Anyone ever try to quantify this?

[micsmith]

There is a part of catching that is not offense and it really is not defense in terms of throwing and glove work, but it is a part of catching that is done on the field (unlike leadership or being a good clubhouse guy); and it is something that I think could be somehow meaured (unlike grit or poise), but I am not sure how. And it is this:

Can you measure how well a catcher "calls a game" and / or "handles a pitching staff"? I am not even sure what exactly the differences are in terms of what the catcher does.

I heard that Wandy Rodriguez turned into a good pitcher after the Astros brough in Ivan Rodriguez to work with him and call Wandy's games.

Anyone ever try to quantify this stuff or track it in any way?

[SABR Matt]

Wandy Rodriguez was a good pitcher before Pudge got there this year - and I find it hard to believe that he had any trouble working with Brad Ausmus...one of the best game-calling catchers in the last fifty years if you believe some other Astros pitchers. I have some theories...but everything I've come up with so far has potential problems.

You could use Tom Tango's WOWY method...measure how well a pitcher did over a certain period of time with all of his catchers except the one you're trying to rate...and how well he did with the catcher you're trying to rate (separately) and take the difference...if you do this for enough pitcher/catcher pairs, you might start to see a pattern. But there are pitchers who stay with a personal catcher for multiple seasons (Maddux and Perez, for example) so I don't know if that method will work well.

[barzilla]

Catcher ERA has the same problem. For instance, Roy Oswalt has seemingly had a personal catcher every season. So, calculating that catcher's personal ERA is a bit problematic. I suppose one could do the same by removing starters and only doing relief pitchers. I don't know of any relievers that have personal catchers, so I would assume you would get better results despite the fact that you would have some smaller sample sizes.

[SABR Matt]

Well you could be a little more global and require your pitcher/catcher pairs to have X number of appearances with more than one catcher in a given season (say...5 or 8).

Then you'd catch most starters and all significant relievers and you'd get the largest possible sample while throwing out the guys with personal catchers.

[Second Base Coach]

Wandy Rodriguez was a good pitcher before Pudge got there this year - and I find it hard to believe that he had any trouble working with Brad Ausmus...one of the best game-calling catchers in the last fifty years if you believe some other Astros pitchers. I have some theories...but everything I've come up with so far has potential problems. >>><<<

Problems? I am the one with the problems, like finding which Astros pitchers have played ball over the last fifty years.

Certainly not with the Astros anyway.

Are we going back further than the Colt 45s?

:waving

[SABR Matt]

I was not saying an Astros pitcher has played for 50 years...I was saying the hype coming out of Houston about Ausmus' game calling abilities made it sound like he was the best catcher they've had ever.

[barzilla]

I would say that was the reputation he had. The Astros have traditionally been a catcher poor organization. When Alan Ashby is your consensus all-time catcher you have some serious issues. However, I would assert that Ausmus was very good at calling games and also good at the other elements of catcher defense in his prime. Over the past several seasons he has not been good at throwing out baserunners, but circa late 1990s early 2000s he was just about as good as any catcher out there.