Catcher Ability - Worth Starting a Weak-Hitting Catcher?

[Weaseltail]

I’m fascinated by the research people have done on catcher ability. It seems clear CA matters, more is better, and almost no level of hitting that can make up for a horrible defensive catcher. It also seems pretty clear CA’s positive impact does not scale linearly (there’s a bigger benefit at lower levels).

https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=304384

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svciB7b5R3w

https://www.reddit.com/r/OOTP/commen..._a_difference/

https://www.reddit.com/r/OOTP/commen..._have_on_team/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjfd8WtZ55E

But from a practical perspective, I always face the following situation – do I start a mediocre hitting catcher with good CA, or a good hitting catcher with mediocre CA. Or put differently, will a catcher with hitting ratings in the 60’s (on a 20/80 scale) but a 55 CA help my team more than a catcher with hitting ratings in the 40’s, but a 70 CA? Those are the types of guys I actually see in my leagues, and I’ve never been clear which is better.

So, I ran some simulations to find out.

First, I looked at whether there’s a difference between a catcher with 55 CA vs. one with 70 CA. This seems obvious, but since the benefits of CA don’t scale linearly, I wanted to make sure the difference was meaningful at these ratings values. I used a 20/80 ratings scale because it’s what I see in most leagues and my main goal was to give some practical insights into making decisions.

I used Salvador Perez circa 2015 as my guinea pig. I ran two sims, 50,000 games each vs. the Blue Jays. Sim #1 – Salvy’s CA was set to 174 (which equates to the highest 70 rating). Sim #2 – Salvy’s CA was set to 109 (which equates to the lowest 55 rating). No other changes to Salvy or any other players.

55 CA Salvy was a big step down from 70 CA Salvy.

BB/9 +0.47
K/9 -0.36
ERA +0.49

Not surprisingly, CA seems to matter even when comparing mediocre CA vs. really good (but not crazy) CA.

But that only tells you everything else being equal, more CA is better. Practically speaking, other things are never equal. There is almost always a trade-off between CA and hitting ability.

So, I fiddled with Salvy some more. I ran 10 sims (50,000 games each, 500,000 games total) that again compared 70 CA Salvy vs. 55 CA Salvy. But this time, 70 CA Salvy had 40 ratings across the board in all batting categories, while 55 CA Salvy had 60 ratings in all categories.





I only looked at team wins since I was really trying to determine how the trade off between CA and hitting would impact the team’s overall performance.

What I found was that:

On an average basis, lousy-hitting, 70 CA Salvy added roughly 0.4 wins per season to his team over great-hitting, 55 CA Salvy.

On a median basis, 70 CA Salvy added roughly 0.6 wins per season over 55 CA Salvy.

It’s hard to draw meaningful conclusions since there are so many other variables at play, but at least based on the sims I ran, choosing a light-hitting catcher with a strong CA (in this case, borderline 70/75) could be a good decision even if you have the option of a solid hitting catcher with a mediocre CA (in this case, borderline 50/55). Since light-hitting, high CA catchers are generally cheaper and easier to find, especially compared to Buster Posey-esque types, they may be a good option for many teams, particularly those with limited budgets.

For all the sims, I set scouting accuracy to 100% and disabled injuries, coaching, finances, suspensions, development, free agency, and anything else I could find that might impact the outcome.

I’m posting only because I have benefitted a lot from the research others have done, and I’m hopeful this might add to the overall pool of knowledge. No doubt much of this is unscientific and I may have made some glaring errors, but if so, maybe someone can take this and improve upon it to make it more useful.

[MBarrett]

Thanks for taking the time to put this together. I'm always wondering which direction to go here so this will help with my decisions.

[HumanRainDelay]

Super work in thinking through this experiment

Even though the conversations here are very convincing in emphasizing the importance of starting a defensive catcher, it never makes me feel any better with my daily starting lineup in seeing a no-stick catcher batting 9th. That is just something my old-guy brain just needs to push through after decades of looking at non-sabermetrics.

[Chidi29]

Awesome post. Thank you for the analysis. Now I won't feel so bad when my catcher hits .220 every year.

[jeffw3000]

The question of whether to use a low hitting / high CA catcher over a high hitting / low CA catcher has always come down to me to be based on the rest of the lineup, in real life and in OOTP. I always felt if the poor hitting catcher can be hidden in your lineup, then I definitely think what he brings to improve the pitching staff is worth it, but if your team is poor hitting, and your catcher might be your best hitter, it might be best to go with the better hitter as long as the CA is decent. If your team is the 1927 Yankees, you might be better off with a catcher with high exceptional CA even if he is a weak hitter, but if your team is the 1918 Red sox or the 2010 Giants, then you might be better off with the good hitting catcher.

[treymancini]

Thank you for this analysis! Due to injuries, a 35/55 defense rookie catcher seized the starting job. He hit amazingly, around 115 WRC+, but that 35 catcher ability probably hurt me. I will move him to DH for this year after seeing this, I just traded for Danny Jansen to add a third catcher to my team.

[Dave Stieb II]

Just wanted to commend the OP for taking the time and effort to generate this data and his related observations

Over the past four versions of OOTP, I have always started many (many, many) different 'Current Games' with pretty much every team (some teams more often than once).

I enjoy assessing the finances, salaries, current MLB roster and prospect pool, assessing where the team is at in its evolution, and putting in place a plan for the present, near term and longer term future.

And I have always made having two very solid or better defensive catchers a top priority.
That is why Francisco Mejia has never lasted more than a week on a single MLB roster I have inherited in OOTP. LOL

[Clavette]

Would love to see the differences with a 75 or 80 ability catcher as well

[ThePretender]

So the question is at what point is it acceptable to sacrifice defence for offence. What was the wRC+ for the 55 CA Perez and 70 CA Perez? Cause a 55 CA Perez with a 130 wRC+ is likely far more valuable than the 70 CA Perez with a weak bat. Even at 50 CA the 130 wRC+ guy is likely better. But the better question comes when it's closer. Is a 110 wRC+ C with 55 CA that different from a 70-80 wRC+ 70 CA player.

Interesting stuff. Though to be fair, at a 0.4/0.6 win difference is not significant either way, so doesn't seem like there's any real advantage beyond the financial component you mentioned.

[Weaseltail]

Originally Posted by ThePretender

So the question is at what point is it acceptable to sacrifice defence for offence. What was the wRC+ for the 55 CA Perez and 70 CA Perez? Cause a 55 CA Perez with a 130 wRC+ is likely far more valuable than the 70 CA Perez with a weak bat. Even at 50 CA the 130 wRC+ guy is likely better. But the better question comes when it's closer. Is a 110 wRC+ C with 55 CA that different from a 70-80 wRC+ 70 CA player.

I don't know if you can pull wRC+ or other advanced stats off the sim module (at least I can't figure out how to do it). Below is the hitting info I could pull from the module for weak-hitting Salvy and good-hitting Salvy to the extent it helps. Pretty stark difference, but at least from the sims I ran, roughly a wash in overall impact on team wins when you factor in the difference in CA.

60-rated hitting Salvy (.293/.374/.487, .861 OPS)


40-rated hitting Salvy (.220/.270/.307, .577 OPS)

Originally Posted by ThePretender

Though to be fair, at a 0.4/0.6 win difference is not significant either way, so doesn't seem like there's any real advantage beyond the financial component you mentioned.

I think that's right. Salvy w/ 60's across the board in hitting would be one of the better catchers in any league I'm in and eventually a guy most teams would struggle to retain. If you can get similar overall benefit at a team level from a cheap catcher with a good glove and lousy bat, that's a decent trade off for cash-strapped teams. Also worth noting that the benefit obviously skews more towards the good glove/poor bat option when you're talking about most catchers that are available in a league. Those guys generally have weaker bats than 60 ratings across the board and in that case a really bad hitting catcher with a 70/75 CA would likely be a better option.

[Weaseltail]

Originally Posted by Clavette

Would love to see the differences with a 75 or 80 ability catcher as well

I didn't have time to rerun the entire analysis, but I did look at the difference between a mediocre CA catcher and one with 80 CA.

I used Salvador Perez circa 2015 again and ran two sims, 100,000 games each vs. the Blue Jays. Sim #1 – Salvy’s CA was set to 200 (which equates to the midpoint of an 80 CA rating). Sim #2 – Salvy’s CA was set to 109 (which equates to the lowest 55 rating). No other changes to Salvy or any other players.

The results:

BB/9 +0.64
K/9 -0.49
ERA +0.71
HR Allowed +29.7%

In each case, there was a pretty big improvement both vs. borderline 50/55 CA Salvy and borderline 70/75 CA Salvy (see OP).

There's always a trade-off and it's hard to know where the line should be drawn, but my guess just from running all this is that an 80 CA, even one with a pretty weak bat, is going to be a good option for most teams.

My biggest take-away from this, at least personally, is that CA is every bit as important as hitting for a catcher. I always knew it mattered, but I still tended to value hitting more in a catcher and was almost always willing to sacrifice CA for a little more pop, eye, or contact. I think I've now come to the conclusion I should be searching for high CA catchers and then, within that group, looking for the best bat, rather than the other way around.

[Garlon]

This is an interesting thread. I am concerned that the value OOTP may be placing on CA is too much.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/catch...min=q&sort=4,1

The difference between the best and worst catchers in baseball is about 30 runs, not 100 runs over a season. A difference of 0.71 in ERA comes out to 162*0.71 = 115 runs. This is about triple the distance between what catchers can really do in baseball. Great seasons for catchers will get them 15-20 runs saved above average. So if you had to choose between an elite defensive catcher and an average defensive catcher and their hitting abilities were all the same except that the average defensive catcher could give you an additional 10 HR, then those two players will be about equal since those 10 extra HR will give you about 14-15 extra runs on offense, roughly the same amount that the great defensive catcher will save your team.

I think that the effect of catcher ability ratings on pitch framing may need to be significantly reduced.

[Church OOTP]

Excellent post - thank you for covering this topic.

[ThePretender]

Originally Posted by Weaseltail

I don't know if you can pull wRC+ or other advanced stats off the sim module (at least I can't figure out how to do it). Below is the hitting info I could pull from the module for weak-hitting Salvy and good-hitting Salvy to the extent it helps. Pretty stark difference, but at least from the sims I ran, roughly a wash in overall impact on team wins when you factor in the difference in CA.

60-rated hitting Salvy (.293/.374/.487, .861 OPS)


40-rated hitting Salvy (.220/.270/.307, .577 OPS)




I think that's right. Salvy w/ 60's across the board in hitting would be one of the better catchers in any league I'm in and eventually a guy most teams would struggle to retain. If you can get similar overall benefit at a team level from a cheap catcher with a good glove and lousy bat, that's a decent trade off for cash-strapped teams. Also worth noting that the benefit obviously skews more towards the good glove/poor bat option when you're talking about most catchers that are available in a league. Those guys generally have weaker bats than 60 ratings across the board and in that case a really bad hitting catcher with a 70/75 CA would likely be a better option.

Interesting, thanks again.