In continuation of Sunday’s What the Pirates Should Do With Catchers’ Options: Part 1, I bring my readers What the Pirates Should Do With Catchers’ Options: Part 2.
As I mentioned in Part 1, Pittsburgh Pirates general manager Neal Huntington has stated that the Pirates don’t intend to pick up the club options of catchers Ryan Doumit and Chris Snyder.
If the Pirates were to pick up Doumit’s option, they would have to pay the 30-year-old $7.25 million next season and $8.25 million in 2013.
I wrote yesterday that picking up Doumit’s option would be the right move for Huntington and owner Bob Nutting to show the city of Pittsburgh that they intend to win, and intend to spend the money required to field a competitive team.
Snyder, on the other hand, could be kept in Pittsburgh for $6.75 million next season. The 30-year-old played in just 34 games last season before his year was cut short by a back issue which required surgery in June.
Snyder took 96 at bats in those 34 games, hitting for a .271 average with three home runs and 17 RBI, in addition to a .376 OBP and .396 SLG%. His batting average and OBP were well above his career averages of .231 and .333, respectively. It was pretty small sample size, so we can’t really assume that Snyder is any better with the bat than he was when the Pirates acquired him last year.
We can assume, though, that Snyder isn’t as potent with the bat as Doumit, though that’s more of a fact than an assumption.
Defensively, Snyder threw out six of 23 attempted steals last season for a 26% rate, which is below his career average of 30%. Again, it was a relatively small sample size, so we don’t know if his arm us any worse than it has been over the course of his career.
We do know, however, that Snyder is a better defensive catcher than Doumit. Snyder has committed three less errors (9) in his entire career behind the plate than Doumit did in the 2010 and 2011 combined seasons (12). Doumit has committed 37 errors in about 170 less career games at catcher.
Both catchers are certainly injury prone as well, but both catchers are about all we have.
Are you comfortable with any combination of Michael McKenry, Jason Jaramillo, Matt Pagnozzi and Eric Fryer catching for the Pirates on a daily basis? I know the city of Pittsburgh has a love affair with McKenry, and that’s acceptable after the way he played once the Pirates acquired him. He’s not a major league caliber catcher, though.
Twenty-three-year-old Tony Sanchez had a poor year in AA-Altoona. The Pirates are still high on the 2009 fourth overall draft pick’s potential, but scouts and fans around the league aren’t sold. As my high school newspaper teacher wrote in an email yesterday, it certainly is a shame “To think — that back in the day — Buster Posey was still available when the Pirates chose [Pedro] Alvarez”
Regardless, the Pirates need better if they’re going to compete this season. The free agent market is extremely weak at the catcher position. As Wilbur Miller over at Pirates Prospects writes:
…the odds of [the Pirates bringing in] somebody noticeably better than McKenry or Jaramillo are slim. The free agent ranks are filled with catchers who are in their mid- to late-30s and nearing the end, and catchers who simply can’t hit at all, or both. Guys like Dioner Navarro, Matt Treanor, Gerald Laird, Brian Schneider and Josh Bard, all of whom will struggle to put up a .600 OPS.
Ramon Hernandez and Rod Barajas are both likely to hit the free agent market, but with such slim pickings this offseason, the Pirates will likely be outbid for their services by larger market teams.
We know the Pirates will be picking up neither Doumit nor Snyder’s option. I have to disagree with this move. I truly feel the team should pick up one of these players’ options and keep a major league caliber catcher in the organization.
Given the choice, I’d take Doumit over Snyder. On most teams, I’d take the defensively-sound catcher with the average bat. The Pirates’ offense is so abysmal at this point, though, that I’d rather have Doumit’s bat in the lineup and put up with his defensive deficiencies.
It was a relatively hard decision for me to decide which catcher I’d rather have, but the Pirates have made it clear that they will choose neither, and likely enter the 2012 season with a barrage of AAA-caliber backstops.
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