo had to be the starting point in the package for Castillo.
"At some point, the person on the phone just has to read the voice of the person on the other end: Do you believe them or not believe them?" Hollander said. "And I vividly remember Jerry coming in my office and saying, 'I believe them. It's either this or we're not going to be involved. I've been trying for 96 hours to get them to move in a different direction, and they're not moving.'"
After more debate between themselves inside Hollander's office, Dipoto and Hollander ultimately decided to include Marte and Arroyo in the trade.
"And that's when the conversation (with the Reds) picked up very quickly," Hollander said.
Castillo had pitched two days before against the Marlins in Cincinnati on July 27 in what would be his final start for the Reds.
It was lunchtime that Friday when the Mariners agreed to the Reds' demand for Marte and Arroyo. By 7 p.m. in Seattle, the Reds made it clear they were ready to complete a deal that night, and there was one other team involved in trade negotiations.
That other team was believed to be the Yankees, who had reportedly agreed to include outfield prospect Jasson Dominguez but would not part with shortstop prospect Anthony Volpe.
The question the Reds posed to the Mariners then was: "What else can you do for us?"
From there, the two sides went back and forth exchanging names of other Seattle prospects. The Mariners said a flat "no" on several suggestions. The Reds balked at a few others.
Finally, they settled on the last two pieces the Mariners would include — pitchers Andrew Moore and Levi Stoudt — and a deal was in place.
The extra two prospects are effectively the price of doing business midseason. A trade-deadline tax, if you will.
"If you're the buyer in that situation, and there's one player you think stands apart from everybody else, who is clearly your top choice and will fit your club incredibly well — presently and in the future — it's going to be really uncomfortable," Hollander said. "A trade like that just doesn't happen any other way."
The cherry on top for the Mariners was when Castillo agreed to the long-term contract. The day after the trade, Hollander had floated that idea to Castillo's agent, Rafa Nieves, who was on a family vacation in Europe at the time.
Nieves flew to Seattle a couple weeks later. He was working with Hollander on the framework of a new deal for Castillo on the same day Dipoto was on the phone in his office working through final details of Rodriguez's massive contract extension with Rodriguez's agent, Ulises Cabrera.
Castillo was sold on Seattle the night he made his T-Mobile Park debut, pitching eight shutout innings against the Yankees in a thrilling 1-0 victory (in 13 innings) before a packed house on Aug. 8, 2022. The move to Seattle was already the third time Castillo had been traded in his career — he's technically been traded five times counting the two back-and-forth swaps between the Marlins and Padres over a four-day period in 2016 — and he wanted a place to settle down with his family.
"This is special here," Castillo had told the Mariners executives.
It took a special case to get him there.
Marte, by the way, was back in the lineup at third base for the second day in a row against the Mariners, batting eighth on Tuesday night. He had three hits, including his first big-league home run, off reliever Dominic Leone, in the sixth inning.
Arroyo, 20, is ranked as the Reds' No. 3 prospect and No. 59 overall in the minor league, per MLB Pipeline. He's hitting .251 with 46 extra-base hits, 28 steals and a .760 OPS in High-A Dayton this season.
Moore, 24, a hard-throwing reliever, is in High-A Dayton after spending the bulk of the season on the injured list.
Stoudt, 25, made his MLB debut with the Reds in April. The right-hander is currently in Class AAA.
Castillo will not pitch against his old club. He's scheduled to start Thursday in Tampa Bay. It's a big series between two American League playoff contenders, and the Mariners have their big-game pitcher leading it off.
