Fantasy Baseball Cheat Code: How To Get An Elite Fantasy Catcher On The Cheap

As I prepared for fantasy baseball this preseason, I was ready to throw up at the prospects of the catcher position. It was one of the shallowest positions I’ve ever seen entering 2017, and even the premier hitters were overdrafted. The only catcher I would’ve been excited to own was Gary Sanchez, and while he’s been very good, he has spent time on the DL and isn’t quite swinging leagues. So as my draft neared, I decided to carry out an experiment.

Instead of locking up one of the few catchers I expected to reign supreme – they were Sanchez, Buster Posey, Kyle Schwarber and Willson Contreras in that order – I looked at the Astros’ situation and spent back-to-back picks (No. 183 and No. 201) on Evan Gattis and Brian McCann.

Separately, these two had warts. Both had concerns about playing time, and while Gattis was the more exciting of the two in Roto, he posed major batting average and OPS risk because of his strikeouts and low walk rate. McCann was likely to play a bit more, but he had questions about age (33, and catchers age in dog years), declining power, leaving the short right field porch in Yankee Stadium, and similar batting average woes. Together, they’ve become an elite catcher for my first place team.

In this particular league, which is a 12-team, 7x7 category Roto league, these are the Top 10 catchers and their overall rank:

1.     Salvador Perez (91)

2.     Buster Posey (113)

3.     Willson Contreras (189)

4.     J.T. Realmuto (231)

5.     Gary Sanchez (314)

6.     Yasmani Grandal (428)

7.     Yadier Molina (511)

8.     Brian McCann (557)

9.     Evan Gattis (579)

10.  Alex Avila (633)

Pretty disgusting right? So this Roto league’s categories include Runs, Home Runs, RBI, Stolen Bases, Total Bases, Average and OPS. This is how Perez ranks vs. the McCann/Gattis tag team in 2017.

             AB      R    HR    RBI    SB    TB    Avg    OPS

Perez    337    43    20    62    1    177    .285    .841

Astros   458    53    19    72    1    215    .262    .785

As you can see, Perez offers a significant edge in batting average and OPS, but elsewhere he’s beat. Having McCann and Gattis offers far more at-bats, more runs, almost equal power, and greater total base potential simply because you’re getting many more plate appearances. I figured out the McCann/Gattis rank in each of these categories among the top 10 catchers, and my guys ranked first in ABs, runs, RBI and total bases, and finished second in home runs. That is so much value for 14th and 15th round picks. Compare that draft position with Posey’s (6th round) and it becomes clear that this is a strategy worth serious consideration.

The next question though, is how many situations does this apply to?

In short, almost none. Rarely does a team have a situation like Houston in which they have the luxury of platooning two above-average hitters at the catcher position. So next season, I recommend targeting McCann and Gattis as a package deal. If another team has two decent catchers, snag them both and resist the urge to drop one during the year. If you don’t, be prepared to spend the 2018 campaign somewhere between mildly disappointed in your catcher and ready to stick pins in a voodoo doll of him