Braves, Padres Trade Uncertain Futures of Bethancourt, Kelly

The Braves kept working the trade machine on Thursday, as they continue to tear down their team in hopes of building it back up. The club once again directed its attention to the National League West, this time getting the now-limbered-up Padres into the mix. And in doing so, they managed to get a couple of players in Casey Kelly and Ricardo Rodriguez who may have interest in the future for a player — Christian Bethancourt — whose interest probably has died out.

Once upon a time, Casey Kelly was going to be a star. If you’re looking for a player to whom you might point when attempting to characterize the risk inherent in prospects, Kelly would be a great example. As one of the prizes of the Adrian Gonzalez trade, Kelly was thought to be within striking distance of the majors heading into the 2011 season. After all, when the Red Sox had traded him to the Padres, Kelly had 21 starts at Double-A under his belt. That’s plenty these days. Jose Fernandez didn’t make any before he graduated. Neither did Carlos Rodon. Lance McCullers made five, and then graduated. Anthony DeSclafani made 21 in Double-A before graduating to Triple-A, and hit the majors after 13 starts there. I’m cherry picking, but you get the point: at the time of the trade, Kelly was (understandably) thought to be on the cusp.

He wasn’t. He made 27 starts in Double-A in 2011, and didn’t graduate to Triple-A or the majors. At 21, his 3.98 ERA wasn’t exactly blowing people away, nor was his 3.77 FIP or 17.1% strikeout rate. So he opened 2012 in the minors. He started at Triple-A, but he missed most of the season after straining his elbow during his second start of the season. That was probably the red flag for his career. Had he shut it down and had Tommy John surgery right then, he might be working on his second major league season already. But he didn’t. After sitting out from mid-April to late July, he came back and made six starts in the minors — striking out 14 against two walks in the last two, both at Double-A — before making his major league debut.

That debut was a pretty good one — six shutout innings against the Braves, in which he allowed just five baserunners. He would get rocked pretty hard in four of his subsequent five starts, but he struck out 26 batters in 29 innings. The promise seemed clear, until the TJ Reaper pointed its finger at him the following March.

Does Kelly still have that promise? Maybe, and the Braves are going to find out. There’s no reason he can’t immediately compete for a spot in Atlanta’s starting rotation.

The Braves didn’t just get him, though. They also got Ricardo Rodriguez. Not much is known about Rodriguez, as he was just recently signed out of Venezuela. He has only 10 plate appearances stateside, so much of what we do know comes to us from this site’s former prospect analyst Kiley McDaniel — who, as you may have heard, now works for the Braves. We know that he got $800,000 to sign as a 16-year-old, and that it may take him some time for him to climb the prospect ranks. And we know that Kiley has scouted him before. We also know that he showed a good batting eye in the Dominican Summer League during 2015, which isn’t nothing for a 17-year-old who was among the youngest catchers in the league. This season, he’ll start as a 18-year-old, possibly here on U.S. soil, and if he does well… hey, everyone loves a catching prospect.

So much so that it’s hard to let them die. But that’s just what we may need to do with Christian Bethancourt, who ranked 106th on Kiley’s top 200 list last year. When you’re given every opportunity to start on a rebuilding team and instead lose your spot to a decrepit A.J. Pierzynski and an out-of-fashion Ryan Lavarnway that isn’t a good sign for your career. When the Braves demoted Bethancourt to Triple-A last season, he was rocking a .198/.221/.287 line, good for a .218 wOBA and 33 wRC+. It was the result of just 104 plate appearances, true, but the Braves wanted to give him more playing time than that. Certainly, they hadn’t signed the 38-year-old Pierzynski to be their starter. Bethancourt started the team’s first two games, and four of the first five. Atlanta was hoping Bethancourt was the truth, but sometimes the truth hurts.

Now, a quick glance through history says that catchers do hang around with offensive seasons this bad. For his career, Bethancourt now has a 43 wRC+. Were he really Framing Jesus, I suppose you could live with the total and complete lack of offense. But is he really Framing Jesus? The 2015 catching reports from both StatCorner and Baseball Prospectus throw a whole lot of cold water on that theory. By StatCorner’s methodology, he finished 14th from the bottom in total value, and was decidedly in the bottom half in per game stats. And by BP’s, he ranked 86th out of 105 in framing runs — behind, it must be noted, Lavarnway, who has often been said not to have the defensive skills to stick at catcher.

Is this definitive? No. And on the positive side of the ledger, we know thanks to Neil Weinberg’s research of Statcast data in The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2016 (on sale now!!!) that Bethancourt had the third-best average pop time in the game last season. So he’s not a total zero behind the dish. But hitting like Drew Butera and framing like Ryan Lavarnway is not a great look.

Of further question is how Bethancourt fits on the Padres roster. They already have Derek Norris and Austin Hedges ensconced at catcher — and with Wil Myers seemingly now the first baseman, it seems unlikely that the defensively-limited Norris is about to change positions. So unless the Padres plan to carry a third catcher — often a popular choice for managers who have no idea what they’re doing — it seems that Bethancourt may be in for some more Triple-A seasoning.

Christian Bethancourt has been an interesting player and a top prospect. He might be decent someday, but the early returns show him to be a bust. For him, the Braves got a player who has been interesting and a top prospect, but it’s been awhile since Casey Kelly was anyone of note. Could he be again? We’ll see — he’s been derailed more by injury than poor results. The Braves also got an interesting player who isn’t quite yet a prospect, but could be one soon. The value in Kelly and Rodriguez may be sliver-like at this point, but if the Braves have decided Bethancourt isn’t the solution, slivers are worth acquiring.