March Composite Rankings – Catcher
Our staff composite rankings are back! We’re kicking things off with Catcher and we’ll be rolling out a new position each day over the next week-plus. I will still be doing my commentary by position rankings to give a quick little thought, but those will be separate posts. When all the positions are out, I’ll make a spreadsheet that has all of them together with team and league columns added.
We’re using Yahoo! eligibility requirements which is 5 starts or 10 appearances. These rankings assume the standard 5×5 categories and a re-draft league. If we forgot someone, please let us know in the comments and we’ll make sure he’s added for the updates. If you have questions for a specific ranker on something he did, let us know in the comments. We can also be reached via Twitter:
There will be differences, sharp differences, within the rankings. The rankers have different philosophies when it comes to ranking, some of which you’re no doubt familiar with through previous iterations. Of course the idea that we’d all think the same would be silly because then what would be the point of including multiple rankers?! Think someone should be higher or lower? Make a case. Let us know why you think that. The chart is sortable. If a ranker didn’t rank someone that the others did, he was given that ranker’s last rank +1. On catchers that wasn’t necessary because we all ranked 50 which made getting a top 40 pretty easy.
Updated March 12th – Paul updated Lucroy with OAK and adjusted his Iannetta ranking after further research.
Key:
- AVG– just the average of the four ranking sets
- Adj. AVG– the average minus the high and low rankings (maybe less necessary with just four rankers, but we had it in past years)
- SPLIT– the difference between the high and low rankings
—
| NAME | Paul S | Mike | Jeff | Justin | AVG | Adj. AVG | Split | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gary Sanchez | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1.0 | 1.0 | 0 |
| 2 | Buster Posey | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2.0 | 2.0 | 0 |
| 3 | Willson Contreras | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3.3 | 3.0 | 1 |
| 4 | J.T. Realmuto | 4 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 4.3 | 4.0 | 1 |
| 5 | Evan Gattis | 5 | 7 | 5 | 5 | 5.5 | 5.0 | 2 |
| 6 | Salvador Perez | 7 | 3 | 6 | 6 | 5.5 | 6.0 | 4 |
| 7 | Wilson Ramos | 6 | 8 | 8 | 7 | 7.3 | 7.5 | 2 |
| 8 | Yadier Molina | 8 | 6 | 7 | 9 | 7.5 | 7.5 | 3 |
| 9 | Welington Castillo | 10 | 13 | 11 | 8 | 10.5 | 10.5 | 5 |
| 10 | Mike Zunino | 12 | 11 | 13 | 10 | 11.5 | 11.5 | 3 |
| 11 | Jonathan Lucroy | 11 | 16 | 9 | 12 | 12.0 | 11.5 | 7 |
| 12 | Brian McCann | 15 | 15 | 12 | 14 | 14.0 | 14.5 | 3 |
| 13 | Austin Barnes | 13 | 21 | 10 | 13 | 14.3 | 13.0 | 11 |
| 14 | Robinson Chirinos | 20 | 9 | 16 | 15 | 15.0 | 15.5 | 11 |
| 15 | James McCann | 19 | 12 | 14 | 18 | 15.8 | 16.0 | 7 |
| 16 | Yasmani Grandal | 9 | 24 | 27 | 11 | 17.8 | 17.5 | 18 |
| 17 | Christian Vazquez | 18 | 20 | 15 | 21 | 18.5 | 19.0 | 6 |
| 18 | Travis d’Arnaud | 21 | 10 | 17 | 26 | 18.5 | 19.0 | 16 |
| 19 | Russell Martin | 22 | 14 | 18 | 20 | 18.5 | 19.0 | 8 |
| 20 | Tucker Barnhart | 16 | 22 | 19 | 22 | 19.8 | 20.5 | 6 |
| 21 | Tyler Flowers | 24 | 19 | 20 | 16 | 19.8 | 19.5 | 8 |
| 22 | Austin Hedges | 17 | 17 | 24 | 24 | 20.5 | 20.5 | 7 |
| 23 | Chris Iannetta | 14 | 26 | 22 | 23 | 21.3 | 22.5 | 12 |
| 24 | Matt Wieters | 26 | 18 | 23 | 25 | 23.0 | 24.0 | 8 |
| 25 | Manny Pina | 29 | 30 | 26 | 17 | 25.5 | 27.5 | 13 |
| 26 | Francisco Cervelli | 30 | 27 | 21 | 28 | 26.5 | 27.5 | 9 |
| 27 | Stephen Vogt | 27 | 25 | 28 | 29 | 27.3 | 27.5 | 4 |
| 28 | Kurt Suzuki | 25 | 31 | 25 | 30 | 27.8 | 27.5 | 6 |
| 29 | Alex Avila | 23 | 33 | 32 | 27 | 28.8 | 29.5 | 10 |
| 30 | Jorge Alfaro | 28 | 32 | 38 | 19 | 29.3 | 30.0 | 19 |
| 31 | Bruce Maxwell III | 33 | 29 | 30 | 32 | 31.0 | 31.0 | 4 |
| 32 | Jason Castro | 35 | 23 | 29 | 40 | 31.8 | 32.0 | 17 |
| 33 | Chance Sisco | 31 | 38 | 33 | 31 | 33.3 | 32.0 | 7 |
| 34 | Caleb Joseph | 32 | 34 | 36 | 36 | 34.5 | 35.0 | 4 |
| 35 | Yan Gomes | 37 | 36 | 35 | 33 | 35.3 | 35.5 | 4 |
| 36 | Martin Maldonado | 38 | 28 | 40 | 35 | 35.3 | 36.5 | 12 |
| 37 | Mitch Garver | 36 | 39 | 31 | 37 | 35.8 | 36.5 | 8 |
| 38 | Devin Mesoraco | 40 | 35 | 34 | 39 | 37.0 | 37.0 | 6 |
| 39 | Roberto Perez | 39 | 37 | 41 | 42 | 39.8 | 40.0 | 5 |
| 40 | Blake Swihart | 34 | 50 | 37 | 43 | 41.0 | 40.0 | 16 |
Mike, the rebel. I’m with you on Chirinos, but D’Arnaud?
Hey, I just project the players and let the math create the rankings! I have D’Arnaud at:
0.251-16 -56-47
This is in 407 ABs which would be the most of his career. Obviously health is the biggest question mark, but the projection in those ABs aren’t that much better than what he did last year. Also, big dropoff after Ramos — the next 8 guys are worth within $2 of each other! That’s important as it means they are essentially all interchangeable.
And how did Salvy Perez end up ahead of Contreras? That was the most surprising outlier to me.
in OBP yeah, but in BA league Salvy is #3 obviously
I was a bit surprised at Gattis’ rank… Until I looked below him.
Man, catcher got shallow recently.
Are these rankings that are coming out going to make their way into the hard links on the right of the page?
Edit:
Also, with the different types of rankings you guys do – are they all going to be centrally located and linked to somewhere? It is difficult to find the most recent ones otherwise.
Would be great if this was all centrally located. On the other hand, it’s fun to see last year’s rankings – Sanchez #4 behind Lucroy and Schwarber? What were you thinking Paul?
Wow Paul, I’m surprised you ranked Zunino 11th and not 50th. You also weren’t the lowest on Zunino, are you coming around on him?
My own take as a Zunino doubter is that he’s finally at a point where they aren’t going to mess with his playing time. Since he’ll hit 20 HR and drive in some runs, that puts him ahead of Crap Mountain.
Nah, just kinda where he slots based on a bad pool. I’ll still never take him.
My values are based off the average of four projections and the SGP from the 2017 NFBC leagues. I’ll usually only adjust playing time and injuries
I find it interesting that you all have Posey ahead of Contreras even though the drafting consensus is Contreras a few picks ahead of Posey. I agree, which makes 5 of us. Kinda cool?
Even more reason to heavily invest in the Barnes/Grandal duo. Going to be top 5 production in daily leagues.
I think I’m about to pick them #298 and #303 in TGFBI. I just need to decide in what order is least likely to get me sniped on the other half.
They combined for 744 PA, 85 R, 30 HR, 96 RBI, 4 SB, and ~.263 average last season. Even shaving off 75 of those PA, that’s a monster C season. The opportunity cost is pretty painful though in a 5 BN format. Not being able to use an extra platoon bat could be costly.
I made this suggestion in Paul’s post about the All-Sleeper lineup. As far as I’m concerned, a Barnes+Grandal combo is the best possible play at catcher this year. Obviously you have to be certain you can get both, I started with Barnes and then did Grandal but that was before the news of a true platoon broke so I would flip flop it were I drafting now.
As incredible as Sanchez is, there are some hitters with lower ADPs that I could never imagine passing over to draft Sanchez. Lindor, Rizzo, Springer, Seager, Bellinger, Freeman are all at or below Sanchez’s ADP.
Barnes+Grandal combined for 30 HR 85 R 96 RBI 4 SB and a 261/344/468 triple slash with the total PAs of a lead-off hitter last year. That gives you something akin to Eugenio Suarez who had 26 HR 97 R 82 RBI 4 SB and a 260/367/461 last year, but at C. Or to keep it within the Dodgers org, a Yasiel Puig with more R and RBI and less steals (Puig went 28/15 with 72 R 74 RBI and 263/346/487).
If Grandal is anything more than the dumpster fire he was most of last year, your two Cs combine to make the best C in baseball at the price of two bench bats. It might cost you an extra roster spot, but it is still worth it.
How much of a bump does Contreras get in OBP leagues? Projected for a 10% BB-rate and a 350 OBP%
Wow, very surprised to see Posey ranked as consensus #2. I’ll take Contreras in a heartbeat over that slap-hitting pussy…
Sheesh. Tell us how you really feel. I like Posey to be his Posey self this year. Not sure that’s better or worse than Contreras. Ceiling vs. Floor, maybe.
All the Giants are boring solid fantasy plays this year, in my mind. Mad Bum, Cueto, Shark, Posey, Cutch, Longo…there’s value in high floor…
Think you need to take your own advice Sun Tzu.
“Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance.” – Sun Tzu
how did that comment get downvoted? i looove it
So are you saying we won’t see much of Mejia this season?
mets were running a relatively even timeshare between d’arnaud and plawecki down the stretch last year, and reports are they’re planning to do the same thing this year
https://www.mlb.com/news/mets-travis-darnaud-plawecki-to-split-time/c-265774756
plawecki made some adjustments during his midyear demotion and hit .303/.411/.474 in 90 PA after he came back up into the timeshare arrangement in august
this is all without even considering d’arnaud’s injury history
just putting it out there for y’all deepleaguers
It makes me sad their aren’t any 5×5 old school ottoneu ranks or dollar values anywhere. The FGPts stuff dominates, I guess.
Paul, will Fangraphs eventually add ZiPS to the auction calculator?
Yes, the person who can do that on that backend is aware of it!
I was a big fan of Lucroy before last year. Now I see that he gets only one single-digit ranking this year as an unsigned, possibly part-time catcher. High five to Jeff for keeping the hope alive.
In a Daily league with 37 man rosters. Where would you rank the combo of Austin Barnes and Grandal? I was thinking top 10, maybe 6 or 7?
In a league with rosters that big, I’d honestly put Barnes+Grandal in the Top 3 and could make a case that they’re the best fantasy C when you factor in the cost to draft/acquire relative to Sanchez, Posey and Contreras. You have a big enough roster that the extra roster spot this strategy costs you means absolutely nothing. Not to mention the improvement to the rest of your team because of the higher level draft pick this frees up for another position.
In a standard league with a 5 man bench, or a league that counts OBP, I’d put them solidly in the Top 5. I’d put them up against Realmuto and even Contreras, but the cost of losing the extra roster spot with a 5 man bench kills some of the value of this strategy. For comparison, in 2017:
Barnes+Grandal: 30 HR 85 R 96 RBI 4 SB 261/344/468 in 744 PA
Contreras: 21 HR 50 R 74 RBI 5 SB 276/356/499 in 428 PA
Realmuto: 17 HR 68 R 65 RBI 8 SB 278/332/451 in 579 PA
Even assuming regression to the mean for both Barnes (down) and Grandal (up), and taking away a few counting stats for when one or the other pinch hit and wouldn’t be in your lineup, you’re getting pretty similar production as Contreras and Realmuto over at least 100 more PAs.
Gattis-How much does this ranking have to do with his role as full time DH.