Blake Swihart Gets the Call in Boston

After taking a pitch on the hand Friday night, the Red Sox placed Ryan Hanigan on the DL with a broken finger. Hand injuries are always tricky for hitters, and this one appears to be rather serious, as it will require surgery. According to Red Sox skipper John Farrell, Hanigan’s recovery time will be “lengthy,” and he won’t return to action until after the All-Star break. The Red Sox will be without their starting catcher for a while.

Hanigan’s injury leaves the Red Sox thin at catcher. Really thin. Hanigan wasn’t even actually supposed to be Boston’s primary catcher — That distinction was slated to go to Christian Vazquez. However, Vazquez’s season came to an end before just before it started when he suffered an elbow tear in spring training.

To help fill the void behind the plate, the Red Sox called up top prospect Blake Swihart, who placed 9th on our pre-season top 200 list, higher than any other catching prospect. At the time of the call up, the switch-hitting catcher was hitting an empty but solid .338/.392/.382 in Triple-A Pawtucket. Still, despite his solid start, most felt he needed a little more seasoning before he was ready for the show. But the Sox had a gaping hole at catcher, and Swihart was next in line, so here we are.

Swihart’s hot start in Triple-A had almost everything to do with his lofty .411 BABIP, which is obviously unsustainable. Take away these lucky bounces, and there isn’t much else left. He posted middling strikeout and walk numbers, and had all of three extra base hits in his 18 games.

Although he hasn’t hit for much pop this year, Swihart’s demonstrated power in the past. And since power numbers take relatively long to stabilize, we should defer to Swihart’s track record rather than dwell on what’s taken place in the last month. In 92 games with Double-A Portland last year, Swihart belted 12 homers on his way to a .187 ISO. That mark was more than a full standard deviation above the Eastern League average.

Swihart clearly has some pop, and he marries it with solid bat-to-ball ability. According to Minor League Central, he made contact on 94% of pitches he swung at in the zone in Triple-A Pawtucket, which was one of the highest marks in the International League. However, some have noted that he’s very aggressive at the plate, which could wind up holding him back offensively.

This characteristic is also borne out in the data. Minor league zone data can be a tad sketchy, but the body of them agree that Swihart swings more often than most, especially at pitches outside of the strike zone. Both this year and last, he swung more often than the average hitter in the International League (There is no data available for his games in Double-A and below). Although, it appears as though he’s done a better job of laying off pitches outside the zone in 2015.

His undiscerning eye hasn’t stopped him from hitting well in the minors, but big league pitchers will likely test his aggressiveness by throwing him pitches outside of the zone. As is the case with every hack-tastic prospect, there’s a risk that more polished pitching will find ways to exploit Swihart’s less-than-stellar plate discipline.

Not only does Swihart swing a solid bat, but he’s a fine defensive catcher as well. Kiley McDaniel slapped a 60 on his throwing arm back in October, noting that it’s a tad better than that in practice due to his quick release. His receiving skills are also solid by most accounts, and these scouting reports are backed up by the data. Baseball Prospectus’ minor league framing model had him as the third best framer in Double-A last year, behind Tony Wolters and defensive wunderkind, and recent call up, Austin Hedges.

This data point probably explains why Ben Cherington made Swihart an untouchable commodity in trade talks over the winter. The Sox have made a habit of deploying excellent framers over the last year or two — Vazquez, Hanigan and current backup Sandy Leon all rate among the best framers in baseball. Swihart looks like he’ll continue that trend.

KATOH, my prospect projection system, is a fan of Swihart’s schtick. Based on his 2014 numbers, it forecasted him for 4.3 WAR through age-28, which was good for 85th on KATOH’s list. While promising, this rating likely even sells Swihart a bit short. The current KATOH model does not directly account for players’ defensive positions, and this flaw conspires to underrate catchers. Anyway, pay less attention to the actual projection. The takeaway here is that KATOH really likes what Swihart’s done with the bat in the minors.

Everyone loves a comp, so let’s go ahead and generate a few for Swihart. Using Swihart’s league-adjusted stats and his age, I calculated the Mahalanobis distance between Swihart’s 2014 season, and every Double-A season since 1990 in which a player recorded at least 400 plate appearances. Below, you’ll find the historical players who were nearest and dearest to Swihart’s 2014 campaign by this methodology, ranked from most to least similar.

Name	PA thru 28	WAR thru 28	WAR/600 PA
Kelly Johnson	2,573	13.4	3.1
John Roskos	53	0.0	0.0
Kyle Parker*	26	0.0	0.0
Daryle Ward	1,286	0.0	0.0
Matt Brown	27	0.0	0.0
Justin Morneau	3,601	14.6	2.4
Carlos Villalobos	0	0.0	0.0
Luke Allen	11	0.0	0.0
Val Majewski	13	0.0	0.0
Thomas Neal*	41	0.0	0.0
Derrick White	119	0.0	0.0
Jim Tatum	161	0.0	0.0
Todd Frazier	1,846	11.3	3.7
Danny Lewis	0	0.0	0.0
Rene Tosoni*	189	0.0	0.0
Seth Smith	1,449	5.6	2.3
John Bowker	622	0.0	0.0
Mark Smith	577	1.3	1.4
Troy Tulowitzki	3,689	27.9	4.5
Sean Henry	0	0.0	0.0

Since the offensive requirements for big league catchers are vastly different than those for other positions, I included a second table that only considers players who made the majority of their starts at catcher.

Name	PA thru 28	WAR thru 28	WAR/600 PA
John Roskos	53	0.0	0.0
Angel Pena	206	0.1	0.3
Ronny Paulino	1,376	4.2	1.8
Justin Towle	0	0.0	0.0
Brook Fordyce	276	0.0	0.0
Robert Fick	1,323	4.5	2.0
Willie Morales	11	0.1	5.5
JD Closser	508	0.0	0.0
Travis d’Arnaud*	578	1.6	1.7
John Baker	656	2.9	2.7

*Batters who have yet to play their age-28 seasons

Swihart is obviously a very talented player. Most agree he has the tools to make an impact on both offense and defense, but it’s not at all clear he’s ready to be that two-way player just yet. That’s what the stats suggest, at least. Swihart has minimal experience against pitchers above Double-A, and didn’t exactly tear it up in the time he did spend in Triple-A. He basically hit an empty .300 — .303/.349/.381 — in 41 games at the level between this year and last, which was only a tick above league-average. Taking this into account, Steamer and ZiPS forecast him for wRC+s of 76 and 75 respectively from here on out.

Unpolished bat and all, Swihart should still be able to help the Red Sox right now. The offensive threshold for catchers is comically low, so even if he hits .241/.283/.367 as ZiPS anticipates, that’s still a 1 or 2 WAR player. He could potentially be worth even more than that if you account for his excellent pitch framing. All told, Swihart will likely give the Sox more value than they would have gotten from playing Sandy Leon, or any of the other in-house catching options.

Swihart’s probably going to be a very good player some day. He might even be a star. But for now, the Red Sox neither need nor expect him to be that guy. As long as he fields his position adequately and doesn’t embarrass himself at the plate, he’ll still be an asset. And based on his minor league numbers, it seems like he’ll be able to do that, even while learning on the job offensively.