Jay Jaffe Dissects Rutschman’s impact on the O’s

[Frobby]

16 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

 Chirinos has a -1.3 fWAR this year.

Severino was -.1 last year.

Catcher defense is really hard to get a grip on statistically.  For example, Severino allowed 10 passed balls and 66 wild pitches in 883 innings last year.  Chirinos allowed 3 passed balls and 18 wild pitches in 479 innings.  We can measure the direct impact of the extra passed balls and wild pitches.  What we can’t easily measure is (1) how many of the wild pitches were preventable by the catcher, and (2) how many times did a pitcher shake off a call for a low breaking ball, or fail to execute the pitch with conviction, because they were worried that a bounced pitch would elude Severino?   There’s no version of WAR that measures that, but it could be a very significant thing.  

[Sports Guy]

Just now, Frobby said:

Catcher defense is really hard to get a grip on statistically.  For example, Severino allowed 10 passed balls and 66 wild pitches in 883 innings last year.  Chirinos allowed 3 passed balls and 18 wild pitches in 479 innings.  We can measure the direct impact of the extra passed balls and wild pitches.  What we can’t easily measure is (1) how many of the wild pitches were preventable by the catcher, and (2) how many times did a pitcher shake off a call for a low breaking ball, or fail to execute the pitch with conviction, because they were worried that a bounced pitch would elude Severino?   There’s no version of WAR that measures that, but it could be a very significant thing.  

There’s also the idea that pitching was way better in 2022 and no, that had nothing to do with Chirinos.

 

[Tony-OH]

31 minutes ago, forphase1 said:

He was/is an upgrade over Severino.  But that just goes to show how poor Severino was, not so much how good Chirinos is.  We certainly need to have a better backup for Adley next year.

Yep. Severino was so poor defensively that he hurt the team way more than helped. While Chrinos did have a decent offensive season last year, he was always going to be 38-years old this year. That's a dangerous age to expect a catcher to still perform well. 

It's not a be all end all concern, but I'm hoping that Elias will work to get better options to back up Adley next year. We know that Gallagher is at least a good pitch framer, but he can't hit. We don't know how good a pitch framer Handley is in AA, but the fact that did not promote him to AAA this year when all the injuries happened suggest he's going to AAA next year and will not be an opening day option as back up. 

 

[Frobby]

5 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

There’s also the idea that pitching was way better in 2022 and no, that had nothing to do with Chirinos.

 

Entirely possible.  There’s plenty of room for a mixed explanation too.   It had sone to do with the pitchers, some to do with the catchers.  My point is, it’s hard to parse it all out.  

[Tony-OH]

8 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Catcher defense is really hard to get a grip on statistically.  For example, Severino allowed 10 passed balls and 66 wild pitches in 883 innings last year.  Chirinos allowed 3 passed balls and 18 wild pitches in 479 innings.  We can measure the direct impact of the extra passed balls and wild pitches.  What we can’t easily measure is (1) how many of the wild pitches were preventable by the catcher, and (2) how many times did a pitcher shake off a call for a low breaking ball, or fail to execute the pitch with conviction, because they were worried that a bounced pitch would elude Severino?   There’s no version of WAR that measures that, but it could be a very significant thing.  

These are very good points. I always take dWAR by catchers with a grain of salt. Baseball Savant gives us great pitch framing stats, and pop times for catchers, but they don't yet have metrics for blocking pitches. 

[Guest]

Come on down Martin Maldanado!

[Frobby]

Per Cots, the following are potential free agents:

Tucker Barnhart
Curt Casali
Jason Castro
Willson Contreras
Elias Diaz
Austin Hedges
Andrew Knapp
Sandy Leon
Martin Maldonado *
Omar Narvaez
Kevin Plawecki
Gary Sanchez
Max Stassi
Christian Vazquez
Mike Zunino

* team option

Not sure how good this list is.  Chirinos isn’t listed.  

[forphase1]

16 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

There’s also the idea that pitching was way better in 2022 and no, that had nothing to do with Chirinos.

 

That's a bold statement that I'm not sure can be 100% backed up.  In a case of Severino versus Chirinos, I can see how having Chirinos back there could make a pitcher better.  As Frobby noted above the fear of a wild pitch or passed ball could make the pitchers not want to throw certain pitches or to try to not throw them with as much bite or movement.  While it's impossible to know and measure, I DO think having a reliable catcher behind the plate can help the pitching staff pitch better and with more confidence.  

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, forphase1 said:

That's a bold statement that I'm not sure can be 100% backed up.  In a case of Severino versus Chirinos, I can see how having Chirinos back there could make a pitcher better.  As Frobby noted above the fear of a wild pitch or passed ball could make the pitchers not want to throw certain pitches or to try to not throw them with as much bite or movement.  While it's impossible to know and measure, I DO think having a reliable catcher behind the plate can help the pitching staff pitch better and with more confidence.  

Chirinos isn’t good at really anything. The pitching is better for a lot of reasons.  Chirinos isn’t one of them.

[forphase1]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

Chirinos isn’t good at really anything. The pitching is better for a lot of reasons.  Chirinos isn’t one of them.

Compared to Severino he is.  

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, forphase1 said:

Compared to Severino he is.  

Perhaps but that’s a tallest midget contest.

Chirinos isn’t good. The overrating of  him on this site early on was just wrong. 

[forphase1]

22 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Perhaps but that’s a tallest midget contest.

Chirinos isn’t good. The overrating of  him on this site early on was just wrong. 

No doubt it's a tallest midget contest and just like Odor (which is still happening) he was way overrated because what we had in 2021 was so terrible.  If my son was failing a class with a 50% F and he raised that to a 63% D it's a great improvement, but still sucks.  That's what happened with Chirinos and Odor.  They are big improvements over last year, but still really bad.  Odor should already be gone IMO and Chirinos should be replaced next year with someone better.  But to act like he hasn't been an improvement over Severino isn't accurate, and I think that's also helped with the improved pitching.  In other words I think if we had the same staff but Severino catching in place of Chirinos I doubt our pitching numbers are quite as good.  

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, forphase1 said:

No doubt it's a tallest midget contest and just like Odor (which is still happening) he was way overrated because what we had in 2021 was so terrible.  If my son was failing a class with a 50% F and he raised that to a 63% D it's a great improvement, but still sucks.  That's what happened with Chirinos and Odor.  They are big improvements over last year, but still really bad.  Odor should already be gone IMO and Chirinos should be replaced next year with someone better.  But to act like he hasn't been an improvement over Severino isn't accurate, and I think that's also helped with the improved pitching.  In other words I think if we had the same staff but Severino catching in place of Chirinos I doubt our pitching numbers are quite as good.  

It’s not accurate yet both WARs say Severino was better last year.

Even if you want to argue that the catcher defense isn’t properly weighted, Chirinos isn’t making up that much of a difference.

[forphase1]

2 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

It’s not accurate yet both WARs say Severino was better last year.

Even if you want to argue that the catcher defense isn’t properly weighted, Chirinos isn’t making up that much of a difference.

Come on SG, it's not that hard.  Yes, Severino has a much better bat, and that's the reason that WAR values him so much more.  But from a pure catching standpoint Chirinos is much better as Severino had hands of stone and is quite possibly the worst catcher I can remember seeing on a regular basis.  Chirinos bat is just SO bad.  I wouldn't be surprised to see him out of MLB next year really.  

[Sports Guy]

9 minutes ago, forphase1 said:

Come on SG, it's not that hard.  Yes, Severino has a much better bat, and that's the reason that WAR values him so much more.  But from a pure catching standpoint Chirinos is much better as Severino had hands of stone and is quite possibly the worst catcher I can remember seeing on a regular basis.  Chirinos bat is just SO bad.  I wouldn't be surprised to see him out of MLB next year really.  

According to BR, Chirinos has a .4 dWAR this year.  Severino was .6.

Severino has a better pop time in 2021 than Chirinos in 2022.  I believe the framing stats for Severino in 2021 were better than Chirinos this year as well.

Severinos defense is becoming the Jack Cust falling of OH.