Decent catchers making out like bandits in arbitration

[Gruber_Tagged_Him]

Has this always been a thing and I've not noticed? I'm beginning to cringe whenever a young catcher has a respectable offensive season because I know I'm going to get hammered in arbitration. It seems like the weighting of the C position in arbitration is kind of high.

An example:
- Last year before arb, player puts up .274/.351/.455 15 HR 2.5 WAR 412 PA
- Arb award: $4.0 million
- next year, .278/.353/.396 9 HR 2.3 WAR and wins a "Great Glove" award 462 PA
- Arb award: $9.3 million !!
- then he barely played due to injuries and got $10.9 million

Despite the award, he's a very sub-par catcher defensively.

Yes, I'm aware that extending him before arbitration would have been prudent. Don't remind me.

This is by no means my only example, just the first I grabbed. Maybe the lesson I should be taking from this is never let young catchers get to arbitration even if you don't think they will be a part of the future? The player above is now untradeable...

[Rain King]

Gold Gloves can and should hold a lot of weight. If he is a poor defensive catcher that won a gold glove, that is the larger issue here.

[andyhdz]

careful with catchers I've noticed they drop ratings like a stone in the early 30s so don't get tied up in a long contract unless he's truly special and they rarely are.

[Gruber_Tagged_Him]

Originally Posted by Rain King

Gold Gloves can and should hold a lot of weight. If he is a poor defensive catcher that won a gold glove, that is the larger issue here.

I wish I had defensive stat history turned on. My suspicion based on what I can see is that he has degraded defensively. This might explain a lot. He did deal with 3 concussions in the year after his Gold Glove award...

[Rain King]

Ok, that makes sense...and maybe makes him a candidate to non-tender and try to negotiate a contract as a free agent. Arbitration is and should take into account more his past results than his current ability (because real life arbitrators aren't scouts!)

[Gruber_Tagged_Him]

Originally Posted by andyhdz

careful with catchers I've noticed they drop ratings like a stone in the early 30s so don't get tied up in a long contract unless he's truly special and they rarely are.

I have high hopes for my backup catcher who has slowly supplanted him as starter. He is also killing me in arb, is not interested in a long-term deal, is hitting .350 with no power and no walks (so fun, I love this guy, no he's not the Turtle from Minnesota) and is gonna get $8M next year easy... well at least he hasn't been concussed 3X in a year.

With all that being said, catcher #1 is still a top-10 catcher, only 29, but I'm not seeing how to fit him into next year's budget. I guess it's not smart to carry two top-10 young catchers on your lineup, but it would be nice to find somebody willing to trade for either of them.

[5-4-3]

Decent MLB catchers are hard to find IRL.