Boston » Jonathan Lucroy

Roster Recap: Blake Swihart, Post-Hype

Jake Devereaux — Thu, 11 Jan 2018 14:00:38 +0000

It was only 1007 days ago that the future was shining brightly for Blake Swihart. On that day — 2 years, 9 months, and 1 day from the time of this writing — it was my 28th birthday, and Swihart was the number one ranked prospect in the Red Sox system according to SoxProspects.com. Things were good. Back then, when you said the name Swihart, you thought of the promise of an All-Star catcher. A player that would surely be part of the Red Sox core for years to come. He was the Jason Varitek replacement we had been waiting for. In our 2015 prospect rankings at BP, we had him at 17th overall, and the number one catching prospect in baseball.

Swihart had sky-high value at this time and was considered untouchable by many when it came to trade talks. Young catchers who could play the position defensively and could hit for average and pop were not a common commodity, and they still aren’t. At BP, we published three scouting reports on Swihart between August of 2013 and May of 2015. These reports were glowing. Scouts raved about his 60-grade FV glove and arm, as well as his 55-grade FV hit tool. Our own fantasy prospect guru Bret Sayre called him a “lock to stick at catcher long term and hit for a strong average” and ranked him the 31st-best fantasy prospect in baseball. He was Buster Posey-lite, with his potential impact being compared to good Jonathan Lucroy.

A lot can change in a little over 1000 days. For Swihart, his position has changed and then changed back again. His health has changed for the worse and is now close to his old form. His value has also changed. Swihart is no longer talked about as a sought after trade chip, but rather as a player fighting for his baseball life in Boston.

WHAT WENT RIGHT

If you haven’t seen the catastrophic video of Swihart’s ankle injury, consider yourself lucky and do not look it up. On June 4th, 2016 — while playing in left field of all places — Swihart severely sprained his ankle after running into the side wall at Fenway Park. The rest is history: he underwent surgery on August 15th and worked his way back to health by last spring. The positive news was evident, and Swihart was strong enough to battle for a spot on the team during spring training of this past year. Let’s agree not to rehash the poor decision to play him there in the first place.

WHAT WENT WRONG

It was probably a forgone conclusion that the just-recently-healthy catcher who had been moved around the diamond the year before would not be the favorite to make it out of camp as the backup catcher. So what though? He was healthy. That was what mattered. As the year wore on, he played at Triple-A, returning to catching part-time until it became evident that his ankle was still not right. He struggled at the plate and needed a DL stint to get his body right. It was in large part a lost year — the second such year in a row for the player. He was called up in September and played just 12 innings behind the dish. By this time many folks were doubting if he would ever be relevant again.

WHAT TO EXPECT

In many ways 2018 will be a make or break year for Swihart’s future as a member of the Red Sox. He is now as healthy as he has been since his injury initially occurred, which will be key as he battles to make the roster this spring. You see, Swihart is out of options. He either makes the team out of camp or he is on a different team. Luckily for Swihart and the Red Sox, things are finally starting to break right for the former prospect. This winter he was healthy enough to play in the Dominican Winter League, where he batted .407/.515/.481 over 33 PA while catching for the Leones del Escogido.

If I were Dave Dombrowski, I would take a long look at Swihart and try and find any reason at all to have him on the bench to start the year. Swihart has pedigree, he’s only 26 years old, and he’s actually healthy! He still has the most offensive upside out of all of the Red Sox catchers and he’s athletic enough to play other positions. The bat is what should be the selling point though. His offensive upside is far greater than that of Brock Holt, Devin Marrero, and Sandy Leon, who he is potentially competing against for a roster spot. I have long defended Swihart, and now see him as more underrated than ever. I don’t doubt that we haven’t seen his best yet as a player. If I were DD, I’d want to make sure that we do see his best in the future, and that it’s while he’s wearing a Red Sox uniform.

Photo by Kim Klement – USA TODAY Sports

The Stunning Success of Sandy Leon

Matthew Kory — Fri, 29 Jul 2016 16:48:43 +0000

Sandy Leon. That’s the hook. I have you now.

This Red Sox season has been an odd one. Jackie Bradley is an excellent hitter but his defense has taken a step back. Weird. David Ortiz is 40 and better than ever. Huh? David Price has been bad, but somehow really good too. What? But nowhere in this bizarre spin-cycle of a season has there been anything as strange as Sandy Leon.

As I write this, we’re days from the trade deadline and the Red Sox are done unless they’re not. Dave Dombrowski is in charge and, supreme mover and shaker that he is, nobody is safe. Perhaps one of them most intriguing names on the market is that of Jonathan Lucroy. Lucroy is a catcher for the Brewers and brings an exciting group of skills including power, on-base ability and pitch framing. He’s perhaps the one player that makes the most sense for the Red Sox given where they are in the rotation (mostly full), the outfield (returning to health), and the infield (good to go). So, when you consider Blake Swihart’s injury and Christian Vazquez’s complete inability to hit, getting Lucroy makes sense. Except, there is Sandy Leon.

The first 17 players on the list of most valuable catchers per WAR have over 140 plate appearances. In truth, most have more than 300. But all of them have over 140, that is, until you get to the 18th spot. The player in the 18th spot has 93 plate appearances (before yesterday’s game). In those 93 PAs, he has 33 hits including 10 doubles, a triple, and three homers. That player is, of course, Sandy Leon, and that list is of the most valuable catchers in baseball by our metrics here at BP. I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that our metrics treat Leon somewhat roughly, relatively speaking. By FanGraphs WAR, Leon has been the sixth best catcher in baseball. SIXTH! Steven Vogt, Brian McCann, Yasmani Grandal, and Matt Wieters are just some of the catchers that Leon has out-performed this year, which is silly in and of itself, but I want to draw your attention to the part that is extremely nuts. It’s not that Leon has been better than them. He has, but that’s not the point. It’s that he’s been better than them in about a third of the opportunities to be better than them. That’s extremely nuts!

It is on a couple different levels, too. It’s crazy because it’s just crazy. But it’s crazy because Leon was a forgotten player… I was going to say last year, but he was a forgotten player this year! After Vazquez’s injury last season, the team picked up Leon from Washington because that’s who they could get for basically nothing. Do you know who the Red Sox traded for Leon? I looked it up because I couldn’t remember either. The answer: nobody. They bought him for “cash considerations.” Incidentally that’s how I pay for my pizza. The Nationals thought so little of Leon that he wasn’t even worth a player, any player. The Red Sox thought so little of him that they DFA’d him one year ago (July 20, 2015).

To be fair to the Red Sox though, he was kinda terrible. So that’s the other thing that makes this all so weird. Leon has been excellent, amazing in fact, but he’s come out of nowhere to do it. He was literally cut loose by two organizations, and the second time nobody cared enough to bother with him, which is why he’s still on the Boston Red Sox. So then he comes into this season fourth on Boston’s catcher depth chart behind Swihart, Vazquez, and Ryan Hanigan in whatever order you want, and [flash forward four months] he’s not just the starter, he’s one of the best catchers in the sport.

So how in the heck, right? Well, let’s acknowledge that some of this is good fortune. You don’t sustain a .469 BABIP in the majors regardless of how many line drives you hit, or how much you barrel up the ball. Major league pitchers are too good. But this isn’t all luck, right? We’ve all seen Leon hit ball after ball on the screws. This can’t just be the baseball gods favoring a down and out player for a few months. Leon isn’t the best catcher in baseball, saying that much seems fair, but his success deserves the benefit of the doubt. So let’s see if we can figure it out.

First, look at this graph.

This is Sandy Leon’s exit velocity. The light blue is Leon, the gray line is the league average. It’s a weekly graph so it would fluctuate, but you can see how Leon has been, as John Farrell would say, impacting the ball. He’s been impacting the heck out of the ball, in fact. According to FanGraphs, 32.4 percent of his balls in play have been hard hit. For context, Mookie Betts is at 35.3 percent and Dustin Pedroia is at 32 percent. But it should be noted that 48.5 percent of Leon’s hits have been hard enough to be categorized as “medium hard.” That means that of the balls he puts into play, about 80 percent have a good shot to fall for a hit.

So that all sounds great, right? Here’s the bad news: the league average of Hard Hit plus Medium Hits is also 80 percent. Leon sprays the ball around, but his batted ball profile shows him as a very average hitter. So we’re back to Leon’s .469 BABIP, his unimpressive walk rate (six percent) and mediocre strikeout-to-walk ratio (3:1). I hate to end this on a buzz-killing note but I don’t think there’s any way Sandy Leon is this good, or is someone the Red Sox can count on as a star player going forward. If they can get Jonathan Lucroy for a reasonable package, they should, and they shouldn’t let Sandy Leon stand in their way.

However, this article isn’t finished. That’s because what Leon has done so far is, at the very least, put himself in the position to be a league average catcher going forward, or possibly even a little bit better if there is something in his performance that is more sustainable than I’m supposing here. As we’ve seen this season, league average players can be extremely valuable. Just imagine, for example, if the Red Sox had two more league average starters this season. They’d have a bunch more wins and they’d still have Anderson Espinosa. League average players are valuable. Sandy Leon, even if he’s not the best catcher in baseball, is very valuable.

Sandy Leon isn’t the best catcher in baseball, even if he’s made a case for it in the small sample of opportunities he’s been given this season. If the Red Sox can improve the position by adding a star like Lucroy, they should do so and not look back. But Leon has absolutely proven that he can be a major league catcher, even if he doesn’t have the baseball gods so solidly on his side, and considering where he’s been as recently as last season, that just might be the strangest story in a very strange Red Sox season.

Photo by Winslow Towson/USA Today Sports Images

What the Red Sox Really Have In Christian Vazquez

Matthew Kory — Fri, 17 Jun 2016 15:03:22 +0000

The more baseball they play, the more we learn about the 2016 Red Sox. We can see the young talent they have, just as we can see glaring holes in the roster. The team isn’t unique, but it is rare to have such big positives and such obvious negatives. There is one position, though, where that isn’t the case, and that’s catcher. The Red Sox catching position isn’t clear at all. Instead, it’s as hazy as a stout, as confusing as buying a house, and as convoluted as your cell phone bill. The Red Sox have four catchers, one who is also a left fielder, two who are hurt, three who can’t hit, and on and on.

It all starts, at least for now, with Christian Vazquez. Vazquez isn’t hurt, but looking at his production, he may as well be. Can you hit .209/.248/.299 with a broken arm? Maybe. That’s what Vazquez is doing with two healthy arms. He’s not the worst hitting catcher in baseball… but he’s awful close.

Despite starting the season in the minors, the Red Sox have depended mostly on Vazquez behind the plate this season. Vazquez was expected to start the season in Boston last year but injured his right (throwing) elbow during spring training and required Tommy John surgery. He missed the season, returned during spring training 2016 and started the year in the minors. When starter Blake Swihart struggled both at the plate and behind it during the first few weeks of the season, Vazquez got the call. That was mid-April. It’s now mid-June. So, recalling the last paragraph, that’s two solid months of horrendous hitting.

But Vazquez isn’t in the lineup to hit! He’s there because of his fantastic defense. He’s the best defensive catcher ever in the history of history, or something. Well, hold those horses, because at least so far this year, he’s not. Looking at our catcher defense report, Vazquez has been fine, good even, but he’s not been great. There have been 12 other catchers who grade out better than Vazquez, so sure, he’s an above average catcher so far, but remember, this is a guy whose slugging percentage is currently below .300 and whose on-base percentage is below .250. He needs to be better than “top half” to have any kind of argument towards playing time with those numbers.

Looking at our catcher defense report, Vazquez has been fine, good even, but he’s not been great.

The argument for Vazquez is probably twofold. First, he’s young, and this is his first extended taste of major league pitching. The second part is true, but the first part is pushing it. Vazquez will be 26 in August. Yes he missed last season so perhaps you cut him some slack based on that. Perhaps he’s still getting into better game shape, remembering his swing, strengthening his arm, and what have you. Perhaps. It’s fair to give him more than just two months if you believe, from a scouting standpoint, that his bat is playable, and you believe in his defense.

Ah, yes, his defense. Let’s get back to that. Remember when the Red Sox brought him up in mid-April, part of the reason they wanted him instead of Swihart was the tremendous defense Vazquez offered. We’ve already discussed his rather mediocre pitch framing, but what about his amazing throwing arm? It was so good he could stop the opponent’s running game simply by reputation. Back in 2014 Vazquez threw out 52 percent of opposing baserunners. That’s nuts! This year he’s thrown out six of 17 baserunners, or 35 percent. That’s 4.5 percent above league average. Allow that perhaps some of that drop off is because his arm strength isn’t all the way back yet after surgery, and that’s fine. But again, we’re talking about a player who has failed to contribute anything with his bat. He has to be fantastic defensively to make that package work, and Vazquez has failed to do that, at least so far.

It’s fair to think Vazquez might hit better than he has to date. He might play better defense as well, and could even improve as a pitch framer. But if everything he does gets better, it’s still up for debate whether or not he’ll ever be anything more than an above average defensive catcher who can’t hit. We have a shorter name for that package of skills: we call them backup catchers. This is where Blake Swihart comes in. The Red Sox have a player in Swihart who has some clear defensive issues, but is athletic and has a worthwhile bat. He’s not likely going to be Manny Ramirez, or even Hanley Ramirez with the bat, but if he can hit for some average and get on base with occasional extra-base pop, that makes him one of the best-hitting catchers in the league.

Unfortunately Swihart is out for at least six weeks (and I’m guessing much longer) after hurting his ankle in the Native American burial ground the Red Sox call left field. The bulging disk in Ryan Hanigan’s neck may let him play sooner rather than later, and Hanigan is likely a step up from Sandy Leon, but he’s not a starting catcher for a reason. So the Red Sox are left with four catchers, two who maybe should be in the minors in Leon and Vazquez, one who won’t be back anytime soon and may not even be a catcher when he returns in Swihart, and one who is a back up and ideally should remain so for health reasons as much as skill-based reasons.

The trade deadline is a bit more than a month away, so the Red Sox will have some more time to evaluate Vazquez, and get Hanigan and Swihart back healthy, but for a team hellbent on winning this season, the catcher position might just be one place the team needs to put on its list of positions that could use an upgrade.

There will be time to go over specific players and trade proposals closer to the end of July, but right now it wouldn’t be shocking if the Red Sox could use A) better offensive production, B) better offensive production from the catcher position, and C) better defensive production from the catcher position. That’s a tall order considering the state of catching in baseball today, but there is one player who, bizarrely, fills that bill: Jonathan Lucroy of the Milwaukee Brewers. Lucroy can hit .(311/.368/.527 through Thursday), he’s one of the best defensive catchers in baseball, and the Brewers are in full rebuild mode so they’d love a look in the Red Sox prospect cupboard as well.

Things can change over the next month. They certainly did last over the last month. But if Vazquez is going to keep playing most days, he’s got to improve. As has been made clear by Dave Dombrowski’s and John Farrell’s actions, this season is about winning and the rest doesn’t matter. If the Red Sox are going to stay in-house at catcher, Vazquez needs to be better. Right now there are more pressing concerns on the team, but if July comes and Vazquez has a .500 OPS, things may change, and quickly.

Photo by Kelly O’Connor, www.sittingstill.smugmug.com