Here at Grading on the Curve, I am beginning a series that highlights the most underrated Mets prospect at each position on the diamond.
It only felt right to begin behind the plate, as it’s a position that most scouts, analysts, and fans look upon as one of the deepest in the Mets organization.
As far as MLB-ready depth is concerned, catcher is one of the least of the Mets’ concerns, featuring the resurgent Travis d’Arnaud (.265 average, .787 OPS in the second half of 2014) and the power-hitting backup Anthony Recker (7 home runs, 3.10 catcher’s ERA in 2014).
Should this tandem struggle or fall to injury, New York can always turn to the 23-year-old Kevin Plawecki, who batted .309 with 64 RBIs and a .365 OBP across Double-A Binghamton and Triple-A Vegas in 2014.
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Amidst all this catching talent, it’s easy for an under-appreciated ballplayer to get lost in the fold. Xorge Carrillo, praised as a draft steal by Baseball America back in 2011, has been forgotten by Mets fans and scouts for no good reason.
Carrillo was selected by the Mets in the 14th round of the 2011 June Amateur Draft and signed after completing his degree at Arizona State University. Immediately sent to Brooklyn following the draft, Carrillo looked extremely overmatched for the first time in his baseball career. He posted a .217 batting average, hit only two home runs, and finished his first experience in pro ball with an abysmal .602 OPS.
Despite the poor performance with the Cyclones, the Mets promoted Carrillo to Savannah for the 2012 season, but the backstop only managed to make it through 11 games with the Sand Gnats. In those eleven games, the Mexico-native somehow posted even worse numbers than his Brooklyn output, concluding his second season in the Mets organization with a .154 batting average and .426 OPS.
Whether these numbers were due to small sample size or not, two straight poor performances in the low minors caused Carrillo to fall entirely off the prospect map.
The Mets gave Carrillo one last shot with High-A St. Lucie in 2013, and finally, in his age-24 season, the former Sun Devil began producing at the level most expected of him prior to draft day. Across High-A and Double-A, Carrillo posted career-highs in nearly every major statistical category. He batted .285, posted a .712 OPS, and knocked 59 hits in 66 games despite receiving inconsistent playing time as the backup to fellow catcher Blake Forsythe.
Carrillo’s defensive skills improved along with his bat, as the young backstop managed to catch 28% of potential base stealers in 2013. To put that in perspective, that number would rank the young catcher eighth among 2014 Major League catchers.
Even with his solid 2013 performance, Carrilo was still an unknown to the common diehard Mets fan and described as an “organizational guy” by MetsMinorLeagueBlog.com. But despite receiving no fanfare, Carrillo again produced solid results when the Mets repeated him in Double-A in his age-25 season. He began the year as a backup to top prospect Kevin Plawecki, receiving little playing time as the Mets focused on developing the more-talented prospect.
But after Plawecki’s promotion to Triple-A in July, Carrillo seized the starting job, and even earned his own promotion to Triple-A Vegas, where he hit .313, for a short stint of games.
Baseball America profiles Carrillo as a “solid defender and a good receiver”, even comparing him to a young Bengie Molina, and the numbers seem to support that comparison.
Early on in his minor league career, Carrillo struggled with both his defense and his offense. In Brooklyn, the then-22-year-old caught only 9/47 base stealers (19%), committed six errors (in only 27 games), posted a lowly .977 fielder percentage, and reached base only 29.8% of the time.
However, by the time he finished repeating Double-A in 2014, Carrillo was finally living up to his pre-draft projections. He committed only 4 errors in 435 chances with Binghamton (.991 Fld%), caught 16/56 base stealers (29%), and finished the year out with a solid .355 on base percentage.
If Carrillo continues his current upward trend, we can only expect him to improve those marks in 2015 and beyond.
Despite his across-the-board improvements, I still do not believe that Carrillo will ever have near the MLB potential of Plawecki or d’Darnaud. However, Carrillo could have better prospects for long-term success than current Mets backup Anthony Recker, a lifetime .197 in 419 big league at-bats.
Carrillo, unlike Recker, has proven to be effective when receiving inconsistent playing time. Besides his 2013 and 2014 success backing up Forsythe and Plawecki, the 220-pound backstop had similar success backing up future Miami Marlins 9th round pick Austin Barnes in college; he batted .336 with a .409 OBP in his career at ASU.
Should the Mets front office agree that a fully-developed Carrillo could at least approach Recker’s production, it would significantly improve their trade assets and likely their overall team. By settling on Carrillo as the Mets backup catcher, Sandy Alderson could choose either Plawecki or d’Arnuad as his catcher of the future and deal the other for a valuable return at a position of need.
Granted, we need to see more of Carrillo before giving him a spot on a talented Mets roster, but his remarkable improvement, array of solid tools, and longtime history of success as a backup, combined with a lack of attention, make him my choice as the most underrated catching prospect in the Mets organization.