Rankings week is mercifully drawing to a close, with only the pitchers left for Monday. It makes sense to close the offense with catchers, in a way — they are the least likely position to make an offensive impact on your fantasy team. Sure, middle infielders hit for a worse batting line, but catchers are close, and they accrue fewer plate appearances. Their teams need to watch out for their knees and always employ a tandem at the position — only five catchers are projected to accrue more than 500 at-bats this year by the updated ZiPs, and that’s not a ton. By contrast, there are three first baseman that might crack 600 at-bats, and 21 that should cross the 500 at-bat threshold.

Catchers: not only are they doing it worse, they’re doing it less often. Maybe that’s a boon, actually. Sometimes, especially in two-catcher leagues, it makes sense just to leave that space unfilled. Many of these guys are just going to hurt your team more with every plate appearance.

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As we settle in here for the mid-summer classic, it’s a good time to take a look back at some of the biggest surprises of the first half with respect to the catching position and what you might expect moving forward. Read the rest of this entry »

With the All-Star break upon us, we finally don’t have to worry about our fantasy teams for a few days. It’s always nice to have that little break, especially when you run multiple teams. Rather than the usual daily waiver wire shtick, let’s take a look at four players who have gone from undrafted and afterthoughts to key contributors in all formats.

Carlos Ruiz | C | Phillies | Preseason ADP: 290 | Owned: 89% Yahoo! and 100% ESPN

Chooch has been, my far, the best hitting catcher in baseball this season. He came into the year with a .265/.357/.393 career batting line which is solid but not exactly worth a fantasy roster spot. The 33-year-old Ruiz carries a .350/.412/.584 (!) line into the break this summer, having already hit a career-best 13 homers with 21 doubles that are just eight shy of his career-high. He’s moved into a more premium lineup spot — fourth or fifth depending on whether or not Ryan Howard plays — and the result has been 46 RBI that are the second most among qualified catchers and eight short of his career-high. His 523 ottoneu points lead all catchers by a significant margin.

Ruiz’s production will likely step back for a number of reasons in the second half, mostly because catchers tend to wear down in August in September. A .362 BABIP and 18.3% HR/FB don’t exactly scream sustainable either. That said, Chooch’s first half production is already in the bank and anyone who grabbed him off waivers in April is surely thrilled.

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It’s time again to re-visit the catcher tiers as the calendar flips to July. I’ve taken both current and expected performance into account, some thoughts and expectations of my own and a few comments from you, my very own Peanut Gallery. Things are looking a little different than they did back in June, so without further ado… Read the rest of this entry »

Is your team lagging in production from behind the plate?  Can you sacrifice some batting average if it means a boost in the counting stats?  Well, if you answered yes to either or both of these questions, here are a pair of catchers you should probably look into to give your fantasy team a nice little burst of power. Read the rest of this entry »

Look at Jesus Montero. You probably aren’t excited by the .263/.301/.406 work, or the eight home runs. It’s just not a strong package, not after all that hype.

As that hype creates the context that has led to disappointment — an emotion that’s running high among his owners if twitter is to be believed — there are other ways to place Jesus Montero that make him more attractive. Context is key.

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At this time last year, well actually about a week earlier, we did a series of Bullish/Bearish articles where we each picked one side or the other on a particular player of note.  My Bearish on Carlos Santana piece wasn’t convincing anyone and some even pointed out that perhaps yours truly was just taking one for the team here and picking a side he may not wholeheartedly believe in.  But here we are a little more than a year later and while I still have hope for confidence in another second half surge, I look back on that article and can sympathize with the guy who wrote it. Read the rest of this entry »

For the most part, the catcher position has been a pretty big disappointment this season.  Some have performed as expected, but by and large, there are more downs than ups.  Hopefully, things will pick up in the second half when we get a serious influx of players coming back from injuries who might be better options than the Nick Hundley, Miguel Olivo, or Jason Castro that you have sitting in your catcher slot right now.  They’re not all precious gems coming back, but some are definitely better than others and likely better than what’s out on your waiver wire as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Even though the positional rankings aren;t being updated monthly, the tiers are, so let’s take a look at some of the movement amongst the catchers.  We saw a few things happen with the May tiers but I held back any extreme movement because of sample sizes and questions surrounding performance sustainability.  This month, guys are moving… Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s waiver wire brings you two rookies who have come into more important roles of late, one an outfielder and one a relief pitcher.

Norichika Aoki | OF | Brewers | Owned: 3% Yahoo! and 1.7% ESPN

Aoki turned 30 years old earlier this year, but technically he’s a rookie after coming over from Japan. He opened the season as a reserve player with Ryan Braun, Corey Hart, and Carlos Gomez/Nyjer Morgan entrenched in the outfield, but he’s seen more playing time lately because Mat Gamel’s season-ending knee injury has forced Hart to play some first base. It wasn’t just Gamel’s injury though, Aoki earned his spot.

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