Notes, quotes and comment

Korean import Byung Ho Park
strikes a pose during Media Day
on Tuesday at the Twins
spring training complex.

I'm in Fort Myers now despite multiple brain cramps en route, and I'll be at JetBlue Park, the "Fenway South" home of the Red Sox, for the Twins' exhibition opener today. I've not been there on my previous trips to southwest Florida, and I'm looking forward to it.

The lineup the Twins are bringing to the crosstown contest features players I'm particularly interested in seeing: Byron Buxton in center, Miguel Sano in right, Byung Ho Park at DH, John Ryan Murphy behind the plate. These are four guys the Twins really need to see come through. On the noumd, it's Phil Hughes starting with Trevor May "piggybacking."

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Aroldis Chapman, star reliever now with the New York Yankees, got a 30-game suspension out of his domestic incident case. That's not long enough to keep him from free agency after the season, but it's also shorter than a PED suspension. Craig Calcaterra reasonably suggests that this was effectively a plea bargain, especially considering that Chapman agreed not to appeal the ruling.

So a precedent of sorts is set. Nobody was injured and there were no charges filed in the Chapman incident, but he did fire a gun. We'll see what happens in other cases, including the pending Jose Reyes case involving the Colorado shortstop.

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The Kansas City Royals signed Salvador Perez to a contract extension through 2021. I wonder if the Royals will ease up on their use of him now that they're committed to him for another five years.

Pondering the use of backup catchers

Torii Hunter got Thursday off, which made sense; day game after a night game, and he's not a young guy. Kurt Suzuki started at catcher, and that surprised me. I figured it a good chance to get Chris Herrmann a start. Day game after night game, right-handed pitcher for Detroit, and Herrmann last started on May 6.

That start came against a lefty (Scott Kazmir). Herrmann's previous start was on May 3; it too came against a lefty (John Danks). Thirteen of Herrmann's first 30 plate appearances came against left-handed pitchers. That's probably suboptimal for Herrmann, and I infer that Paul Molitor isn't as interested in matchups with his catchers as I expected him to be/

Suzuki has started 28 of 35 games behind the plate, which pales in comparison to Salvador Perez of Kansas City. Perez sat Thursday; it was only the third game he didn't start behind the plate this season.

Perez's current backup is Drew Butera, who came to the Royals a week ago from the Angels in a trade that involved a minor-league infielder. He's already made two starts fo K.C., which suggests that either

• manager Ned Yost knows he's got to pull back on Perez or
• Yost trusts Butera a lot more than he trusted Eric Kratz, who opened the season as the No. 2 catcher.

Or maybe both. Kratz is on the disabled list, but he barely played when active. A lot of fans look at Butera's anemic hitting stats and wonder why he keeps finding jobs, but managers really do like his defensive chops. Yost has been reluctant to rest Perez for years because Perez is so good defensively; Butera's no Perez, especially throwing, but he's good enough defensively that the dropoff is manageable.

On the AL Gold Glove for catchers

Salvador Perez was one of three Kansas City Royals
awarded Gold Gloves, which fits the notion that the
Royals were the best defensive team in the American League.

The process for awarding Gold Gloves has been at the least tinkered with, arguably overhauled, and one visible result is that there were three finalists named at each position in each league.

Joe Mauer was the only finalist from the Twins. When the awards were announced last week (Tuesday, an off day during the World Series), Mauer didn't win.

No real surprise there. For one thing, Mauer caught just 658.2 innings. The winner, Salvador Perez of Kansas City, caught 1,115.1; the other finalist, Matt Weiters of Baltimore, 1201. That's a sizable difference.

Perez is probably the best throwing catcher in the league these days, and Kansas City had the lowest runs allowed in the league, so presumably he wasn't hurting his pitchers with his pitch calls. He's not a terrible choice by any means. Still, I would have favored Weiters for the ugly trophy.

Late in September, I wrote a post using wild pitch rates to compare Mauer as a receiver to his Minnesota colleagues. Perez comes off quite poorly here.

Perez was behind the plate for 49 wild pitches in 2013. He was also charged with three passed balls. That works out to .40 wild pitches per nine innings, .42 WPPB/9.

Mauer, as described in the earlier post, was .22 WP/9 and .26 WPPB/9.

Weiters had 28 wild pitches, five passed balls, rates of .21 WP/9 and .25 WPPB/9.

The American League averages were .37 WP/9, .45 WPPB. So Perez was slightly worse than average in allowing wild pitches, slightly better in the combination — and Mauer and Weiters much better than the norm.