Ryan Jeffers' Place Among AL Catchers

[bighat]

3 hours ago, bean5302 said:

The same way every team looks to upgrade. They look for available talent internally and externally, and if they can acquire it for a reasonable cost, they obtain it. Looking to upgrade is not some sort of requirement to upgrade. 

Side note, there are a dozen catchers significantly better than Jeffers on other teams' rosters. It's not like Jeffers is above average, even now when good catchers seem to be at a premium.

Agreed. With all the terrible backstops in the league, Jeffers still ranks at the bottom. Frankly I'd take Godoy over Jeffers in a heartbeat, I don't see how he could be any worse. It would be almost impossible.

The guy's a .186 hitting backstop with a season of ABs under his belt. He stinks. Sure, he might get better - but right now he's easily one of the worst catchers in MLB and one of the worst regular/"every day" players in the game.  His stats are indefensible.

[stringer bell]

Cherry-picking a bit here, but with his three-hit game today, Jeffers raised his OPS to .643, which translates to about an 86 OPS. Certainly not an All-Star, but for catchers it is middling, not bottom of the barrel.

[umterp23]

Very good night for him last night shows the potential is there. More consistency is the key now.  

Who will be the focus of another Twins Daily guy sucks article that could generate a spark in them to have a good game?  

 

[Bigfork Twins Guy]

Good framer of pitches but terrible at throwing out runners.  If base stealing picks up more in this dead ball era, we are in real trouble.  I think that the new positioning being taught to have one leg lay practically flat on the ground is impacting the ability to throw out runners.  Better start teaching pitchers the slide step NOW.

As for his hitting, he has shown a nice swing on his recent homers/doubles.  He just needs consistency which I believe will come with more at-bats.

I agree with other posters that he, nor Sanchez, should be DH'ing.

Lastly, I think his value goes down if/when MLB implements the computerized ball-strike process since framing will not longer be needed.

[MMMordabito]

Jeffers passed Stassi and Mejia after his 3-hit, 1 HR game.  He's now currently a middle-of-the-pack bat at C!! ??

 

[prouster]

1 minute ago, MMMordabito said:

Jeffers passed Stassi and Mejia after his 3-hit, 1 HR game.  He's now currently a middle-of-the-pack bat at C!! ??

 

I know this is said partially in jest, but it seems to indicate that we’re looking at some pretty small sample sizes here. 

[bean5302]

The small sample sizes apply to both Jeffers and his peers. I wouldn't have a big opinion on Jeffers if his poor hitting didn't stretch across a bigger series of plate appearances last year as well.

If we expand the sample size to last year and this year, among catcher with 450+ plate appearances, Jeffers is 23rd of 32 at the plate. wRC+ 83 with the median at wRC+ 97 (who just happens to be Gary Sanchez). He's not a black hole at the plate relative to his peers, but he is far below average.

It's not like Jeffers is going to tank the Twins' chances at competing or something, but he's not a guy you want to count on helping the team to make the playoffs, either. He's just a player the Twins should want to upgrade away from or at least hedge their bets against him, especially since Jeffers' only plus skill (catcher framing) is likely to be nullified entirely by robo umps in 2024.