OK, don't exhale just yet, ye who wait with baited breath. This is not a major transaction. The Giants signed veteran catcher, Cameron Rupp, to a minor league deal with an invitation to spring training and an opportunity to earn $750 K if he makes the team. Rupp received substantial playing time with the Phillies from 2015-2017. He hit with some thump in his bat knocking 39 dingers in 1127 MLB PA's albeit playing in a hitter-friendly home ballpark. He spent all of last year in the minors with 3 different organizations and a combined slash line of .223/.320/.425.
Rupp is 30 yo and is huge, listed at 6'2", 260 lbs. He is not considered a great defensive catcher. His pitch framing stats have been average to poor. What this signing means for Nick Hundley remains to be seen. Farhan Zaidi may just want more depth at the position in light of Buster Posey's hip surgery or he may be thinking he can replace Hundley on the cheap and re-allocate the $ difference elsewhere on the roster.
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Hundley is a fair backup and popular with fans and teammates.
ReplyDeleteHowever, he is not a bottom-line-winner, a lot due to being on a lot of bad teams.
If you have to have a so-so backup, make him stellar C in D!
Or Garcia.
Nationals say bye-bye to Bryce with prolific signings, the $300M they put on the table was the final offer.
The intense spending war going on guarantees Borass and more importantly Harper a super payday with Las Vegas style glamour.
If you suggest Barry Bonds II, go for it.
At "AT&T":
Bryce .164/.305/.284/.588
Barry .335/.526/.763/1.289
Zaidi ain't falling for that!
I like Bryce Harper a lot, but he's not Barry Bonds and he's not a great fit for AT&T Park.
DeleteOoof! Dude's neck is wider than his head! At least no one is going to try to bowl him over at the plate trying to score!
ReplyDeleteGiants have hired two new faces to head the scouting department-- Zack Minasian, formerly of the Brewers, and Mike Holmes, most recently with the A's. Holmes replaces John Barr.
ReplyDeleteRupp has positive dWAR numbers for Baseball Reference and pretty strong ones for Fangraphs. By that criterion he seems as adept as Nick Hundley, with the added advantage of relative youth.
ReplyDeleteI could be wrong but I don't believe any of those defensive metrics include framing, but then Hundley is not known as a great framer either.
DeleteThe Giants had an under the radar signing of Kieran Lovegrove. He is 23, drafted in the 3rd round by the Indians straight out of Mission Viejo High School in Southern California. Last year he pitched 59.1 innings of 2.73 ERA ball encompassing A+,AA and AAA with a 4-0 record. I heard he had a few injuries but Zaidi might have been watching the kid a while. MVHS is in my neck of the woods along with ETHS where Jonah/Nolan Arenado are from so I am excited to see Kieran get a shot one day with the Giants.
ReplyDeleteOne of the good things that will come with robo pitch calling is the elimination of "framing" where the catcher steals a strike from the batter while duping the umpire.
ReplyDeleteI would like to see stat of which UMPIRES are most susceptible to being fooled by catchers.
Robo is coming unless MLB does something about umpires who are consistently bad on close pitches and have (as Krukow claims endlessly) a strike zone that changes during the game. He (Krukow) also says that when a pitcher is "wild" he won't get corner pitches called his way. C'mon, a strike is a strike is a strike. Krukow seems to have a "book" on every umpire and describes what to expect at the beginning of each game and when pitching changes are made. I'm especially alarmed when he reports that so-an-so looks for strikes -- doesn't everyone?
Some umpires are good at it. They should be the home plate umpires and be paid more than the guys who can't call a consistent zone. It's a tough job -- I was horrible at it in boys baseball and not that I didn't try hard but I wasn't good.
Each crew should have two good pitch callers alternating between home and 3rd (day off) and let the "blind" umps rotate between 1st and 2nd. Maybe even guys who are better at 1st base.
Jim Joyce should never be allowed to umpire 1st base again! And MLB should have re-instated Galaraga's "perfect" game -- it was the 3rd out, the "next" batter made the out and the game was over. Rewind -- there's no harm done!
I agree about having robo-umps calling balls and strikes. And it would be fascinating to see how the current umps grade out on that.
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