ZiPS projects Bryan Anderson as a .261/.319/.387 hitter in the majors for 2011. No great shakes by most interpretations. That translates to something around a .310 wOBA or about 8 runs worse than average over 600 PAs. That’s not actually terrible for a catcher.

Gerald Laird projects as a .240/.302/.342 hitter in 2011 or roughly a .285 wOBA.

Arguments for Gerald Laird to be the 2011 backup catcher have to include a rational discussion as to how he is 15 runs better (over a full season; prorate accordingly) defensively relative to Bryan Anderson.  That is to say you’d have to believe Gerald Laird is a little better than average and Bryan Anderson is well below average behind the plate.  It’s the minimum hurdle that has to be overcome and only serves as a starting point for potential discussions regarding platooning, age, injury risk, etc.

Succinctly, this looks like a bad decision to me. It’s more runs lost at the margins of the team.  Eventually, those add up.

ZiPS Projection

The candidates for Memphis are Steven Hill and Tony Cruz.  Neither is a “pure” catcher and both are known for their hitting.  Cruz has been very productive so far in the Arizona Fall League and Hill got a few call ups to St. Louis.  Both have valid claims to the starting job in Memphis and they will probably end up splitting time at catcher with the other at DH. Should be interesting to see how it shakes out over the season.

Around the Springfield level, we have another group of guys.  Charles Cutler is a high OBP catcher who ended last season on the DL and is down in Columbia getting at-bats this winter.  Luis De La Cruz is an organizational catcher who will go anywhere he is assigned, playing at 3 different levels last season.  De La Cruz has failed to make much impact with his bat, which could be a result of his wanderings or his lack of punch with his bat could have turned him into the Wanderer.  Nick Derba is another light-hitting catcher, with a career OBP under 650, he may be headed back to Palm Beach or a backup somewhere else.  Springfield is the big question for catching this season with a gap between the youngest guns and Cruz and Hill.

Cody Stanley and Robert Stock both have the credentials to be promoted to Palm Beach after both ending up in Quad Cities last year.  Stock has had a full season and could be following Shelby Miller if he moves up to Palm Beach.  Cody Stanley was just drafted in the 4th round and made it to Quad Cities in his first partial season.  Stanley may stay in Quad Cities for at least the beginning of 2011.  However, there is another name in the mix at Quad Cities: Audry Perez.  Perez has been getting a lot of buzz around the organization this season and offseason and should be moved to his first full season minor league squad this season.  That leaves two teams, Quad Cities and Palm Beach and three potential starting catchers.  My guess is that Robert Stock starts in Quad Cities with one of the minor league catcher farmhands like Roberto Espinoza or Ivan Castro.  Espinoza ended last season on QC and Castro was the 3rd catcher in Palm Beach at the end of the year.  Next, Stanley and Perez should split time at catcher in Quad Cities since neither has played a full minor league season yet in their careers.  Depending on how each

The Cardinals have two interesting hit-first catcher prospects in Cruz and Hill ticketed for Memphis this season and a gap at Springfield before the higher profile prospects like Perez, Stock and Stanley are at Palm Beach and Quad Cities.  With this gap, this season could represent a big opportunity for Charles Cutler to prove himself at Springfield.  Tony Cruz and Steven Hill are very interesting catchers to have on the cusp of St. Louis, especially with Cruz’s success in the prospect finishing school in the Arizona Fall League and Hill’s appearances in St. Louis.  The Cardinals are also in the enviable position that they have multiple high upside catchers in the low minors.  As we have seen with Bryan Anderson, a lot can go wrong between potential and arrival in the major leagues.  But, with 3 potential young catchers, the Cardinals do not have all their proverbial eggs in one basket or even two.

Acknowledging that Bryan Anderson is a valuable commodity or future MLB backstop didn’t always translate to advocating him in the majors. It did always advocate for him being ahead of Matt Pagnozzi on any proverbial depth chart though. It seems like the Cardinals have firmly committed to that decision — whether that was always the internal ranking or if all parties involved believed in that assessment is a different story and not one I’ve been privy to — with their release of Matt Pagnozzi, per Joe Strauss of the St. Louis Post Dispatch.

This winter the club intends to seek more from the role after Jason La Rue announced he would retire following three years in the role. Left unsaid is a desire for the next backup to take on more of the catching load; Yadier Molina has ended the last three seasons with knee issues.

If ever there was a prescription for giving Anderson some playing time it’s the above quote combined with a very good 2010 performance in Memphis. Anderson’s spent time working with Mike Matheny and while he won’t win any gold gloves, he’s not such a liability that he can’t catch a game or two a week.

Anderson is a left-handed hitter. Molina is a right-handed hitter. While Molina’s past offensive production and superb defense argue against a strict platoon, the opportunity to leverage off days in ideal situations both for starts and late inning pinch hitting is ideal.

Anderson’s heaviest workloads came in 2006 & 2006 when he accumulated over 400 PAs as the primary catcher for Quad Cities & Springfield. (Anderson skipped Palm Beach altogether.) Since then he’s seen significant though pronounced split time behind the plate with a co-catcher at Springfield & Memphis.  So while no one would expect him to take on a full catching load in 2011, he’s also used to being in the game sporadically.

The downside is that Anderson might benefit from more playing time than he’d see with Yadier Molina. The manager and many of the pitchers would almost certainly have a definitive preference for Molina, who has shown little desire to remove himself from games even when it is prudent to do so. If the concerns regarding Molina’s knee are significant (and based on his missing time in 2010 and reduced offensive production, there has to be some concern even if it’s inappropriate to decisively link his offense to an injury), the task falls to the manager to effectively integrate a young catcher who is still learning how to call a game but who also has as much offensive potential as any backup catcher since Yadier Molina was protege to Mike Matheny.

Anderson put up a .270/.341/.448 line in Memphis last season over 300 PAs. That’s a tick better than average offensive production without regard to position. Anderson’s climb to the majors would likely reduce that production at the beginning and it would be misleading to indicate that he’ll be better than a .290-.300 wOBA hitter in a good season. But a .290 wOBA hitter is better than the Cardinals have had as a backstop since 2004 with Yadi when he hit .267/.329/.356 behind Matheny. A .290 wOBA hitter is 1 WAR player from the catcher position over a full season (assuming neutral defense).

The bar simply isn’t set high for offensive production from a backup catcher.

So getting increased offensive production, even if your not a Bryan Anderson believer, is a very low bar relative to recent catching performances. If Anderson puts together a .270/.315/.360 he’s achieved a .290 wOBA performance.  Anderson has a history of hitting for average and drawing walks. If the bulk of his opportunities are against right handed pitchers, there is a strong case to be made that he can achieve these levels of production.

None of this is meant to indicate that Bryan Anderson is a world beater. He’s a useful role player right now and the Cardinals would be prudent to see what, if anything, he can be long term. Yadier Molina’s team friendly contract is up in 2012 (option year at $7M) and the team may wind up looking for more than a backup catcher. It’s still an open question how productive Anderson will be at the majors but he’s tailor made for the Cardinals current needs. He comes at minimal monetary cost and, potentially, could play a larger role on the team in the future. 2011 should be the year of Bryan Anderson, backup catcher for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Bryan Anderson is having a good year by catcher’s standards. He’s posted a .792 OPS and a .344 wOBA.  While the translation for those numbers are perhaps less inspiring (.657 OPS MLE) the manner in which Anderson is posting those numbers is, arguably, a noteworthy one.

With 7 homeruns in 2010, Anderson has surpassed his 2009 total and is just 2 away from meeting the combined 2008-2009 total. Given the paucity of recent at bats in recent years, this isn’t terribly surprising since we’re working with a counting stat. It does add to the narrative that he’s hitting for more power though. With a .192 ISO, he’s got the highest power rate of his entire career thus far. After having been pilloried in recent years for never developing the power he was projected for, at age 23, Anderson may be ready to make good on his initial promise.

Additional cause for optimism this season would be the appearance that Anderson has hit into bad luck with a 25% line drive rate and a meager .283 BABIP.  Anderson is hitting just .267, which is a bit of a departure from previous seasons when the main point of his resume was his ability to hit .300 consistently.  In reality, Anderson continues to make contact and put the ball in play.

Keeping in mind that Anderson plays catcher (an inherently valuable position) and is showing increased power to go with good contact rates, there’s still reason to keep an eye on this player who remains a valuable prospect.

Note: All statistics include games through 6/19.

He was called up over Matt Pagnozzi who was the last catcher to be moved down from major league spring training.

Backup catcher Jason LaRue is headed to the DL.

What do you think of the move?  Good move? Or should Anderson stay in Memphis and get regular ABs?

Bryan Anderson is going to be 23 in two weeks.  (Happy Birthyday Bryan!)  Let that sink in for a second.  If he had been drafted as a college catcher, he’d basically have played AAA in his first season of pro ball.  Now, obviously this isn’t his first season but it’s a good illustration of how young he is playing at an advanced level.  Prior to 2009, his lowest batting average at any stop was .281.  In 2008 at Memphis, he posted a .367 OBP.  Remember that the offensive threshold for a catcher is set very low.  Their positional adjustment is 12.5 runs.  If a catcher in the majors posts a .330 wOBA and plays a full season, they’re an instant 3 win player.

Based on his 2009 numbers (.245/.293/.399), there’s not a chance that Anderson would have done that.  MinorLeagueSplits MLE converter shows his 2009 season at Memphis compiling a .215/.253/.335 in St. Louis. Baseball Prospectus, once again seemingly optimistic, project a .232/.276/.390 season in St. Louis. (I’m calling crap on any translation that shows his ISO getting BETTER in the majors.)  The former translation nets a .256 wOBA and the latter a .290 wOBA.

Take that back a year and use his 2008 line translated to the majors and the MinorLeagueSplits (i.e. the pessimisstic one) gets as sunny as BP 2009.  His Memphis line of .281/.367/.379 translates to a .242/.312/.319 line in the majors good for a .292 wOBA.  Think Jason Kendall post-2004.   Over the course of a full season, that wOBA is equivalent to about -23 runs.  So Bryan Anderson circa 2008 performed in Memphis like a 1 WAR catcher in the majors assuming average defense.

In 2008 a lot of things went right for Anderson.  To assume that he’s actually a .290 wOBA player in the majors at that point seems optimistic.  2009 shows the perils of making that assumption.  Jason LaRue has a much more reliable track record (lower variance for projections) so there’s a risk averse model of assembling your team that would make a strong advocacy for retaining his services.  LaRue has posted a .286 and .279 wOBA over the last two seasons so even a strong translation for Anderson doesn’t show much in the way of offensive gains.   The Cardinals aren’t really paying LaRue to be a good catcher.  They’re paying him to suck less than any in house alternatives.  The marginal gains here aren’t more wins so much as they are fewer losses.

At this point, even as an ardent supporter of Anderson, I’d be skeptical of him posting anything higher than a .300 wOBA in 2010 at the majors — and that would be something like my 90% projection.  All I can really hope for is that the Cardinals dispose of whatever ill-conceived notion they have regarding Matt Pagnozzi.  In 2009, Pagnozzi had a .221/.299/.308 line in Memphis over almost 300PAs.  He’s never posted an wOBA over .300 in the minors over a full season.  Anderson at his worst offensively, is still better than Pagnozzi at his best offensively.  I struggle to believe that the differences in defense (which I think is way overblown in the negative for Anderson and in the positive for Pagnozzi) overcome that offensive disparity.

Jason LaRue makes a lot of sense for St. Louis in 2010.  There is no viable in house alternative that we can trust to be replacement level.  Bryan Anderson makes a lot of sense for Memphis and getting a full season of PAs after rehabbing from his shoulder injury.  Matt Pagnozzi just doesn’t make much sense anywhere.

Great to see Matt Pagnozzi with a strong game at Busch. He’s a perfect example of why the organization values strong catch and throw skills

I think Pagnozzi’s defense is largely overrated.  He’s got a good arm but he struggles with balls in the dirt from what I’ve seen.  He’s an average defender; more importantly, he’s a terrible hitter even for a catcher.  Unless his bat takes a quantum leap forward, he shouldn’t be anywhere near the big club, today’s effort notwithstanding.  Part of Luhnow’s job is to be positive about the minors in the press and while I appreciate the opportunity to praise an individual, I’m perturbed by reading what appears to be organizational philosophy that results in bad players coming up at certain positions.

Poor Bryan Anderson.

• Nick Derba caught 34 out of 78 attempts (43.6%) and came in 5th on Badler’s list.
• Luis De La Cruz caught 20 out of 52 (38.5%), coming in 13th.
• Bryan Anderson was much improved from last year, catching 41 out of 109 attempts (37.6%), good for 19th. Last year his CS% was 26.8%. Hopefully that will squelch some of this nonsensical talk that he should be moved to another position.

Badler only looked at players whose names were in one of their handbooks so I figured I may as well could look around and see how well our other catchers controlled the running game. Onward bullet points, ho!

• Arnoldi Cruz:  15-for-55, good for 27.2%.
• Blake Murphy:  20-for-53, 37.7%.
• Paul Vasquez:  31-for-74, 41.9%
• Brandon Yarbrough: 26-for-75, 34.6%
• Kevin Moscatel: 12-for-35, 34.2%.
• Steve Hill: 1-f0r-4, I don’t have is AFL #’s, unfortunately.

Some quick thoughts:

• The reverse-Inge experiment with Cruz is probably still worth exploring, but he has some work to do. That percentage would put him well in the bottom third of Badler’s list.
• Nick Derba fooled us into thinking he could hit, posting a .377 wOBA for the Quad Cities last season. This season at Palm Beach his wOBA .274, but he dominated the running game. Another Jason Motte experiment in line?
• Murphy was my favorite late round pick last season, and here is another reason why. The 42 round pick completely dominated college ball both on offense and defense, then he hit pretty well in Batavia before struggling a bit at the QC. We’ll see what he can do over a full season before I get really interested.
• Paul Vasquez came from the independent leagues to hit for a .394 wOBA in the Quad Cities. He struggled in under 70 plate appearances at Palm Beach. Maybe he’s a hidden gem.

Anderson will however be backing up Molina in the Puerto Rican Winter League, which starts on Election Day.

Speaking of voting, Derrick Goold is polling the fans on who should be the Cards minor league player of the year. There is a great case for Freese, but where is the love for Daryl Jones? I just am not sure the real organizational player of the year should be trailing by so much.

Arizona Fall League

• Shane Robinson went 1-3 with an intentional walk. Who is the manager that would intentionally walk Shane Robinson? He stole his sixth base of the AFL season and also had a sac fly.
• Brett Wallace went 0-4 with a walk. A .644 OPS wasn’t what we were hoping to see out of Wallace in fall ball; I’ll have to look at his batted ball types to see if it is just a matter of tough luck.
• Adam Ottavino with another less than stellar performance- 3 IP, 3 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 1 HR.
• Justin Fiske threw a scoreless inning, pitching around a couple of hits. He recently updated his blog, found here. Box.

Hawaii Winter Baseball

• Tony Cruz went 1-4.
• Blake King allowed two hits over two innings and struck out five.

Dominican Winter League

• For Halloween, Albert Pujols dresses up as Amaury Marti. Marti doubled and walked in four at bats. Box.

Venezuelan Winter League

• David Freese drove in a pair of runs, one on a sac fly and another on a solo jack. He struck out twice in his other two at bats. Box.

The baseball population is skewed toward replacement level on a talent curve.  There’s far more replacement level players than average players and far more average players than superstars.  We assign value to the superstars because of scarcity (although baseball still does so in a linear fashion**) of talent.  If you further diminish the pool of players (looking for a catcher), it’s like placing a seconder finer granularity filter beneath the first — less is going to pass through the second filter.

Bryan Anderson has had some disappointing seasons to date.  It’s not that they’ve been bad, merely underwhelming.  It’s conceivable, perhaps even likely, that he still has power potential to translate into HRs; even without any further growth, it’s important to note that he’s already better than about a third of the league’s regular catchers.  A straight translation (without regard to aging curves) of his Memphis performance this year, would give him an EqA of .249 (league average is .260).  Among catchers with 300 PAs or more, of which there are 29, he would be better than 10 of those catchers and within 10 pts of another 8.

There’s a tendency to evaluate players based on what they can’t do (he can’t field, he can’t hit for power, he can’t put the ball in play, etc.) rather than what they can do; in this case, Anderson can’t hit for power but he can play a position at which only a small group of people can.  He can hit for average and draw walks.  The absence of one offensive trait hardly negates the value of others.  Even a peak translation (applying aging curves) has Anderson hitting just 4 HRs but it also has him at an EqA of .275, which is considerable for a catcher.

The question of whether the Cardinals should keep Anderson is a more complex one.  It’s apparent that he has the ability to become an above average offensive catcher relative to league average — not just “catcher” average.  Obviously, the Cardinals have a catcher signed long term in Yadier Molina.  The question boils down to one of three solutions: A) Anderson never develops at the major league level, B) trade Anderson or C) platoon Anderson with Yadier.  While I don’t believe that choice A is likely, it’s certainly a possibility.  The uncertainty still exists that he could turn into a lesser player than the projections above imply.  There’s risk to keeping him.  The only real way to diminish that risk is to eliminate it completely.

Trading Anderson this offseason could be viewed as a sell-high move.  The question would be how much you could expect to get back for him.  When Atlanta acquired Mark Texeira, they made young catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia the centerpiece of that deal.  There were a lot of side dishes with that entree (SS Elvis Andrus, RHP Neftali Feliz, LHP Matt Harrison, LHP Beau Jones) but acquiring a catcher with substantial offensive potential was a sweet deal for the rebuilding Rangers.  Anderson isn’t the caliber of prospect that Salty was and the Cardinals would be hard pressed to come up with a comparable package.  That said they don’t need to shoot for a player like Texeira in a trade.  There are a myriad of teams that lack a solid MLB caliber catcher or long term solution in the form of a prospect.  The hot name to throw out right now would be the Padres whom have little in the way of catching.

The third option is one that the current manager would likely be disinclined to agree to.  Putting a young player in a bench/platoon role is something that TLR has explicitly spoken against in the past and that’s not to say he isn’t right.  Yadier Molina plays a fair amount of games for a catcher but still leaves 40-50 games on the table for his backup due to injury or rest.  Assuming that Molina would catch against left handed starters (.859 vs. LHP/.690 vs. RHP) and Anderson would start against right handers, do the benefits outweigh the costs.

I’m not sure either side comes out substantially ahead in a comparison like this.  Anderson might be a one-win upgrade over whatever free agent backup the Cardinals snare but is that marginal gain enough to justify not moving him?  If Yadier were to be hurt for a more substantial portion of time, I’d prefer to have an MLB ready catcher to take over the responsibilities but you can’t hoard your prospects against every possible contingency.  That would be a poor use of resources.

It leaves us at something of an impasse.  Anderson is better than a few catchers currently in the majors and could work his way into the upper half given a few years.  He could also flame out.  We have a young catcher signed long term and other needs on the team.  If I were the GM, I’d hole onto him in AAA for one more year as insurance against a Molina injury and with the hopes that he could raise his stock a little bit more.  Then I’d wish him the best on another team via trade. He doesn’t have to be on the 40-man roster yet so there’s no imperative to protect him yet and it’s certainly justifiable to stash him in AAA for another season.  Either way, Mozeliak has a defensible set of rationalizations for any move he makes with Anderson provided he gets some kind of value back in return.

Anderson’s case is different compared to that of fellow draftee Colby Rasmus.  While Rasmus became the opening line for the Jeff Luhnow draft management, Anderson has been something more of a footnote.  The differences in depth also impact their value to the club as well.  While the Cardinals have a high number of outfielders, none of them are as young as Yadier Molina who will enter next season at age 26.  The age gap between Rasmus and outfielders versus Anderson and Molina would tend to favor Rasmus in terms of getting younger as a team.*** It’s a decision that Mozeliak will be forced to confront as he attempts to make trades this offseason.  There may not be any right decision with Anderson and, fortunately, there are very few wrong decisions as well. ****

*I was the catcher in my softball league last year.  The next day it often hurt to stand.  I would not like to do this for 100 days a year.  A million dollar salary would soften the blow though.

**I would prefer an exponential valuation for superstar talent.

***I’m aware younger != better in all cases.

****Trading Anderson for, say, Juan Pierre would constitute a wrong decision though.  Nothing is completely idiot-proof but I’m highly skeptical that Mozeliak would do anything that stupid.