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.

So, the Padres tried to play hardball with the Dodgers. The Dodgers (I guess?) stared them down. Eventually, the Padres realized that Matt Kemp’s hips don’t lie and, as was first reported (it seems like) many moons ago, completed the trade for the outfielder.

The Dodgers got Yasmani Grandal and some other players for Kemp and a backup catcher. They’ll now be able to complete their trade for Jimmy Rollins and all the excitement that last week brought will finally be (realized?).

This guy won twitter, with a nice breakdown of how this transaction might have been finalized.

Padres: "Kemp is hurt, can we have more money?" Dodgers: "no" Padres: "we wont make the trade" Dodgers: "ok" Padres: "Fine! We'll do it"

— Blake (@BlakeW47) December 19, 2014

So, for this night, Blake wins. Good job, Blake! Here’s hoping the Dodgers management continues to kind of get whatever they want for the remainder of the offseason.

And, here’s hoping the Padres remain doormats this season, because isn’t that kind of a rookie move?

Happy Holidays.

I better type fast. Before I’m done, the Dodgers might make another trade.

Here’s what we know — For almost two months leading the Dodgers’ front office, Andrew Freidman and company made very few public moves. Then, yesterday, the dam broke. Perhaps it just started to break.

At any rate, the Dodgers went from a shortstop-less team with a few big holes to what looks now like a team that is a lot more efficient.

Is this the New York Stock Exchange or the Dodgers’ front office over the past 24 hours. By Ryan Lawler (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Instead of a question mark at catcher, it looks like they’ll roll with Yasmani Grandal. (Perhaps Grandal is a question mark unto himself. But he will be a question mark with a high upside).

Instead of four outfielders and a bloated payroll, the Dodgers have made room for a young player

They’ve also made themselves better defensively up the middle. Replacing Matt Kemp, Hanley Ramirez, and Dee Gordon with Joc Pederson, Jimmy Rollins, and Howie Kendrick will result in a completely re-tooled and unquestionably better middle of the field defense. Giving Andre Ethier and Carl Crawford defined roles could do wonders, especially for Ethier who Scott Van Slyke starts to fit-in as a potential platoon player with. Without Kemp, the combinations start to fit better together — though trading Ethier or Crawford could still be in the cards. Joc Pederson is almost surely going to get a chance to play every day in center field and Yasiel Puig will man right field. That leaves one position for Etheir, Crawford, and Scott Van Slyke to somehow split. OK, there is still some inefficiency with outfielders, but not like before… .

For an organization who looked to the “nerds” to take the next step, Andrew Friedman and his geek squad might be bringing balance to the force.

Of all the players who they’ve acquired, I’m most excited about replacing Gordon with Kendrick. Quietly, the 31 year-old Kendrick has been a force for the Angels in recent years. Remember, the Angels team he was on last season had the best record in baseball. Gordon was a fan favorite — a young, fast, energetic player who I always loved to see on the base paths.

But Gordon’s peripheral numbers aren’t great and Friedman must have seen him as having had something like a career year last season. So he sold high and got a lot in return from Miami.

Kemp seems to have also been sold high. The Dodgers didn’t get as much back for him, though Yasmani Grandal might be due for a breakout year. Getting rid of Kemp is a possible roll of the dice, but they also get rid of about $70 of the money he is owed over the next few years, which brings us to the really fun part of this equation — the Dodgers, despite their bloated payroll — are starting to make themselves a lot more financially flexible without completely ruining the major-league product on the field. In fact, along with being cheaper, they might be even better already.

The final chip probably has yet to fall. A trade for Cole Hamels is heating up the rumor mill. So are free agents James Shields and Max Scherzer. If the reported trades all go through, the Dodgers have positioned themselves with prospects and freed-up cash to make a run at any of these three.

I haven’t even mentioned Brandon McCarthy, whose deal helps with depth at the back end of the rotation. That was an issue last season for the team.

Assuming Kemp, Rollins, McCarthy deals become official, #Dodgers will have made 6 transactions involving 19 players in less than 24 hours

— Bill Plunkett (@billplunkettocr) December 11, 2014

Lots of Dodgers fans are excited. Many are nervous about losing fan-favorites Kemp and Gordon.

Here are links to a few articles (below) that have put me at ease recently. Remember Dodger fans — don’t get too worked up quite yet. There are probably other moves to be made and, by the time you finish reading this, it will be incomplete at-best and possibly inaccurate. Because this Dodgers front office is making moves.

Marlins Pay Steep Price to not get Better – From Fangraphs

The older and better Dodgers Middle Infield – From Fangraphs

Dodgers, McCarthy reportedly near 4-year deal – From Dodgers.com

What are the Dodgers even doing? – From Deadspin