Catching

[Philip]

16 minutes ago, Frobby said:

“I thought he really improved from spring training to the last game of the year defensively, and I think there’s still a lot of room to grow defensively..

Half of that statement is true.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

44 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Well, at the halfway point of the season, the pitchers had a 6.20 ERA when Severino was behind the plate, but by the end of the year, that figure was down to 5.43 (so maybe about a 4.70 ERA in the second half, depending on how equal the playing time was with the first half).     That could be sheer coincidence, but it’s possible Severino was improving in some of the defensive areas outside of stopping the running game.   

Severino might have finally gotten into a rhythm with the pitchers. Remember, he was brought in during the last, what, week? Week and a half of Spring Training?

[Frobby]

20 minutes ago, Philip said:

Half of that statement is true.

I can’t say I have a strong opinion of whether or not Sisco improved defensively as the year progressed.   First, I’m not the best judge of the nuances of catching beyond the obvious and what can be captured statistically.    Second, I just haven’t watched as much baseball the last two years as I normally do, even though I still follow what’s going on daily.    

As to what can be captured statistically, I don’t see much evidence of improvement.    I don’t have an exact breakdown for Sisco, but I know in the first half he had a better CERA than Severino but Sisco’s was considerably worse at year end.    He might have gotten a little better at stopping the running game; he allowed 20 stolen bases in his first 21 games, but only 5 over his last 31.    I’m not really sure if he gets the credit for that (he wasn’t throwing out a lot of guys, but teams just stopped running on him for whatever reason), but perhaps he does.   He seemingly was better at pitch blocking than Severino (1 PB vs. 10, 20 WP vs. 40 in roughly 55% of the playing time that Severino had).   
 

 

[Redskins Rick]

35 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I can’t say I have a strong opinion of whether or not Sisco improved defensively as the year progressed.   First, I’m not the best judge of the nuances of catching beyond the obvious and what can be captured statistically.    Second, I just haven’t watched as much baseball the last two years as I normally do, even though I still follow what’s going on daily.    

As to what can be captured statistically, I don’t see much evidence of improvement.    I don’t have an exact breakdown for Sisco, but I know in the first half he had a better CERA than Severino but Sisco’s was considerably worse at year end.    He might have gotten a little better at stopping the running game; he allowed 20 stolen bases in his first 21 games, but only 5 over his last 31.    I’m not really sure if he gets the credit for that (he wasn’t throwing out a lot of guys, but teams just stopped running on him for whatever reason), but perhaps he does.   He seemingly was better at pitch blocking than Severino (1 PB vs. 10, 20 WP vs. 40 in roughly 55% of the playing time that Severino had).   
 

 

Didnt Sisco get shipped to AAA at some point in Juneish for a time, because of his defensive lapses????

[Frobby]

2 minutes ago, Redskins Rick said:

Didnt Sisco get shipped to AAA at some point in Juneish for a time, because of his defensive lapses????

That was in 2018.    In 2019, he started the year in the minors and got called up in early June and stayed up the rest of the year.    

[Redskins Rick]

6 minutes ago, Frobby said:

That was in 2018.    In 2019, he started the year in the minors and got called up in early June and stayed up the rest of the year.    

my mind has gone senile on me.

[Frobby]

1 minute ago, Redskins Rick said:

my mind has gone senile on me.

We’re at that age, though I think you have a couple years on me.   

[Philip]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

I can’t say I have a strong opinion of whether or not Sisco improved defensively as the year progressed.   First, I’m not the best judge of the nuances of catching beyond the obvious and what can be captured statistically.    Second, I just haven’t watched as much baseball the last two years as I normally do, even though I still follow what’s going on daily.    

As to what can be captured statistically, I don’t see much evidence of improvement.    I don’t have an exact breakdown for Sisco, but I know in the first half he had a better CERA than Severino but Sisco’s was considerably worse at year end.    He might have gotten a little better at stopping the running game; he allowed 20 stolen bases in his first 21 games, but only 5 over his last 31.    I’m not really sure if he gets the credit for that (he wasn’t throwing out a lot of guys, but teams just stopped running on him for whatever reason), but perhaps he does.   He seemingly was better at pitch blocking than Severino (1 PB vs. 10, 20 WP vs. 40 in roughly 55% of the playing time that Severino had).   
 

 

When I said half that statement was true, I was referring to the “he needs to improve on defense” half. And I was being mildly sarcastic, because Sisco’s catching overall is so bad that he can’t really be considered a catcher. I think Flaherty was our emergency catcher and I’d Rather have him behind the plate.

Severino is admittedly nothing to make the heart grow fonder, but his mistakes are the mistakes of a guy who knows how to field the position and just isn’t doing it very well. Sisco comes across as a guy who has no idea what he’s doing, and hasn’t given any indication he ever will.

[Frobby]

4 minutes ago, Philip said:

When I said half that statement was true, I was referring to the “he needs to improve on defense” half. And I was being mildly sarcastic, because Sisco’s catching overall is so bad that he can’t really be considered a catcher. I think Flaherty was our emergency catcher and I’d Rather have him behind the plate.

Severino is admittedly nothing to make the heart grow fonder, but his mistakes are the mistakes of a guy who knows how to field the position and just isn’t doing it very well. Sisco comes across as a guy who has no idea what he’s doing, and hasn’t given any indication he ever will.

I understood your meaning.    I don’t agree with you on how bad Sisco is behind the plate, though I’d readily admit he is well below average back there.    To me, in the end it boils down to whether he becomes an above average hitter for a catcher.     If he was hitting .280/.360/.420, I’d have no problem at all putting up with his defensive flaws.     But he hasn’t shown us so far that he can do that.    I’m fine letting him spend another year splitting time with Severino to see how he develops, recognizing that the team stinks and we’re just marking time at the catcher position until Rutschman arrives.    

I’m really interested in why teams stopped running on Sisco after the all star break, though.    
 

[Philip]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

I understood your meaning.    I don’t agree with you on how bad Sisco is behind the plate, though I’d readily admit he is well below average back there.    To me, in the end it boils down to whether he becomes an above average hitter for a catcher.     If he was hitting .280/.360/.420, I’d have no problem at all putting up with his defensive flaws.     But he hasn’t shown us so far that he can do that.    I’m fine letting him spend another year splitting time with Severino to see how he develops, recognizing that the team stinks and we’re just marking time at the catcher position until Rutschman arrives.    

I’m really interested in why teams stopped running on Sisco after the all star break, though.    
 

All right, fair enough, I think he verges on hopeless, but I don’t have any problem with letting him see what he can do. The question of why teams stopped running on him is an interesting one, but I don’t think it has anything to do with his reputation as a flamethrower.

[sportsfan8703]

8 minutes ago, Philip said:

All right, fair enough, I think he verges on hopeless, but I don’t have any problem with letting him see what he can do. The question of why teams stopped running on him is an interesting one, but I don’t think it has anything to do with his reputation as a flamethrower.

Oddly enough, it's his offense that is going to determine if he can stick in the big leagues.  Teams just don't run anymore.  It's too risky with the juiced ball.  Especially with the slugger filled lineups in our division.  We play 96 games in the AL East, name the base stealers of significance?  

I wouldn't be down on Sisco one bit, if he retools his swing this winter, and they stick him in AAA to get "everyday" ABs.  Up here we really don't have the luxury to DH some games when he doesn't catch.  We need those AB's to figure out what our other DH types can do.  

[Philip]

2 hours ago, sportsfan8703 said:

I wouldn't be down on Sisco one bit, if he retools his swing this winter, and they stick him in AAA to get "everyday" ABs.  Up here we really don't have the luxury to DH some games when he doesn't catch.  We need those AB's to figure out what our other DH types can do.  

Yes, I agree with all of that, I think the one thing going for him, and it’s not a very big thing, is that he’s lowered his strikeout percentage a bit and slightly raised his walk percentage. That means he’s seeing the ball a little bit better. But I think his strikeout rate is still ~ 30%, which is awful.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

44 minutes ago, Philip said:

Yes, I agree with all of that, I think the one thing going for him, and it’s not a very big thing, is that he’s lowered his strikeout percentage a bit and slightly raised his walk percentage. That means he’s seeing the ball a little bit better. But I think his strikeout rate is still ~ 30%, which is awful.

Do "hit by pitch" count as walks too?

[Philip]

18 minutes ago, Legend_Of_Joey said:

Do "hit by pitch" count as walks too?

I think they contribute to on base percentage, but no they don’t contribute to Walks.

[sportsfan8703]

At this point, I don’t see the value of having Wynns on the 40 man. He either clears waivers and is AAA depth, or we just sign a similar C on a milb deal for AAA. Then if there is a need we add that C to the 40 man.