Orioles Catchers, 2017 season

[foxfield]

Just now, Redskins Rick said:

I would rather have a defender behind the plate, it makes your whole team better defensively, and probably win more games by not losing, then by their bat in the lineup. IMO

I agree.  A strong defensive catcher with ok offense would be preferable to a good bat and poor defense.  

[Frobby]

13 minutes ago, foxfield said:

I agree.  A strong defensive catcher with ok offense would be preferable to a good bat and poor defense.  

Everything is a trade off.   It depends how good his offense is and how poor his defense is.    If you thought his catching cost us 1.37 runs per game (the CERA difference between Castillo and Joseph), there’s no realistic amount of offense that could make up for that.    But if you thought Castillo’s offense cost us 10 runs all season (which is BB-ref’s calculation of the difference in the defensive component of rWAR between Joseph and Castillo), that’s something else entirely.    As always, measuring catcher defense is very hard. 

[foxfield]

1 minute ago, Frobby said:

Everything is a trade off.   It depends how good his offense is and how poor his defense is.    If you thought his catching cost us 1.37 runs per game (the CERA difference between Castillo and Joseph), there’s no realistic amount of offense that could make up for that.    But if you thought Castillo’s offense cost us 10 runs all season (which is BB-ref’s calculation of the difference in the defensive component of rWAR between Joseph and Castillo), that’s something else entirely.    As always, measuring catcher defense is very hard. 

Absolutely...as you have been pointing out, the dilemma of understanding Castillo's defensive metrics and his possible affect on the Orioles pitching woes is a big one.   I don't claim to understand the metrics at all.  On one hand throwing out 49% of attempted base stealers is stellar.  Offensively Castillo/Joseph were certainly an upgrade.  But if that CERA number has merit.....yes, very hard indeed.

[Redskins Rick]

1 hour ago, foxfield said:

Absolutely...as you have been pointing out, the dilemma of understanding Castillo's defensive metrics and his possible affect on the Orioles pitching woes is a big one.   I don't claim to understand the metrics at all.  On one hand throwing out 49% of attempted base stealers is stellar.  Offensively Castillo/Joseph were certainly an upgrade.  But if that CERA number has merit.....yes, very hard indeed.

I dont want to play the blame game and I believe defense catching is a priority, we did have a change in pitching coaches, did we not?

[Redskins Rick]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

Everything is a trade off.   It depends how good his offense is and how poor his defense is.    If you thought his catching cost us 1.37 runs per game (the CERA difference between Castillo and Joseph), there’s no realistic amount of offense that could make up for that.    But if you thought Castillo’s offense cost us 10 runs all season (which is BB-ref’s calculation of the difference in the defensive component of rWAR between Joseph and Castillo), that’s something else entirely.    As always, measuring catcher defense is very hard. 

CERA is a newer metric, right?

Has it been run on the historical stats?

I was wonder what Dempsey's CERA, his DEF WAR was by far the best Oriole Catcher.

[Frobby]

11 minutes ago, Redskins Rick said:

I dont want to play the blame game and I believe defense catching is a priority, we did have a change in pitching coaches, did we not?

We did.     Obviously you can allocate blame to the catcher, the pitching coaches or the pitchers themselves.    However, if the pitching coach was the difference, why was Joseph’s CERA basically unchanged from 2016 to 2017?

[Redskins Rick]

6 minutes ago, Frobby said:

We did.     Obviously you can allocate blame to the catcher, the pitching coaches or the pitchers themselves.    However, if the pitching coach was the difference, why was Joseph’s CERA basically unchanged from 2016 to 2017?

Solid point you make.

 

[Frobby]

2 minutes ago, Redskins Rick said:

CERA is a newer metric, right?

Has it been run on the historical stats?

I was wonder what Dempsey's CERA, his DEF WAR was by far the best Oriole Catcher.

There’s nothing complicated about CERA — it’s simply the team’s ERA when that catcher is catching.    On the ‘83 Orioles, for example, Dempsey’s CERA was 3.56 and Joe Nolan’s was 3.61.   The previous year, they were at 3.89 and 4.19, respectively.    Those are small differences, easily affected by things like whether one catcher or the other happened to catch the better pitchers more often, or happened to catch when the team was facing weak-hitting opponents more often.    But when you see a gap of 1.37 runs — in pretty equal playing time — it becomes more likely that at least some of the difference relates to the skill of the catcher.   

[esmd]

5 hours ago, Frobby said:

And it’s fair to think that.   However, Castillo had a 5.60 CERA compared to Joseph’s 4.23.    For the starting pitchers, the differential was even more extreme.    Could be a coincidence, but that’s a huge gap.

It's a good point.  I often thought they faired better with Joseph behind the plate than Wieters when he was here, though I have no stats to back that up.  Just a perception.  Seems to be the same last year with Caleb and Beef.  I like Beef, and I think he's played himself into a nice contract this offseason from a team other than us, but I'm happy with Joseph as the starter.  The bigger question, as someone mentioned, is whether Sisco makes the team with his rep for being sub-par defensively.

[Redskins Rick]

41 minutes ago, esmd said:

It's a good point.  I often thought they faired better with Joseph behind the plate than Wieters when he was here, though I have no stats to back that up.  Just a perception.  Seems to be the same last year with Caleb and Beef.  I like Beef, and I think he's played himself into a nice contract this offseason from a team other than us, but I'm happy with Joseph as the starter.  The bigger question, as someone mentioned, is whether Sisco makes the team with his rep for being sub-par defensively.

Keep in mind, we kept hearing about that Mancini being sub-par, and they was wrong.

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

There’s nothing complicated about CERA — it’s simply the team’s ERA when that catcher is catching.    On the ‘83 Orioles, for example, Dempsey’s CERA was 3.56 and Joe Nolan’s was 3.61.   The previous year, they were at 3.89 and 4.19, respectively.    Those are small differences, easily affected by things like whether one catcher or the other happened to catch the better pitchers more often, or happened to catch when the team was facing weak-hitting opponents more often.    But when you see a gap of 1.37 runs — in pretty equal playing time — it becomes more likely that at least some of the difference relates to the skill of the catcher.   

Thanks for the education.

[esmd]

26 minutes ago, Redskins Rick said:

Keep in mind, we kept hearing about that Mancini being sub-par, and they was wrong.

Very true.  Unfortunately by the time Sisco got some playing time, I had already tuned out, so I didn't get to see him play.

[Redskins Rick]

34 minutes ago, esmd said:

Very true.  Unfortunately by the time Sisco got some playing time, I had already tuned out, so I didn't get to see him play.

Oriole instructions did wonders with Joseph and Steve Clevenger, both was sub-par behind the plate, so the track record is there.