Reds fire manager Bryan Price

The Reds announced Thursday that they have fired manager Bryan Price. Bench coach Jim Riggleman will take over on an interim basis.

Price is the first manager fired mid-season since 2016, when the Marlins, Padres and Braves made changes. No manager was fired in the middle of the 2017 campaign.

Cincinnati is off to a miserable 3-15 start on the year, already sitting nine games back of the NL Central-leading Pirates. The club was not expected to contend this year, but was thought to be a team that could make positive strides in its rebuild as young prospects reached the majors for the first time.

Price, 55, replaced Dusty Baker as the Reds’ manager after the 2013 season, moving from his role of pitching coach to lead the club for more than four full seasons. In that time, he compiled a 279-387 record, with his best season coming as a 76-win campaign in 2014. Before managing the Reds, Price was the pitching coach for the Mariners and Diamondbacks.

Riggleman, 65, has managed the Padres (1992-94), Cubs (1995-99), Mariners (2008) and Nationals (2009-11), compiling a career 662-824 record as skipper. He has been with the Reds organization since 2012, managing the club’s Double-A and Triple-A affiliates before joining the major-league coaching staff in 2015.

The Reds hired ex-Red Sox manager John Farrell as a scout earlier in the year, so some believe he’s a candidate to take over on a full-time basis once Cincinnati conducts a formal search. Hall of Famer Barry Larkin and ex-Yankees manager Joe Girardi are also considered potential candidates, per USA Today’s Bob Nightengale.