Russell Martin will no doubt be a part of an offseason of journalistic rear-view mirror celebration for Pittsburgh sports writers looking for something other than the Steelers to fill their columns. People will cite a career resurgence and his leadership and his defense and how valuable he was to his team. I get all that. But in fantasy circles, we sometimes have to have a colder heart than George Steinbrenner after double header losses and a bad day at the track.

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Fantasy owners have grown accustomed to plucking surprise fantasy studs off the waiver wire. This year, it was someone like Jean Segura, Josh Donaldson or Michael Cuddyer. On the pitching side, owners fought over guys such as Hisashi Iwakuma and Jose Fernandez. In 2012, though, one of the top waiver wire superstars was veteran Carlos Ruiz.

The Phillies’ catcher was the fourth-ranked catcher in fantasy baseball in 2012. Seemingly out of nowhere, he compiled a .398 wOBA with 16 home runs, and his mere 421 plate appearances was the only thing really keeping him from accruing more value. He was a solid fantasy contributor across the board, minus the obvious dearth of stolen bases.

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Wilin Rosario was one of my flag players for 2013, so to speak. I owned him in a lot of places and thought he could reach 30 home runs.

While that didn’t happen, I and other Rosario owners certainly walked away happy after the 2013 returns. That’s because, even with just 21 home runs, Rosario ranked behind only Mike Napoli and Yadier Molina.

With Napoli set to lose eligibility, Rosario seems a safe bet to hold a top-five preseason ranking for 2014.
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When I hit the Rotgraphs internal message board this week it appeared that most catchers of consequence had been claimed by my colleagues for ‘catcher week.’ But Brian McCann and A.J. Pierzynski remained unclaimed, and the two seemed like a logical pairing for discussion given they are both possibilities to be signed by the Texas Rangers this offseason. Read the rest of this entry »

Buster Posey was great as a rookie in 2010. He was fine in a 2011 that was largely truncated by his broken leg, then was outstanding in 2012 as the Giants won another World Series. He was almost certainly the first catcher off the board in just about fantasy draft this year, with perhaps a few holdouts for Joe Mauer making it less than unanimous, and they were rewarded with… well, it’s hard to be disappointed by .294 and 15 homers from your catcher. But it was merely a good season, and not a great one, wasn’t it?

That’s backed up by the fact that he finished seventh in catcher wOBA (min. 250 PA), behind guys like Jason Castro and Yan Gomes, and also seventh in Zach Sanders’ end of season rankings. Seventh isn’t bad, of course; it’s a starter in even the shallowest of leagues. But it’s also not what fantasy owners were expecting, and that means we need to understand why in order to figure out where he’s appropriate to draft headed into 2014.

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Mike Zunino came into the 2013 as a highly touted prospect. Baseball America had him as 17th ranked prospect and here at FanGraphs, Marc Hulet ranked him 12th overall. It looked like he may spend a good portion of 2013 in the minors, but he was promoted after Jesus Sucre’s hand got injured and the Jesus Montero experiment failed worse than the new Lone Ranger. Going into 2013, the 23-year-old power hitter looks to be the Mariners future everyday catcher if he can work out some contact issues.

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Matt Wieters has not lived up to the enormous expectations placed upon him as a prospect and as a young player.

In his age-27 season, Wieters posted his second worst season in terms of wRC+ (86) and his worst since 2010 in terms of wins above replacement (2.4).

Still, even though Wieters hasn’t become the instant legend that led to sites like Matt Wieters Facts, he’s been very solid behind the plate for Baltimore. He’s excellent defensively and even in a down year was an above-average player overall. He may not sit on the ‘generational talent’ pedastal many had prepared for him, but he’s still very good.

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Is it just me, or do you think of the former American Idol contestant when you hear the name Jason Castro as well? Now that the cat is out of the bag and I have admitted to previously watching the popular singing competition, let’s talk about the Astros catcher.

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Expectations weren’t sky-high for Jonathan Lucroy coming into 2013. For many, Lucroy represented a solid fallback option once some of the bigger names came off the board, with an ADP somewhere in the 120’s. His projections looked something akin to .270/.330/.400 with double digit home runs and 50/50 runs and RBI. Not thrilling, but nice. You could check off that pesky catcher position and move on to other issues.

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Last year when we did our position-by-position post-season recaps, I wrote a piece touting Miguel Montero for his consistent performance and exceptional draft value. His numbers between 2009 and 2012, save for the one injury-riddled year he played just 85 games, were very consistent as he posted an average in the .280’s with 15 to 18 home runs each season while also maintaining that relative consistency in both his walk and strikeout rates and other batted ball data. That consistency, coupled with his always reasonable price tag, made him a pleasure to own and someone I felt confident in recommending as your fantasy catcher. But this past season, that consistency was replaced with struggle and because Montero didn’t cost you much on draft day, he became the poster boy for “you get what you pay for.” The decline is in full-swing and it’s time to move on from him. Read the rest of this entry »