DFS PLAYBOOK PRO – An exciting offering from the Alarm is the DFS Playbook Pro. I will be doing a daily breakdown of the hitters – Hitting Coach – while Howard Bender looks into the Pitchers (Pitching Coach). You can find the link to the Hitting and Pitching articles under the DFS Playbook pro tab at the top right of the screen.
OTHER LINKS TO BOOKMARK
THE CATCHERS SPOT
This position has become a mess, or perhaps better yet, a morass of mediocrity. Let’s see if we can ferret out anything of use – maybe a way or two to gain a small advantage.
Minimum 250 plate appearances…
Brian McCann is the only catcher with 20 homers.
There are only 12 who have hit as many as 10.
Only three catchers in baseball have 55 RBIs. They are: Buster Posey (78), McCann (69) and Stephen Vogt (62).
Only three catchers have 50 runs scored: Russel Martin (60), Posey (58) and Derek Norris (50).
Unless I’m missing someone, there is only one catcher in baseball with five steals (Nick Hundley).
Three men are batting .290: Posey (.327), Francisco Cervelli (.304) and Nick Hundley (.303).
Only three have a .345 OBP: Yasmani Grandal (.390), Posey (.385) and Cervelli (.371).
Only three have a .470 SLG: Welington Castillo (.498), Posey (.495) and Grandal (.484).
Let’s put some things together.
How many catchers have gone .250-10-40-40 thus far? The answer is just three men: Posey, Vogt and Grandal. That’s pretty awful, ain’t it?
Let’s look at some splits.
The last 30 days (minimum 50 plate appearances)…
Curt Casali has seven homers in 56 plate appearances, tied for the second most in baseball at the position the last month. Still, he has only one homer his last 11 games.
Welington Castillo owns an out of this world .672 SLG thanks to eight homers. His wOBA over the last 22 contests is .417.
Francisco Cervelli is batting .347 with a .398 OBP and .547 SLG.
Yan Gomes has hit just .259 the past 22 games but he’s also produced 18 RBIs, third most for the position.
Caleb Joseph, who continues to see more time than expected as Matt Wieters cannot stay healthy (he’s dealing with a hamstring injury at the moment), has been rolling. Over his last 16 games he’s hitting a solid .302 but it’s the five homers and 16 RBIs that totally jump off the page at you.
A.J. Pierzynski is batting .305.
Kyle Schwarber has 21 runs scored and 21 RBIs over his last 27 games. He’s also gone deep seven times. No catcher has more runs or RBIs in that time.
Versus lefties…
Francisco Cervelli is batting .390, the best mark in baseball. James McCann is second at .364 with J.T. Realmuto (.315), Josh Phegley (.315) and Russell Martin (.310) rounding out the men who are hitting .300 against lefties.
Cervelli owns the best wOBA in baseball versus lefties at the position (.450). McCann (.442) and Martin (.424) are the only other catchers with a mark over .380.
Versus righties…
Two guys have a wOBA over .390: Hank Conger (.459) and Kyle Schwarber (.445).
There are three men with an OBP over .390: Schwarber (.432), Conger (.413) and Buster Posey (.401).
Three men, minimum 50 plate appearances, have HR/F ratios over 25 percent: Curt Casali (33.3), Roberto Perez (31.3) and Conger (26.1).
Four catchers are really living the high life off insanely high BABIP marks: JR Murphy (.395), Schwarber (.389), Blake Swihart (.383) and Chris Stewart (.361).
At home…
Nick Hundley is a boss batting .360 with seven homers and 32 RBIs… in 44 games. Rocking the .970 OPS as well, tops in baseball. Two others have home OPS marks over .950: Hank Conger (.962) and Matt Wieters (.961).
Brian McCann leads the way with nine home homers. No one else is in double-digits. McCann also leads the position with 38 RBIs at home. Three others are at 30: the aforementioned Hundley, Buster Posey (30) and Derek Norris (30).
On the road…
Buster Posey has 12 road homers, Stephen Vogt 11 and Welington Castillo 10.
Posey has 48 RBIs on the road… in 55 games. The next best mark for a catcher is 36 (Vogt).
Kyle Schwarber leads the way with a .347 batting average, just ahead of Buster Posey (.338). The only other catcher hitting .300 on the road is A.J. Pierzynski at .313.
RUSNEY CASTILLO ROLLING
It’s been a very uneven year for Rusney Castillo. Struggles at the dish, injuries and demotions have helped to crush the production of a player that many folks were happy to draft as their 3rd or 4th outfielder coming into the 2015 season. Maybe though, finally, he’s found his missing game.
Since July 27th Castillo has 66 plate appearances. Over the span of action he’s gone deep three times with two steals displaying his power/speed game. He’s also posted a .339/.369/.548 slash line with a .394 wOBA.
This is who Castillo can be. He’s not going to be on waivers, we know that at this point, but just in case I’ll say this – he shouldn’t be. He’s a power/speed talent that is a mix of Desmond Jennings and Gregory Polanco… though a little more refined with a higher batting average upside.
For more on the Red Sox outfield give a read to Glenn Colton’s article that breaks down the suddenly streaking Jackie Bradley.
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday at 8 PM EDT on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 9 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).