It seems odd to be writing about the difficulties of replacing a player who hit a rather abysmal .205/.286/.287 last year, but the Astros are now scrambling to figure out who will fill in for starting catcher Jason Castro this year. Numerous outlets have reported that Castro has a torn ACL and is likely to miss all of 2011.
Houston had a major catching problem before Castro’s recall in midseason 2010; at least he provided a glimmer of hope for the future. Now, what does Houston do behind the dish?
The frontrunners for the two catching spots in Houston are now longtime Astros backstops Humberto Quintero and J.R. Towles.
Quintero is 31, which means he’s not getting any better. A career .232/.271/.322 hitter, his 2010 was poor even by his standards, as he hit just .234/.262/.317. He’s a solid receiver behind the plate, but other than some almost-semi-competence as a hitter in 2009, his career has seen him consistently flail in the batter’s box. For defensive purposes, he’s a decent backup, but he doesn’t even have much of a platoon split, so you can’t really spot-start him against anyone and get a good offensive matchup.
Towles is significantly younger, but the 27-year-old has been just as bad at the plate, with a career line of just .189/.273/.327. Worse yet, he’s not considered much of a defensive catcher. Offense-oriented catchers who can’t crack the Mendoza Line aren’t exactly hot commodities. It is, of course, worth noting that Towles has hit in the minors on occasion, and he strung together 44 impressive plate appearances with Houston in 2007 (most notably, striking out just once), so he’s certainly got more offensive upside than Quintero. Still, the odds he actually hits over .235 are what? One in twelve? Worse? He’s going to have to improve on his paltry career line-drive percentage of 13.3 to be a viable MLB hitter, and there’s little indication he will. He’d make sense for a trial run to see if he hits…if it weren’t for the poor defense. At least Quintero’s pretty much guaranteed to add a few runs with the glove and take away a few with the bat–Towles is likely to give away a few runs with the glove, but there’s no certainty that he’ll hit any better than his counterpart.
The Astros have three NRI catchers in camp. One, Rene Garcia, is a 20-year-old who had a Quintero-esque line last year in Low-A. He won’t be up anytime soon, if ever. A second, Brian Esposito, is a 32-year-old who hit .225/.263/.298 in Triple-A last year, so it’s probably a good bet he won’t be able to clear even the lowest of offensive bars, like the ones set by Quintero and Towles.
The third option is Carlos Corporan, a 27-year-old and proud owner of a spotless big league record–he was 1-for-1 with the rival Brewers in 2009. That year, he hit just .201/.250/.279 in Triple-A, but a move to the Diamondbacks system in 2010 sparked his bat, and he improved to .290/.356/.514–a shocking gain of 137 points of wOBA. A solid receiver, he’s not going to shut down the running game, but if the offensive breakout was for real, then there’s reason to believe he’s the best offensive option of the three. His winter ball numbers cast doubt on the breakout, however.
Finally, Houston could elect to simply rush either Federico Hernandez or Jonathon Fixler to Minute Maid Park. Both ended 2010 in Double-A and hit well, with Hernandez putting up a .304/.350/.446 line and Fixler hitting .265/.363/.500. Unfortunately, both aren’t MLB-ready defensively, and it’s tough to imagine that two merely above-average offensive catchers who are barely out of High-A would be able to provide enough offensive ability to mitigate the defensive problems.
So, in short, there’s really no easy answer. Probably the best thing to do is push Fixler to Triple-A with Corporan, while starting Towles and Quintero in Houston. If Towles doesn’t hit and either Corporan or Fixler does, Houston could then switch them out after six weeks or so.
Overall, it looks like the Astros are in for more of the same from the catching position. Astros backstops hit .216/.268/.307 in 2010, and they may perform even worse at the plate in 2011 with Castro out of the picture.