The Role of the Catcher

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Photo via JT Realmuto - Instagram

JT Realmuto

JT Realmuto

If it’s true that every World Series winner sets a new trend in the narrative around Major League Baseball, then this year’s Fall Classic might have been a tipping point in a discussion on the role of catchers.

The Phillies made an unexpected run to the World Series at least in part because of the performance of one of the game’s elite catchers: J.T. Realmuto is a legitimate star offensively, coming off a season where he batted .276 with a .342 on-base and .478 slugging, hit 22 home runs and stole 21 bases. He’s also a very good defender, but defense isn’t the first thing most fans will remember about him.

In the end, however, the catcher who won a World Series ring this year is a very different kind of player: Former Brewer Martin Maldonado has caught 238 regular season games over the last two seasons despite batting just .179 with a .261 on-base and .325 slugging, but the Astros still started him behind the plate in 11 of their 12 games during the playoffs. Over the last two years the Astros are 143-86 (.624 winning percentage) when Maldonado starts behind the plate, and 58-37 (.610) when he doesn’t.

The 2022 postseason featured two groups of teams with very different philosophies on the catching position. The three teams with the best on-base plus slugging from their catching positions this year were the Braves, Blue Jays and Phillies, and they all reached the postseason. At the other end of the spectrum, however, the Rays, Mets, Astros, Cardinals and Guardians were all among the bottom eight, and they also all made playoff appearances.

Calling Pitches, Blocking Balls

The role of a catcher is different from any other position player, and it’s almost certainly the most difficult to quantify. In addition to the offensive side of their game, catchers make a huge impact on the game by calling pitches, blocking balls in the dirt, receiving pitches in a way that makes them more likely to be called strikes and preventing or controlling the running game with their throwing arm.

It’s difficult to determine the impact or value of these factors, but the numbers speak for themselves. Baseball Prospectus, long considered a frontrunner in the effort to quantify catcher defense, compiles pitch framing, pitch blocking and catcher throwing metrics into one number they call the Catcher Defensive Adjustment. In 2022 seven of the top eight catchers in that metric played for teams that went to the postseason.

Meanwhile, in recent years teams have been increasingly willing to trade offense for defense at the catching position. Across baseball catchers posted a .663 on-base plus slugging in 2022, the lowest since 1989. That’s down 50 points from three years ago.

If more teams are, in fact, inclined to prioritize defense and treat offense from their catcher as a bonus, adding the designated hitter to the National League will make it easier for them to do so. Needing to bat a pitcher and a light-hitting catcher in a pre-DH NL lineup would have had a significant impact on offensive output as teams would have had a pair of nearly automatic outs batting consecutively at least three times in every game. Now that pitchers are no longer batting, teams are able to deprioritize offense at the catching position without having to solve that lineup problem.

The Brewers are one of many teams likely to discuss their priorities at catcher this winter. With Omar Narvaez becoming a free agent over the weekend, the Brewers will need to decide if they’d like to seek out a new primary catcher this offseason or turn the reins to Victor Caratini. Caratini’s offensive contributions in 2022 were slightly below average, even in a diminished era for catcher batting, but Baseball Prospectus estimates his performance behind the plate saved the Brewers about 8.4 runs this season. That was enough to make him baseball’s 13th best defensive catcher and a positive contributor overall.

Successfully going “defense first” at catcher, however, would likely require the Brewers to make some improvements at other offensive positions. The Astros were able to get away with limited offense from Martin Maldonado, for example, because their lineup was so strong in other spots. The 2022 Brewers, meanwhile, also had an on-base plus slugging under .700 from their center fielders (.650), third basemen (.656) and designated hitters (.699).

Considered simply through the lens of offense, the Brewers are one of many teams where the catching position is a weak spot in their lineup. The 2022 Astros demonstrated, however, that a light-hitting catcher can still be a major contributor to a winning team if the right steps are taken to build around them.