Bruce Bochy is open to Rangers’ new school catching ideas despite potential pitfalls
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SURPRISE, Ariz. – This is a story about taking a stance on … taking a stance.
It is the kind of debate that will rage throughout spring behind the doors of the Rangers’ catching caucus which includes manager Bruce Bochy, catching instructor Bobby Wilson and bullpen coach Brett Hayes. All caught in the majors, combining to play 820 games behind the plate.
To kneel or crouch, that is the question?
“It’s been discussed,” Bochy said Friday. “We’ve had some good debates. I’m hearing their side. So, I’ve enjoyed that part of it.”
What is spring training for, if not for these seemingly esoteric philosophical baseball arguments? It seemingly pits Bochy, the perceived “old-school” guy, who is concerned about a catcher’s ability to block balls in the dirt vs. the “new-school” thought that framing is where it’s at. And being on one knee improves a catcher’s ability to frame pitches. The Rangers – and most of MLB – have gone that way in recent years. Then, every time a pitch gets by a catcher, somebody throws a pillow at their TV.
Thing is: It may just be causing a run on TVs at Best Buy. This is not a minor issue for the Rangers. Sure, the club has been among the best in framing pitches, though the results don’t stand out so much to the eye as a passed ball or wild pitch that allows a run to score.
A year ago, the Rangers were charged with 77 wild pitches and passed balls, third most in the majors. While only one run scored directly on a passed ball, consider this: In the innings in which the Rangers allowed their 11 passed balls, opponents scored 28 runs. The Rangers allowed 11 run-scoring wild pitches, including one for a walkoff loss at Houston. For a team that lost a lot of one-run games, that’s an awful lot of charity to be handing out.
On the other hand, Wilson, loathe to call himself a new-age thinker, says that data shows framing of pitches has higher value than the occasional embarrassing run. He cited that the difference between the best and worst framing teams was 36 runs, according to metrics. Jonah Heim ranked second in the majors in runs saved via framing. The only guy ahead of him: Jose Trevino, who spent all of spring with the Rangers. Contrast that to the difference between the best and worst blockers: 1.9 runs.
Simply put, the data makes framing a bigger priority than blocking. The framing vs. blocking debate is one of those arguments that was just starting to bubble up about the time Bochy left the San Francisco Giants after 2019. Like every other change around the game, it has mushroomed in the last three years.
“The numbers come out overwhelmingly in favor of receiving as a priority,” Wilson said. “I’ve spent the last three winters trying to poke holes in it. And I can’t. Sometimes what we think is real isn’t really real.”
Bochy may have arrived to the Rangers with the same anecdotal feeling about the “dangers” of the one-knee stance, but he’s quickly grasped what Wilson and Hayes have presented him.
In short, there is no data to suggest that the one-knee stance really impedes blocking balls. Most balls that must be blocked are in the dirt but around home plate. The one-knee stance doesn’t allow a catcher to move laterally as much, but, unless a pitcher is dealing with the yips (sorry, Brett Maher), they aren’t going to be a foot wide of the plate.
Setting up on one knee has the catcher already in a lower position, theoretically better to block a ball in the dirt on the plate … and also better situated to get a call at the bottom of the zone with good framing and presentation.
“It’s just like a ground ball to the infielders,” Bochy said. “You want to work it [from] down, up. So, these guys can get their target low and it’s easier to catch, really. Especially when you look at the velocity of the stuff guys have today. It actually makes it a little bit easier.
“Now, I do think it has be a concern when you have a huge run on base and you don’t want a ball to get by. From my own education, that’s the last thing you want to see happen, but it has happened, I think, more often the last couple of years. For me, it’s going to be what’s more important at the time. So, these are the things we’re talking about.”
The Rangers have another problem in this vein and there isn’t much they can do about this one, unless, of course, they can replicate the Ant-Man suit. They have very tall catchers.
Jonah Heim is 6-4; perennial catcher of the future Sam Huff is even taller at 6-5, on the giant spectrum for a catcher. Even when they are as far down as they can get, they are a little up. Case in point: Of the Rangers’ 11 passed balls last year, Huff allowed five in just 227 innings. In a lot of ways, he’s like a middle-aged dad at a dance: It’s hard for him to get down. Only six players as tall as 6-4 caught at least 10 games in the majors last season. It is not a tall man’s position.
“You rarely see two guys as big as they are,” said Bochy, who was a giant of catcher at 6-3 in his day and who walks with a pronounced limp because of the physical strains catching took on his body. “And the good thing about being on one knee, it takes less of a toll on them. It makes life a little easier on them.”
What’s not to like? For the moment, he’s all in favor of that.
But check back. He may take a different stance on the stance the first time a run trots home on a pitch in the dirt.
Twitter: @Evan_P_Grant
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Texas Rangers catcher Jonah Heim catches a ball during spring training workout at the team’s training facility on Friday, Feb. 17, 2023, in Surprise, Ariz.
© Shafkat Anowar/The Dallas Morning News/TNS