Battling Bucs : ATP Near and Far: Catchers

All Time Pirates Near and Far: Catchers
Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania available pool of players contains 18 players eligible for the position under my 20% rule and another 6 players who played at least one game at the position during their Pirates career. Those 6 players not eligible for the position are Gene Tenace, Chuck Lauer, John Wehner, Frank Shugart, Chappy Lane and Ken Macha. These players will all be covered later at the positions they are eligible for so I won't delve into any details here but I wanted their names out there for full disclosure.
Overall the group of 18 catchers from Pennsylvania isn't an impressive one. During my construction of the team I made use of fWAR as a guiding tool and while I recognize the difficulties with this measure I feel it is an acceptable starting point as long as I don't leave it at that. Anyway of the 18 catchers eligible only 3 produced greater than a 0.5 fWAR in their time with the Pirates. This indicates that their stays were either extremely brief and/or rather forgettable. Still the ground rules of this exercise state we must select at least two catchers from this group so let's start parsing through them.
Coming in with 1 career game for the Pirates and 1 career PA is the trio of John Sullivan, Pat Kilhullen and Bill Warwick. With only 1 PA apiece there isn't much to parse here but we will nonetheless take a look. John Sullivan made his appearance for the Pirates in 1908; his only other major league time came three years earlier with Detroit. For Pat Kilhullen his one lone PA with the Pirates in 1914 was the only time he saw the major leagues. Warwick's lone PA in 1921 was his first taste of the majors but he did go on to get a couple of brief call up with St Louis in 1925 and 1926.
Moving up the playing time scale just slightly we find Mike Wilson and John O'Connell. Wilson pulled off the tricky feat of playing in more games (5) than he had plate appearances (4). His time with the Pirates in 1921 was the only major league action he would see. O'Connell with 9 career PA over 3 career games is the first catcher we reached that actually registered a hit in his Pirates career and it was indeed a solitary one. O'Connell like the previous group got 1 lone PA his first year, 1928, but unlike the others he returned the following year to make 2 starts and record another 8 PA. These 3 games represent the entirety of his major league career.
Climbing up to the under 50 PA crowd we find Paddy Fox, Mike Ryan, Dave Ricketts and Erik Kratz. Paddy Fox, real name George, is one of two players here who's primary position was not catcher. With the Pirates Fox's primary position was 1B where he played 9 games compared to his 3 career games at catcher. Fox first appeared in the majors in the American Association in 1891 with the Louisville Colonels. Eight years later he would see his time in Pittsburgh which proved to be the end of his major league career. Mike Ryan is the first catcher listed here who I think has a shot of being remembered by some of you reading this piece. Ryan had a fairly long career with Boston and Philadelphia spanning 1964 through 1973 but he finished his major league career up with a stop in Pittsburgh in 1974. Playing in only 15 games and recording 34 PA Ryan found himself on and off the roster throughout the season. He was never much of a hitter but with the Pirates he was awful. Dave Ricketts is a similar story to Ryan as he had a decently long career with the Cardinals from 1963-69 before finishing up in Pittsburgh in 1970. Ricketts also pulled off the feat of having played more games (14) than he collected PA (12). Kratz represents our first active player on this list. Kratz saw 9 games and 36 PA back with the Pirates in 2010. He has since established himself as a competent reserve catcher and as a fun fact he represents the return the Blue Jays received when they dealt former and current Pirates farm hand Brad Lincoln to the Phillies.
Before we move on to the guys with more significant playing time we first come to Joe Schultz Jr who registered 56 career PA with the Pirates over a 22 game span. What I find noteworthy about him is his father Joe Schultz Sr also played for the Pirates forming a father son duo I was unaware of. The two of them messed up my data pulling method as well sharing the same name and all. Schultz nor his father who I will touch on at a later position had much of career with the Pirates but junior here did go on to be the St Louis Browns primary backup catcher from 1943-48 (his time with the Pirates was 1939-41).
Coming in with decent sized Pirate careers but poor performances we have Danny Kravitz and Bill Haffner. Kravitz was a Pirates from 1956-60 and I guess he must have been considered a somewhat capable defensive backstop because his career Pirate line of .236/.280/.355 leaves a lot to be desired. Kravitz played 156 games with the Pirates and his offensive performance by wRC+ was 35% below league average. In 1960 he was traded to the Athletics for Hank Foiles, a catcher born in Virginia so he won't be touched upon here. Coming in with a -0.8 fWAR which is the worst of all 18 catchers is Bill Haeffner. Haeffner saw his time with the Pirates in 1920 and that was the middle of an oddly spread out major league career that saw him debut with Philadelphia 5 years earlier and finish with New York 8 years later, those 3 seasons were the only years he saw time in the major leagues. His time with the Pirates was by far the longest part of his career as he played in 54 games and recorded 186 PA but they were pretty bad ones as his line of .194/.230/.229 will attest.
This leaves us with just 6 eligible catchers. George Susce, having played for the Pirates back in 1939 is one of them but he saw only 89 PA that year. He did however post a respectable batting line .227/.333/.333 good for a 82 wRC+. Lance Parrish and Billy Earle also saw limited playing time registering just 147 and 119 PA respectively but they were both fairly good with the bat posting wRC+ of 98 and 114. As far as fWAR is concerned Earle ranks 3rd with 0.8 and Parrish fourth with 0.4. Parrish is a relatively recent player with a long career spanning from 1974 all the way through 1995. This was just a bit before my memory can recall but I'm sure some of you may recall him playing for the Pirates in 1994. Parrish caught 38 games that year (started 35) and was the backup catcher to Don Slaught. Billy Earle played for the Pirates in their early days, 1892-93, and by almost any metric put up the best offensive rate stats of the 18 eligible catchers. He played in only 32 games for the Pirates but his line of .287/.353/.472 was impressive even back then for a backup catcher. Earle's time with the Pirates was his first in the National League though he had played in the American Association previously and he stuck around one more year split between Louisville and Brooklyn.
Left are the 3 Pennsylvanian born catchers with the most career plate appearances. First I'll mention Tun Berger who is sort of unique to the list. Berger was a classic utility player and you'll see him mentioned not only here but also at SS and the OF he also just barely missed qualifying for 2B and he also saw limited time at 3B. He was a player that really didn't have a position. Berger played for the Pirates in 1890-91 and saw time in 147 games (582 total PA) with 39 at catcher. He wasn't a special hitter but he was a competent one posting a line of .259/.332/.322. Berger's time with the Pirates was his first major league action though he did play one more season with the Washington Senators in 1892.
Now let's get to the two catchers who have by far the most career playing time with the Pirates. Joe Sugden, another guy from the early days played for the Pirates from 1893-97. He spent his first 3 seasons with the Pirates serving as the primary backup catcher but by the later two he had worked his where into a job share, starting more games than anyone else at the position. He played in 279 games (258 at catcher) recording 1099 PA and posting a solid 85 wRC+. His career fWAR of 1.5 is second on the list and almost double that of third place. Last on the list is a name I'm sure most of you have heard of and a player I'm sure a lot of you remember seeing play and that is of course Ed Ott. Ott was with the Pirates from 1974-1980 but didn't see any significant time until the 1977 season. Ott was the primary catcher for the 1979 World Series team. In all he caught 430 games for the Pirates (420 of them in his last 4 seasons). His career fWAR of 5.8 dwarfs all the other eligible catchers for the PA team. His time with the Pirates was the beginning of his major league career but he did play one additional season in 1981 with the California Angels.
International: Looking at the international team we have a much deeper crop of catchers, with 24 eligible players and 4 others who caught at least one career game with the Pirates. Just to get them out of the way those 4 players are Orlando Merced, Pop Smith, Manny Mota and Jose Pagan. Of the 24 eligible catchers the top quartet (6) would all at least be in consideration for the PA team. This group is a whole different animal.
Like the PA group there are some brief stint players here, recording fewer than 10 PA we have Mike Hopkins, Rueben Rodriguez, Jay Clarke and Bill Farmer. Hopkins hails from the United Kingdom and played for the Pirates in 1902 which was his only major league season; he recorded 2 PA and got a hit in both (a single and a double). Ruben Rodriguez, from the Dominican Republic, played for the Pirates in 1986 and 1988 recording 8 PA over 4 games. This was his only major league action and he recorded one hit. Clarke a Canadian born player had a fairly long career mainly with the Cleveland Naps from 1905 to 1911 (he also had brief stints with Detroit and St Louis). His major league career appeared over at that point but he hung around eventually appearing for Philadelphia in 1919 and then finishing his career with Pittsburgh in 1920. He played 3 games with 9 PA and though he didn't get a hit he walked twice. Bill Farmer was born in Ireland and played for the Pirates in 1888. He recorded 4 PA across 2 games but didn't get a hit. The 1888 season represents his entire career but he also played with Philadelphia later that year where he we went 2 for 12.
Moving up the ladder to under 100 career PA we have Ozzie Virgil, Carlos Maldonado, Paddy O'Connor, Frank Smith, Benito Santiago, Elmo Plaskett and Jimmy Archer. Virgil was primarily a 3B in his career spending more time there than anywhere except for his one season with the Pirates where catcher was his primary position. His appearance with the Pirates in 1965 came after the primary portion of his major league career, 1956-62 was over he received just scatted call ups after that point. Virgil was from the Dominican Republic. Maldonado is a player those with good memories may recall as he played for the Pirates in 2006-07 and more recently 2010 and 2012 resurfaced with the Nationals. He is from Venezuela and during his two years with the Pirates was the third catcher called up for September. O'Connor born in Ireland began his career with the Pirates in 1908 and received sporadic call ups through the 1910 season. He played a total of 27 games; he would hang around the game appearing in the majors in 1914, 1915 and 1918. Smith, from Canada, played for Pittsburgh back in 1884 when they were part of the American Association. He appeared in 10 games and that was the entirety of his major league career.
Santiago I'm sure most of you recall. From Puerto Rico, Santiago actually had a rather good career but was acquired by Dave Littlefield in the '05 offseason when he was clearly at the end of his career. Traded away was Juan Oviedo (Leo Nunez at the time) who despite the name controversy spent 3 years as a solid closer and is still employed as a middle relief option. As for Santiago his time with the Pirates was short lived lasting just 6 games. Elmo Plaskett from the US Virgin Islands played for the Pirates in 1962-63 which was his only MLB experience. Jimmy Archer, from Ireland started his MLB career in 1904 with Pittsburgh. It took him a few years to get established but from 1909-1917 he was with the Cubs serving as their primary catcher for a lot of those years he even got some MVP votes in each season from 1911-1913. In 1918 at the end of his career he spent time with three different clubs including another stint with the Pirates. In all he played parts of two seasons with the Pirates, 14 years apart and appeared in 31 games receiving 83 PA.
Continuing to gradually move up we find Raul Chavez, Robinson Diaz, Angelo Encarnacion and Orlando McFarlane with less than 200 PA. Chavez had a relatively unremarkable career as a reserve catcher form 1996-2009 and his next to last stop was with Pittsburgh in 2008. Born in Venezuela, Chavez time with the Pirates, 122 PA and 57 wRC+ was in line with the rest of his career as a depth catcher. Diaz, from the Dominican Republic, I am sure everybody recalls as the catcher the Pirates got when they traded Jose Bautista away. He had a little major league time with Toronto in 2008 but most of his career was with the Pirates in 2008-09. He wasn't awful posting a 79 wRC+ in 144 PA but with what Bautista went on to do his performance was to say the least disappointing. Encarnacion is another Dominican Republic born player. He was with the Pirates in 1996-96 appearing in 65 games and registering 197 PA. He got a cup of coffee the following year with the Angels. McFarlane is our first Cuban born player signing with the Pirates back in 1958 he first appeared with the major league team in 1962 and then again briefly in 1964. He never established himself eventually moving on to Detroit and the California Angels where it was more of the same for him.
On the bottom of the list in terms of fWAR we find Harry Smith, a catcher from the United Kingdom who spent parts of 1902-1907 with the Pirates. His overall numbers, -0.9 fWAR, look pretty bad but it was an uneven stay as he posted a -1.8 fWAR his first two years and a 0.8 WAR his last 4 years. In total he had 645 career PA and batted .202/.259/.234 positing a 53 wRC+. Before coming to Pittsburgh he had one season in Philadelphia and then finished his career with 3 years in Boston.
Before we get to what I believe is the clear top 6 we have two final catchers to touch on. These two catchers recorded 827 and 562 PA with the Pirates but they were rather unremarkable ones leading them to each finish with a career fWAR of 0.0. First having appeared with the Pirates in 1982-83 and then again in 1985-89 we find Puerto Rican born Junior Ortiz. Ortiz's first stint with the Pirates was a short one consisting of only 12 games but the second one would prove to be much longer lasing 287 games (he had 299 total). Ortiz was by no means a bad catcher an 82 wRC+ and from what I can tell he seemed to be about an averageish defensive backstop but there was nothing about him that really stood out. In between his Pirates stays he saw time with the Mets and then he finished career up bouncing around from the Twins, Indians and Rangers. The last catcher before we move on to the bigger names is Humberto Cota. A lot of may remember Cota, he hails from Mexico, and played with the Pirates from 2001-07 but what you probably don't know is he still hanging around playing baseball down in Mexico. He spent most of his 7 years with the Pirates playing sparingly except for 2005 when the Santiago situation forced him into regular duty. Cota wasn't much with the bat positing a 63 wRC+ but was considered an above average defensive catcher.
Now we move on to the 6 players who are in my mind head and shoulders above the rest. With an fWAR of 1.5 this player comes in 6th place in this group but his total is 5 times higher than that of the 7th place finisher. He is also the only player here who didn't spend at least half of his Pirates career at catcher and that player is from Ireland, Jocko Fields. More of an outfielder by trade Jocko Fields was in Pittsburgh from 1887-1891 but you won't find any note of him in Pirates history in 1890 and that is because he jumped to the Pittsburgh Burghers a member of the short lived Player's League. The 1890 season was by far his most extensive in Pittsburgh but doesn't count in this exercise. In his time with the Pirates organization Fields played in 186 games recording 755 PA. His best season came in 1889 when he batted .311/.376/.443 good for a 130 wRC+. His other years with the club were less memorable. After finishing in Pittsburgh Fields played 1 year in each of Philadelphia and New York. Moving a bit closer towards modern times we reach Ronny Paulino. Paulino who hails from the Dominican Republic had a strong rookie season for the Pirates in 2006 and looked like a potential catcher of the future obviously that never materialized and Paulino never again enjoyed a season as successful as his rookie campaign. Paulino's Pirate career spans from 2005-2008 where he posted a respectable 3.5 fWAR. He went on to play for the Marlins, Mets and Orioles but never recaptured his rookie form (although in his first year away, 2009, his rate numbers were similar but in about half the playing time).
I mentioned a separation between the top 6 and the rest of the pack well there is a similar separation between the top 4 and the rest. The 4 remaining catchers represent 4 of arguably the top 10 catchers in franchise history. The earliest player on the list from Canada, George Gibson, was the Pirates primary catcher for most of his tenure from 1905-1916. With 1,174 career games with the Pirates Gibson has the second most of any eligible catcher on either team. Considering how far back he played it is impossible to know for sure but Gibson seems like he was a good defensive catcher and why he was no Babe Ruth at the plate he managed to hold his own to the tune of a 86 wRC+. Gibson even received some MVP votes back in 1911 which was admittedly odd as it was one of his worst offensive years.
Next in chronological order we get the only catcher mentioned to surpass Gibson in games played (and one of only two in franchise history) the Panama born Manny Sanguillen. I don't really think I need to say much about Sanguillen he was with the Pirates from 1967-1976 went to Oakland for a year and then finished his career here from 1978-1980. He was the primary catcher on the 1972 World Series team and though he had a diminished role was part of the 1979 champions as well. In four separate seasons he received MVP votes, finishing in the top 10 in 1971. He was considered by pretty much everyone to be a very good defensive catcher and for his career with the Pirates his bat was roughly league average but at his best it was even better topping out at a 134 wRC+ in 1975. Even today Sanguillen is known amongst Pirates fans as he has a barbeque stand named after him in PNC Park.
Moving forward in time we reach Tony Pena who joined the Pirates in 1980, Sanguillen's last year, and was with the team through 1986. With "only" 3,091 plate appearances Pena doesn't quite have the resume length of the last two catchers but the content of his time in Pittsburgh was stellar. Pena, born in the Dominican Republic, won 3 gold gloves with the Pirates, was a four time All Star and in 1983 received MVP votes. His gold gloves show how great he was behind the plate but at the plate he was no slouch either as his 104 wRC+ shows (that is good enough to tie Jock Fields for 2nd best of all the international catchers, excluding Mike Hopkins and his 2 career PA). Pena went on from the Pirates to continued success in St Louis, Boston and Cleveland before finishing his career up with the White Sox and Houston but he was never as good with any of them as he was with the Pirates.
Finally we arrive at the last catcher, one so recent I have a feeling everyone reading this can recall him. I am of course speaking of the Canadian born Russell Martin. Unlike the previous 3 catchers I mentioned Martin doesn't have longevity with the Pirates spending just two years here and registering just 966 plate appearances. However his leadership and defensive skills behind the dish helped turn the franchise out of one of its darkest times and at the plate he posted some great numbers as his 120 wRC+ is easily the best of all the international catchers (excluding Hopkins again of course). At 9.4 fWAR Martin is clearly in 4th place amongst these final four but he also accumulated that over by far the shortest time period. As for the rest of his career I think we all know he spent time with the Dodgers and Yankees before coming to Pittsburgh and has since signed a lucrative contract with the Toronto Blue Jays.
Well there you have it a breakdown of all the Pennsylvania born and internationally born catchers to play for the Pittsburgh Pirates in their history. I have my picks which will be revealed at the end of this exercise but feel free to discuss this and let me know if there is someone who I am missing. Who knows maybe you can change my mind before the final part of this series. The first baseman will come out in a few days but it takes a while to put together even from my notes so be patient.