PITTSBURGH — Walt Jocketty won’t say the exact words that Jim Leyland said after the Tigers traded Eugenio Suarez to the Reds, but to be sure, they weren’t pleasant.

Jocketty and Leyland have been friends for years, but Leyland wasn’t feeling too friendly when he saw Jocketty in the hallway of the Grand Hyatt in San Diego in the early hours of Dec. 11, 2014.

Because at the time Jocketty and the Tigers’ Dave Dombrowski were the longest-tenured general managers in baseball, they had the two best suites at the hotel — and they happened to be across the hall from each other.

MORE:Young Luis Castillo proving to be special for Cincinnati Reds

The Reds, needing to move some veteran starting pitchers, worked into the early morning of the last day of the winter meetings and finally agreed to a deal that would send Alfredo Simon, an All-Star the previous year, to Detroit in exchange for then-minor-league shortstop Eugenio Suarez and right-hander Jonathon Crawford, a former first-round pick.

Because of the proximity of the suites, Jocketty ran into Leyland in the hall.

“I can't repeat what he was saying, but he basically said, 'I'm so mad, I can't believe we traded this guy, I love this guy,’” Jocketty recalled before Friday’s Reds game with the Pirates. “He texts me all the time to see how he's doing. He'll say, ‘I saw he hit another one. I love him.’ He was upset they traded him.”

“It’s true,” Leyland said before Friday’s game against the Pirates.

Leyland, now a special assistant to the general manager for the Tigers, was in Pittsburgh on Friday. He caught up with Suarez, who didn’t play for him with the Tigers but was in two springs with Leyland as a minor-league shortstop.

Suarez said he gave the notoriously prickly Leyland a giant hug upon seeing him.

“He's one of the best people and he's one of the best managers in the big leagues and everyone knows that,” Suarez said before Saturday’s game. “He's really good and he knows how this game is played. I was blessed to play for him.”

The Reds not only traded for Suarez and Crawford that day, but also sent right-hander Mat Latos to the Marlins in exchange for right-hander Anthony DeSclafani and catcher Chad Wallach. Both Simon and Latos were scheduled to be free agents following the 2015 season. Dealing the two saved the Reds at least $15 million that season, not to mention the four players.

Suarez was the player the Reds wanted from the Tigers all along, and he was a player Leyland didn’t want to let go. The Tigers signed Suarez as a 17-year-old out of Venezuela. He’d reached the big leagues as a shortstop in 2014 with the Tigers, hitting .242/.316/.336 in 85 games. Leyland had already retired from managing, but was still working for the Tigers at that point.

Leyland's son, Pat Leyland, had played with Suarez in the minors and told his father about the young shortstop. Leyland then took notice of him and started watching him with a closer eye.

“I fell in love with him, I just like the way he played. I thought he was going to be a real good offensive player with some pop. He's a great kid,” Leyland said. “He had a loud sound in his bat, he had a different sound in his bat than a lot of guys. I felt he was going to have a lot of pop in his bat. I thought he could hit 20 (home runs) some day. It worked out pretty good.”

Suarez hit .280/.315/.446 in 97 games in his first year in Cincinnati with 13 home runs, replacing the injured Zack Cozart at shortstop. With Cozart back last season and Todd Frazier traded to the White Sox, the Reds moved Suarez to third base. He hit 21 homers last season, but struggled defensively with the new position and took a step back offensively, hitting .248/.317/.411.

This season, though, the 26-year-old has been one of the best third basemen in baseball. Entering Saturday’s game, he was hitting .276/.385/.498 with 24 home runs and 73 RBI.

As an added bonus, he’s been outstanding defensively. He showed that once again in Friday night’s game when he made a nice play on the third-base line and threw from his knees to retire Pirates’ center fielder Andrew McCutchen in the eighth inning of a 7-3 Reds victory. Earlier in that inning, he’d ripped an RBI single to increase the Reds’ lead. In short, it was just another day for Suarez.

Leyland said if he has the TV on and isn’t watching the Pirates, he’ll check in on Suarez.

“Every once in a while as a manager, you become attached to a player that you kind of like,” Leyland said. “But we were looking for a pitcher and we got a starting pitcher. You understand those things. I didn't want to give him up, we didn't want to give him up, either. But you've got to give something up. We got a pitcher that pitched pretty good for them and we were looking for a guy to pitch in our rotation and that's how trades are made.”