Offseason Position Discussion : Catcher

Last year discussion revisited

My thinking was that the Nats would trade for a starting catcher that wouldn't cost much and would cover the position for a year or two while they figured out a longer solution.

It made sense at the time. They like Severino but he didn't seem ready. That meant more AAA playing time for him. They were fine with playing out the string with Lobaton as the back-up as he was familiar with the pitching staff and cheap and here already. They needed a starter.  But starting catchers weren't really available. The best FA available was Wieters who wasn't really good and likely to get a longer more expensive contract, and after that  it was fill-in players. The Nats generally don't sign those types so I figured they'd trade for one.

Turns out they DID trade for one, Derek Norris, who I dismissed because his 2016 was SO bad. But he was cheap and available for a low-minors propsect years away*.  Then they either realized he wasn't going to be good or heard about his off the field issues (or both) and went in another direction. They would sign Wieters who didn't get cheaper but did get forced into a shorter contract, for 2yrs - 20 million. The expectation was he'd give the Nats his typical average seasons and that'd be ok, if a little pricy. If the Nats got lucky he'd maybe have a minor rebirth.

Wieters though collapsed hard and was probably the worst starting catcher in baseball in 2017. Severino wasn't ready and couldn't fill his spot. Lobaton was the diminishing back-up they thought he was and couldn't help either. The end result was a line-up hole. It could have been addressed at the trade deadline. Old friend Kurt Suzuki might have been available. Old tease Jon LuCroy was. But the Nats stood pat here and were rewarded with more terribleness and possibly a series losing performance in Game 5.

My outisde the box suggestion would have been awful as Mesoraco was an all or nothing gambit that would have gotten the Nats nothing because he was hurt.

Presumed Plan : Nats stick with Wieters for one more year because they are paying him. Severino is moved up to back-up or take-over depending. Really though the Nats are waiting out their new catching flavor of the year, Raudy Read.

Reasoning on Presumed Plan : Wieters has a 10 million dollar player option for 2018 and will not make anything close to that on the open market. Once he picks up that option the Lerners won't want to pay for another catcher just so this guy can sit. Lobaton is a FA and there is no reason to bring him back as his bat is too far gone. Plus it's time to see if Severino can hit, so it's time to get him 150+ ABs in the majors. Moving Severino up to the majors permanently allows for Raudy Read to go up from AA to AAA to see how real his bat is. It all works out if you can accept the fact Wieters has to be on the team in some capacity.

The fact that signing a catcher isn't likely isn't a terrible thing. The three most likely guys to garner interest are LuCroy, who's probably fading; Wellington Castillo, who is selling high; and Alex Avila, who has an injury riddled history. There's going to be one bargain here, one overpay, and one bad overpay all for average play. Trading for a catcher (that doesn't cost much) is a possibility. Though if JT Realmuto goes on the market expect the young, overall solid catcher who's still in arbitration for 3 more seasons to fetch a nice set of prospects. Likely more than the Nats are willing to give when they (again) think they have a possible replacement coming up in a year or two.

Also, if you are going to have a hole in your offense, catcher, which can be a hard spot to fill, is the place to have it if you can get some decent defense out of it. Wieters, despite his lapses in the playoffs, is generally ok. He's not seen as a good framer, but Severino is better at that and also regarded well as a defensive catcher.

Problems with Presumed Plan :Wieters stinks. He was God awful this year and he hasn't been someone you really want to see in a line-up since 2012. The best you can hope for is a return to his "I guess this is ok" from 2015. But since you give more weight to recent performance and trend lines the fairer expectation for 2018 is another terrible year. Severino, basically has had a couple VERY brief outings where he has hit in his entire career. The rest of it shows he can't hit. Could he "get it"? Sure, it happens. But we're getting closer and closer to the time you give up on Severino as a batter and again the expectation for next season would be a pretty terrible year at the plate.

Wrapping that together the expectation for Wieters/Severino would be again to have the worst offensive catching duo in baseball. That's a big problem. 

My take : If the Nats goal was different, you could accept the fact the Nats had to live with this. Sometimes you sign players and it doesn't work out. The fans and the system of penalizing high payrolls mostly allow owners to play to the "we can't afford to pay someone else" card. These are things that are part of the game. You may not like it. You may want it to change. However, you understand that's how it is. Accepting that, then yes Wieters is on the team, probably getting another chance to start and that's all there is to it.  

Continuing, Lobaton should be gone. No brainer. Severino isn't probably ever going to hit but since there isn't a better option (if you aren't going to pay for a starter, why would you for a back-up?) you might as well prove that. If Severino looks better, he can start and Wieters can ride the pine. This is unlikely as Severino's best performance with the bat with more than 48 PAs is an OPS of .705 in High-A ball in 2014. That's not a good season either. The more plausible scenario is he stinks and Wieters stinks. The most likely "getting lucky" scenario involves Raudy Read, who has hit better than Severino consistently in the minors, hits in AAA and comes up and plays acceptably in the majors with Severino back in AAA and Wieters on the bench.

Of course the Nats goal is to win the Series. That's what they pretty much said when firing Dusty and with that goal in mind you can't go into the season with a position where the expectation is worst in the majors. They should try hard to trade for Realmuto and if that costs them some prospects so be it. If they fail at that for whatever reason they should spend money on one of those three free agents and let Severino split time with Read in AAA. If they fail with that they should do something else. Again, you can't go into a season with "this position has little hope of being anything less than absolute garbage" and sell yourselves as a real contender.

Do I have faith they really will follow through on that goal talk and it wasn't just something to say to make letting Dusty go face fewer arguements? No, I don't.

Out of the box suggestion :
Name Raudy Read the starter out of camp assuming he doesn't look lost in Spring Training. What kills me up there is not only is the position expected to be terrible but there is little hope of anything else. Wieters isn't going to hit well - he hasn't in years. Maaaaaaybe he will be below average with declining defense. Severino isn't going to hit well - he hasn't ever. Maaaaaaybe he will be well below average with good defense. That's the best case I can put together in my head for these two.

However, Read? Read is a complete unknown. Sure he hasn't hit THAT well, merely kind of average. And no he isn't as polished on defense as either of the other guys but I can at least envision a scenario where we get a Raudy Read who provides the Nats with average offense and average defense from the catcher position. Maybe it doesn't work out that way but at least there is hope, in a way that squares with a team trying to win it all. Not every position can be a winner, but you can't have one that you know is going to be a loser, because something else will go wrong. It's not a great bet but at least it's a bet, not a foregone conclusion.


*Pedro Avila who did actually well in A ball. He struggled pretty mightily initially in his move to High-A but then really rocked in the stretch after that. I wouldn't be surprsied to see him in the Padres Top 10 list going into 2018. Of course that's Top 10 for an organization here.