Dodgers-Giants position-by-position comparison: Catcher

The baseball season’s coming up and Mike Krukow thinks Yasiel Puig is dumb for not pegging the Giants as their biggest rival. In San Luis Obispo, I’d say they are, though the two teams have not met in the playoffs since the Wild Card round started.

I thought it would be fun to, over the next few weeks, go position by position and compare what the two teams have in preparation for the 2015 season. Today’s position: Catcher.

While catchers have lots of value behind the plate, they might lose some of it if and when they play first base, where it’s easier to find a Posey-like hitter. To be clear, I didn’t look into things deeply enough to disseminate the difference. I’m simply evaluating three catchers on each 40-man roster and trying to figure out which team will be better and by what kind of margin that will be the case.

Buster Posey. He’s good. By SD Dirk on Flickr, via Wikimedia Commons

Buster Posey, Hector Sanchez, and Andrew Susac

For the Giants, the catcher position has been solidified for the past five seasons. During the first five full years of Buster Posey’s career, the team has won three World Series titles and the 27 year-old already has a Rookie of the Year and MVP award to go along with a pair of Silver Slugger awards.

The Giants have done a great job of limiting Posey’s innings, which could help him to be able to play primarily behind the plate for longer. Posey has racked-up 18 WAR over the past three years and should be right in the middle of his prime.

ZIPS projects Posey to have another fantastic year — 19 homers and 87 RBIs while posting a 6.4 WAR. I THINK that much of Posey’s WAR value has to do with the fact he plays catcher and the positional adjustment that goes along with that, so moving him off the position for much longer than he already is would have a detrimental effect.

Hector Sanchez has been the Giants’ primary backup at the position. It’s safe to say he’s a significant drop-off in terms of expected production. Sanchez played roughly 317 innings behind the plate last season in 45 games. But Sanchez’ contribution was not good — even for a catcher. The 25 year-old Venezuelan posted a -0.3 WAR, mainly attributable to his .196 batting average, .301 slugging percentage, and .538 OPS.

It’s certainly arguable that the marginal impact of utilizing a player like Sanchez didn’t affect the Giants’ ability to win. After all, the team did manage to post an 88-74 record, make the playoffs, and win the World Series. What is there to not like?

Sanchez is projected by ZIPS to bounce back and earn a .6 WAR for the upcoming season, putting the Giants total at the position

Andrew Susac is an interesting wild card in my position projections game. Susac is projected to have the fifth-highest zWAR of any hitter on the Giants and can play either first base or catcher, allowing him to platoon with Posey. Here’s what Fangraphs’ Carson Cistulli said of Susac in the Giants ZIPS projections post:

Neglected in the discussion of San Francisco’s batting core above but also the recipient of an encouraging projection is catcher Andrew Susac. His competence will allow Bruce Bochy to deploy Posey at first base for purposes of rest and against left-handed pitchers.

The emergence of Susac could make Sanchez’ apparent replacement-level performance meaningless.

Overall, ZIPS projects the Giants’ corps of catchers to produce 8.9 WAR. This number is… well… large. Good catchers and depth at the position are hard to come by. The Giants will definitely have one and could have both this year.

Yasmani Grandal, A.J. Ellis, and Austin Barnes

The Dodgers also have three catchers on the 40-man roster — none as decorated as Posey.

The incumbent is Ellis, a 33 year-old favorite of ace Clayton Kershaw. Ellis has received the majority of playing time behind the plate for the past three seasons, though he played only 93 games last season due to some knee issues.

After posting 5.7 combined WAR in 2012 and 2013, Ellis regressed to post exactly 0.0 WAR last year. This season, ZIPS is projecting A.J. to put up 1.7 WAR, presumably all behind the plate. A potential resurgence from a healthy A.J. Ellis didn’t stop the team from bringing in a few fresh faces for 2015.

One of those faces came from the Padres in the Matt Kemp trade. Yasmani Grandal. Grandal is one of the great unknowns for the Dodgers this season. He will almost certainly get more time behind the plate than Ellis, who is likely to be Clayton Kershaw’s “personal catcher” this year. Grandal’s suspension for PED use is well-documented, but neither the Dodgers (who traded for him) nor ZIPS (which projected him as the fifth-highest WAR on the team this year at 2.8) seemed to have any qualms about the 26 year-old Cuban. If he can stay healthy.

The Dodgers’ version of a prospect wild-card comes in the person of Austin Barnes. Barnes came to Los Angeles in the deal that sent Dee Gordon to Miami. Though he’s never played in the major leagues, Barnes is a diminutive and athletic utility defender who can play second or third base, along with catcher. Grandal is oft-injured, Ellis is getting old, and the season is a long one. We will see Barnes get some time behind the plate.

What may be even more interesting would be if Howie Kendrick or Juan Uribe missed any significant time. Players like Justin Turner, Darwin Barney, and Enrique Hernandez are all on the roster to fill-in when needed at second or third base, but to know Barnes is available is a wild card Andrew Friedman and company could play at any time, especially if his bat plays throughout spring training. Barnes is projected by ZIPS to have more plate appearances than either Grandal or Ellis and to post a 2.2 WAR.

While nobody stands-out particularly, the three-headed catching monster of Grandal, Ellis, and Barnes actually projects quite nicely, adding-up to 6.7 wins. This is far lower than the Giants, but I bet it’s higher than a lot of other teams, and not as far behind as you might think by simply comparing Posey’s skill with that of Grandal or Ellis.

Winner: Giants

While we know a difference of two projected “Wins” through 162 games is marginal, we shouldn’t discount the simple principle of going with the team who has the best player. This is most of how every other position I’ll be looking at will be judged, and in this case that best player is smack-dab in the center of his prime. It’s true, the catcher position is a little bit different because back-up players at that position get innings and at-bats more often.

In this case, advanced stats or not, it doesn’t matter. The Dodgers have improved themselves at catcher, but the Giants have the advantage going into the season. The Dodgers and their fans hope that advantage isn’t as prominent as most casual fans might think.

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1. Dodgers vs. Giants position-by-position comparison: Center Field - Fansmanship says:

   03/25/2015 at 8:46 pm

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