Backup Catchers!

First post! Welcome to SportsFan Diaries, we will write a short introduction of us in a bit, but in the meantime, enjoy a little bit of over analysis and panic from this Blue Jays fan.

The Toronto Blue Jays acquired backup catcher Yorvit Torrealba yesterday, and along the way locked up back-up catcher Jeff Mathis to a two year 3 million dollar deal with a club option for 1.5 million in 2015.

Torrealba is a 34 year old catcher who last played for the Texas Rangers this year. In 49 games, Yorvit put up a line of .236/.302/.342 with a wOBA of .284 and putting up an fWAR of exactly 0. Yes, Yorvit is the perfect replacement level player, nothing more. Can’t expect anything else from a guy who was cut for Geovany Soto, not the rising star 2008 Soto (.285/.364/.504), but 2012 Soto (.194/.278/.340), ugh.    

The way this trade could be looked at is with a view to the future. With injuries to JP Arencibia and Travis D’arnaud, the Jays are forced to start Jeff Mathis at the plate with Yan Gomes as the back up. And with injuries in various other positions in the field, rookies who are not yet ready for the big leagues (A. Gose and A. Hechavarria) are forced to play out of position. With the acquisition of Torrealba, the Jays can send Hech back down to Vegas for more seasoning and protect his prospect status. Yan Gomes can fill the void at 3B and be the emergency catcher. It is clear that once again the Jays will not contend for the playoffs this year, so why risk damaging the psyche and status of one of the top prospects in the organization?  Ideally I’d love to see Gose back down in Vegas as well as the past two weeks has shown that he is not ready for the big leagues. Sure, his defense/arm/speed is tantalizing but right now Mike McCoy can make more contact than he can, which is not a good thing for Gose.

Now, the Jeff Mathis extension. Why? This is a player who is clearly a better back-up than a starter. His career line of .196/.256/.312 is laughable for a Major League player. To be fair he has been better this year, slugging a career high of .410, mostly taking advantages of meatballs thrown to him because he is JEFF FUCKIN MATHIS. To commit 3 million dollars to a guy like this is a high risk low reward move that frankly is unnecessary. Assuming both Travis D’Arnaud and JP Arenciebia breaks camp with the Blue Jays next year, where will Mathis play? Does anyone actually think Mathis will get a Major League deal from any other club? The only logic I see is AA trying to move JPA or shifting JPA to a different position, such as 1B or DH. Mathis is an insurance policy, a nice insurance policy which is bought way over the market value. Maybe the drag of another lost Jays season is taking its toll on me, but this combined with the Dustin McGowan extension are deals that are small, but would not be made by winning clubs. There are many other holes in the Jays lineup which are much more pressing than a back-up catcher.

It will be interesting to see what Jays' GM Alex Anthopoulos does this summer with his significant prospect capital. With the three aces in Lansing and various other useful players in a deep minor league system, this winter is the time for AA to acquire a starter and upgrades at 1B/2B. The future is still bright for this Jays team, with a season that started with so much promise and went so wrong just four days into June, once again September will bring meaningless baseball. For even the most rational fans this is a disappointing end to 2012. Hopefully by August 2013 we will be talking about King Felix 2 hitting the Yankees in the Skydome, and not about Jeff Fucking Mathis.