Archive for Wilson Ramos

As the season moves on, things are really settling in with the catcher rankings.  Not a whole lot of movement from tier to tier (almost none), but some movement within.  Remember, the criteria used for the rankings is as follows:

1.  Current performance level
2.  Expected performance for rest of season
3.  Value based on standard 5×5 categories (avg over OBP)

Here’s how it looks heading into July. Read the rest of this entry »

As we get ready to head into a new month, it’s time to update the 2011 Catchers Rankings once again.  Remember, the criteria for these rankings is as follows:

The arrows are used to highlight a player moving up or down in tier, but you’ll also notice some minor tweaks within the tiers as well.  Some that will obviously have more impact than others. Read the rest of this entry »

Entering the 2011 season, Wilson Ramos had three main obstacles standing between him and the Washington Nationals’ starting catcher job.

One was Ivan Rodriguez. Though Pudge hasn’t possessed offensive punch in years, Nationals manager Jim Riggleman dubbed the 39-year-old the main man behind the plate. Ramos’ other two obstacles were health and his tendency to hack at nearly everything thrown his way.

The 23-year-old broke the tip of his left middle finger and injured his hamstring in 2009, and he dealt with an oblique injury in 2010. Though he held his own in a short 82 plate appearance stint in the majors last year (.278/.305/.405), Ramos walked just 2.4% of the time while swinging at 38.2% of pitches thrown outside of the strike zone (the MLB average is around 29 percent). Swinging early and often was nothing new for the backstop whom the Nats picked up from the Twins last July in exchange for Matt Capps — Ramos’ career walk rate in the minors sits at 5.5 percent.

Ramos has since leapfrogged Pudge on the depth chart, drawing the majority of starts. He has also stayed out of the trainer’s room and is showing a more refined approach at the plate. If you’re in need of catching help, it’s time to start taking this guy seriously.

In 122 trips to the plate this season, Ramos has a .262/.336/.430 triple slash. His .327 Weighted On-Base Average (wOBA) places him squarely in the middle of the pack among catchers with at least 100 PA. Ramos’ pop — he’s got a .168 Isolated Power that is comfortably above the .137 major league average — isn’t shocking, given that Baseball America said before the season that he “has good loft and leverage in his swing, giving him a chance to hit for solid-average or slightly better power in time.” Ramos’ patience, on the other hand, has been a pleasant surprise.

Batting mostly out of the fifth slot in Washington’s lineup, Ramos has jumped after pitches thrown out of the zone just 26.8% of the time. That, in turn, has allowed him to draw a walk in 9.8% of his plate appearances, above the 8.6% MLB average. Laying off those junk pitches means more hitter’s counts and chances for Ramos to utilize his power.

While changes in a hitter’s power production take a large sample size to become meaningful, that’s typically not the case with changes in plate discipline. Swing rates for batters become reliable after about 50 plate appearances, a mark that Ramos is well past at this point. Chances are Ramos’ increased patience in 2011 is more than a mere blip on the radar.

Despite the positive chances in Ramos’ plate discipline, he’s still on the waiver wire in 97-98 percent of ESPN leagues. This is a great time to add him to your roster on the cheap, before more people start taking notice of his quality bat. Ramos isn’t a top-tier catcher. But it’s a far better idea to take a chance on a maturing 23-year-old with a prospect pedigree than it is to settle for the A.J. Pierzynskis of the world.

Injury information courtesy of Baseball Prospectus’ Corey Dawkins.

With the calendar flipping to May, it’s time to re-visit the 2011 Catcher Rankings and see who has climbed closer to the top and who’s been dropping like a stone.  As you may recall, the RotoGraph writers got together before the season began and constructed a composite catcher rankings.  However, after gaining some feedback from all of you, I have decided to make my adjustments to the rankings based on the following criteria:

The arrows are used to highlight a player moving up or down in tier, but you’ll also notice some minor tweaks within the tiers as well.  Some that will obviously have more impact than others.  So without further ado, you may now cue the theme song to The Jeffersons… Read the rest of this entry »

In today’s Deep League Waiver Wire, we look at three players who could help your batting average, among other things.

Read the rest of this entry »

Negotiating trades in fantasy baseball can always be tough in competitive leagues.  Everyone is trying to gain the upper hand and each time you ask for that better starting pitcher or that more powerful outfielder, you end up taking some kind of grief for over-valuing your own players.  So why not try and get that extra boost in numbers from a low-profile spot like behind the plate?  Negotiate a deal and then try to throw in your over-performing catcher for their under-performing one who you think has the potential to improve.  You just might be able to squeeze some more out from their end.  Looking at early season BABIP and xBABIP, here’s a look at some “throw-ins” you just might want to try out… Read the rest of this entry »

For any league, it’s always a good idea to keep an eye on some of the backups behind the plate.  With the number of injuries that befall catchers each year, you never know where the next opportunity will reveal itself and enable you to grab a potentially decent bat for a traditionally weak position.  Nothing eye-popping here, but if you get the opportunity to squeeze out an extra 5 HR or 15 points in batting average from your backstop(s), you’re certainly going to be better off in the long run.  Here are a pair of guys you might want to keep on your radar this season… Read the rest of this entry »

The 2011 baseball season is almost upon us, so we here at RotoGraphs put our collective heads together to come up with some aggregate positional rankings.  I’ll be taking the lead all year with the catchers, but as a group, here’s what we came up with for now:

Despite last year’s power decline, we know the potential is there so Mauer gets the nod for the top spot.  Welcome to the big time, Buster!

Happy to have any one of these guys on my roster.  Santana is on the rise, but this could be the last chance for Wieters in the fantasy trust department.

Stable group of guys who can just tow the line for your backstop position.  Martin could be a nice sleeper in hitter-friendly Yankee Stadium.

No major investment needs to be made here.  Some will rise, some will fall.  Arencibia’s power potential puts him at the top of the sleeper list.

Maybe a pair of diamonds in the rough in Lucroy and Snyder, but I wouldn’t want to invest more than a buck on the rest of the lot.

You’ve got to be pretty desperate to be living with these guys on your roster.

We’ll all be chiming in throughout the week with more detailed thoughts on some of the backstops and the overall rankings will be updated on a monthly basis, so stay tuned for more!

While recently running some projections for the catcher position, I paused at the name Ivan Rodriguez. First, I couldn’t believe he was still in the league. He’s turning 39 next week, he’s survived allegation and decline, and yet he’s employed as a major-league catcher next year and he’s averaged 433 plate appearances over his last three years. His offense hasn’t been great (around a 72 wRC+ the last two years), but it’s a tough position, and his .266 batting average last year was 13th among catchers with more than 300 plate appearances. He’s been owned and will be owned again.

But it wasn’t just Rodriguez that gave me pause. After just returning from the Arizona Fall League, where young Derek Norris played well (.278/.403/.667 in 65 plate appearances), I wondered how soon the Nationals would make a change and look to the future. In that future, it’s Norris that piques the interest. He’s put up a 267/304 BB/K ratio in 1392 plate appearances, or a 19.2% walk rate and a 28% strikeout rate. The first is nice, the second is very worrisome. In the AFL he struck out 33% of the time, so that part of his game has continued.

In this case, the good news is that Norris hasn’t played in Double-A yet and has a full year to work on his strikeout rate. He has patience and power – a .201 ISO so far, and a nice showing at the AFL with four homers, two triples and five at-bats in those 54 PAs – so two thirds of the triumvirate are there. His range of possibilities still includes Geovany Soto (16% walk rate, 25.8% strikeout rate, .217 ISO last year), but it also includes Chris Snyder (13.8% walk rate, 29.5% strikeout rate, .169 ISO last year). The risk of the latter is large, but the promise of the former means that Norris needs to stay on radars as he progresses through Double-A in 2011.

In the short term, Rodriguez may have more to worry about from Jesus Flores. Flores has been battling shoulder woes which took all of 2010 from him – but he’s been catching in the Venezuelan Winter League until a calf injury recently sidelined him. Taken in the Rule V draft from the Mets, Flores has been injured so often that he’s only managed 627 plate appearances since the beginning of the 2007 season. In those plate appearances, he hasn’t shown much patience (6.4%), power (.146 ISO) or ability to make contact (26.5%), but short stints have produced small samples in which he’s walked at double-digit rates and shown above-average power. Flores gets an incomplete but interesting, which seems about par for the course.

Last but not least is the newcomer, Wilson Ramos. Famously blocked in Minnesota, Ramos came over in the Matt Capps trade and found some previously lacking mojo. In 2008 and 2009, Ramos was a young catcher in High-A and Double-A showing the ability to avoid the strikeout (18.6% over the two years, 11.2% in Double-A) and pair that with average power (.146 and .137 ISOs respectively). Then 2010 came, and he lost the power (.104 ISO), hit some poor batted-ball luck (.277 BABIP), and put forth a .241/.280/.345 line that may have contributed to his trade. The change of scenery did the trick, as he put up a .177 ISO with the Nationals, and the batted ball luck returned to normal (.344 BABIP), considering that BABIPs are normally high in the minor leagues.

Through it all, Ramos has shown the ability to avoid the strikeout (17.7% career, and lower at the higher levels). That might serve him to put up an okay batting average despite the lack of walks. Paired with average-ish power, he might look like… Ivan Rodriguez. Without some – cough – help, Ramos’ power peak won’t ever look like Rodriguez’ best years, but look at the Tigers’ version of Rodriguez for an idea of what a nice Ramos year could look like. And, in fact, that makes him the safest bet for the future at the position for the Nationals.

Joe Mauer owners received some bad news on Sunday, as Minnesota Twins manager Rod Gardenhire said that Mauer (bruised left heel) may be week-to-week as opposed to day-to-day. With Mauer ailing, the Twins summoned prospect Wilson Ramos from Triple-A Rochester.

Ramos, 22, signed out of Venezuela in 2004 and ranked as the second-best talent in the Minnesota system (per Baseball America and Marc Hulet) entering the season. BA also named Ramos as its Winter Player of the Year after he mashed as a member of the Tigres de Aragua.

The 6-0, 220 pound righty batter has a career .288/.336/.441 line in the minors, including a .317/.341/.454 triple-slash during a 2009 season spent mostly at Double-A. Ramos is very aggressive at the dish (career six percent walk rate), but he makes a good deal of contact and has some pop, as his 18.1 percent K rate and .153 ISO attest.

While Ramos seems capable of becoming a quality starting catcher in the majors one day, he has struggled to stay healthy: he broke the tip of his left middle finger and injured his hamstring last year, missing nearly three months total. Also, Ramos doesn’t have much experience in the upper levels of the minors. He took 214 trips to the plate at Double-A last year and was off to a slow start at Triple-A this season (.179/.214/.328 in 70 PA, with three walks and 15 punch outs). CHONE projected a .263/.303/.394 line prior to 2010, and ZiPS had a .256/.297/.369 forecast. Four-for-five start aside, Ramos might not hit the ground running.

Here are some other backstops with relatively low ownership rates who may be available in your league:

Mike Napoli, Angels (owned in 51% of Yahoo leagues)

Some fantasy players abandoned Napoli due to his anemic showing so far (.184/.298/.265, .271 wOBA). However, Jeff Mathis (fractured right wrist) is on the shelf and Bobby Wilson (concussion, ankle) got hit by a freight train named Teixeira. ZiPS projects a .356 rest-of-the-season wOBA for Napoli.

Chris Snyder, Diamondbacks (23%)

With Miguel Montero (left knee surgery) out, Snyder is getting the bulk of the starts behind the plate for the D-Backs. Snyder suffered a back injury and had some lousy luck on balls put in play in 2009 (.237 BABIP). In 2010, however, he’s off to a .262/.357/.508 (.373 wOBA) start. He is projected to post a .352 wOBA for the rest of the season.

Nick Hundley, Padres (6%)

Hundley has received 16 starts to Yorvit Torrealba’s nine thus far, and he’s slashing .273/.365/.418 (.344 wOBA). Hundley won’t continue to boast a .350+ BABIP, so expect that average to drop. Even so, he hit a decent .238/.313/.406 in ’09 and possesses solid secondary skills for a catcher (career 8.3 BB% and a .147 ISO). ZiPS isn’t all that optimistic, though, with a .300 wOBA projected from here on out.