Quote:
Originally Posted by Déjà Bru
Hmmm. Out of all that I just said, McCann is the most troublesome. On the one hand, I see a .234 batting average and 97 K's. On the other hand, I see 26 home runs and 94 RBI's.
Am I being too harsh on him? Is his defensive prowess more than enough to overcome his paltry batting average? That's the usual excuse for a catcher.
More to the point, is he that much better defensively than Murphy? Because I think Murphy would be a better hitter than McCann if he were given a chance.
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I don't know too much about Murphy though I've heard a little about him. But as for McCann, I think the positives outweigh the negatives. A 31 y/o C signed for three more years at 17M per year (vesting option for another year) who gives you .268 BA, 20+ HR, 70-80 RBI on average. Definitely no problem with that.
As for 97 SO... I'm looking at the sortable player stats on that, and you got guys with similar numbers that struck out 60-70 more times. I think it's a trade-off you have to kinda eat. Let's look at some of the outstanding performers this year: Chris Davis struck out 206 times (.258/45/112), Nelson Cruz with 161 SO (.303/44/93), and Mike Trout whiffed 157 times (.297/41/89). Hell, our comeback boy A-Rod had 144 SO (.252/33/86). Do we discount these kind of numbers based on SO total? Nope. ESPN certainly won't get off Trout's, well, "trout", knowing that along with those great number, he strikes out quite often.
When you sort by home runs and look at the 30+ HR hitters this year, these guys invariably have 100+ SO or very close to 100 SO. There are two exceptions: Pujols with only 72 SO (.242/39/93) and our very own Teixeira with 85 SO (.255/31/79). I think it depends also on what you value, because those SO might be low, but their averages aren't spectacular either.
So in summation, for someone who's not producing (who has proven they can) and has high strikeouts (100+ in my view), it'd be a concern. Otherwise I think you take the bad with the good. Historically, Brian McCann had an excellent season and I'd say he struck out a reasonable number of times, maybe a *tad* high. What more do you expect, given his career stats? You're being harsh in my opinion.