Why is Welington Castillo still a White Sox?

Welington Castillo already wasn’t hitting well, even for a catcher. During Game 1 on Tuesday, he didn’t catch well, especially for a catcher.

Castillo became the first White Sox catcher since 2006 to yield three passed balls in one game, and unlike A.J. Pierzynski, he couldn’t blame his struggles on a knuckeballer. No, Castillo let three pitches from fairly normal pitchers get past him on Tuesday, and they changed the game.

One of them led to the Astros’ go-ahead scoring with Dylan Cease on the mound …

… and another that scored the first insurance run with Jace Fry pitching:

The one thing that wasn’t normal was the start time. Game 1 had a first pitch of 3:40 p.m., and the poor late-afternoon visibility that you often hear tormenting hitters might have gotten the best of Castillo in the middle of this one. That said, sympathy runs low for a catcher who, after getting busted for blood doping in his first season, has more or less failed in all three phases of the game in Year Two:

  • Offense: Hitting .195/.267/.346, and hasn’t had an average over .200 since April 28.
  • Defense: He’s up to seven passed balls over 37 games, and none of them are because he’s prioritizing framing. He’s also thrown out only 18 percent of basestealers.
  • Handling pitchers: He has a 5.33 catchers ERA, which is nearly a run higher than James McCann‘s 4.49.

So why is Castillo still here? Especially with three catchers in Charlotte, two of whom are hitting? If I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably for the pitchers. Zack Collins and Yermin Mercedes aren’t lauded for their work behind the plate, and while Collins caught the Sox’ worst starters during his limited appearances behind the plate, even the opposition’s game notes were piling it on:

The White Sox could call up Seby Zavala, but Zavala has struck out in nine of his 12 plate appearances in Chicago, and is one of the few players who doesn’t have an OPS of .800 at Charlotte.

That said, three passed balls makes it easy to set aside any pitcher-based arguments, because Castillo doesn’t have any regular members of the rotation endorsing his work with their results. Reynaldo López performed better with Castillo behind the plate in the first half, but López has staged his second-half resurgence with the playing time divided between backstops.

Pitcherw/McCannw/Castillo
Lucas Giolito3.42 (23)n/a
Reynaldo López5.29 (9)5.08 (15)
Iván Nova3.48 (19) 8.33 (6)
Dylan Cease6.86 (4)4.00 (3)

Basically, if the Sox were required to suffer through catching woes from Collins or Mercedes at the big-league level, now would probably be the time to do it. Collins might need a little more time to understand his reworked swing before it gets exposed to major-league pitching again, but Mercedes has been happily mashing in the minors the whole season. May as well, right?

I’m guessing the Sox are reluctant to saddle McCann and the pitching staff with a novice. I also wonder if the lack of August waiver trades makes it less natural to cut a player in Castillo’s place. What’s being said about Castillo could’ve applied to Dioner Navarro in 2016, and yet he was dealt to his former team at the end of August for a pitcher who is still in the White Sox organization (Colton Turner). If the Sox received any talent of intrigue for Castillo, one could justify the shift to a less-qualified catcher as part of the business, rather than an independent and punitive action.

Or maybe the White Sox are waiting until Sept. 1 to cut Castillo in order to make sure that no team can use a dead cat bounce in the postseason. That’s probably too petty to be a primary motivator, but after watching Yonder Alonso put his game together with Colorado, I wouldn’t put pettiness entirely out of the question.

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Patrick Nolan

Handling pitchers: He has a 5.33 catchers ERA, which is nearly a run higher than James McCann‘s 4.49.

Not that this is news to Jim, but that’s heavily a product of pitcher allocation. McCann’s caught all of Giolito starts, Castillo’s caught none. McCann very oddly has caught zero Covey starts this year, Castillo’s caught seven.

Patrick Nolan

I tweeted about this, but the Covey thing is odd. Ten Covey starts, zero times with McCann. But McCann’s caught his fair share of the Despaigne/Banuelos/Detwiler starts. Even if we take the Giolito/McCann pairing as a given, McCann’s started 55% of the rest of the games, which means there’s a 0.03% chance of Covey/McCann never being paired up across 10 starts if the rest are purely random. That seems weird in light of McCann at least having some role with the other filler pitchers.

lil jimmy

My guess, Sept 1 Collins returns and gets Beef’s newly vacated locker.

NorthSideSouthSider

When they brought up Skole to replace Reed, I really feel like they missed the opportunity to DFA Castillo with Reed and ride Mercedes and Collins as DH/1B/C for the last 2 months. Not that they couldn’t do that now, but they gave Skole a 40 man spot while doing that so I bet they are less likely to do that now.

phillyd

Someone has to catch in Charlotte for the last 3 weeks.

Patrick Nolan

My guess is that it’s a money-saving strategy. Castillo can’t be traded, but he can be CLAIMED, right? If he’s on waivers a team could simply claim him and take his whole remaining contract. So maybe they’re just trying to see if some team will claim him and save them a million or two. It sounds crazy, but hey, Dioner Navarro was traded for an actual human person.

Patrick Nolan

Jim — any idea if this is consistent with your understanding of the rules?

lil jimmy

they would not save a million or two. they let him clear waivers, then pick him up. The Sox save that money. Less than $100,000. still that’s something.

yinkadoubledare

A team that really wanted him could claim him if they had a concern someone else would claim him or that he wouldn’t sign with them once a free agent but… hahahahaha yeah right who would actually want him that badly?

PauliePaulie

Ricky told them to sign him. Hahn doesn’t want to hurt his feelings.

As Cirensica

Due to the recent dourness (not one to blame but Hahn) ….I am trying to find positives.

Let’s try to see the half-full glass

White Sox is on pace to win 73 games. That’s an 11 games improvement without actually spending more
Assume Kopech, Cease, Robert and Madrigal plus Eloy maturity add 15 wins
Can Hahn buy 7-8 wins worth in free agency? Can’t be hard. Right?

— Jofp Gallagher (@JofpGallagher) August 14, 2019

Lurker Laura

I admire his optimism, but assuming those 15 wins is a big leap. However, why not hope for that in this moment? Weirder things have happened.

As Cirensica

His optimism and mine are the same as we are the same person. But we just might get a 11 wins leap without actually adding not much. Just the development of Yoan, Giolito and TA. Adding Kopech, Madrigal, Ribert, a full year of Cease, and add progress on Eloy’s hitting tool…. that gotta be more than 11 wins…don’t you think?

Lurker Laura

Well, I admire your optimism, then! I’m on board. For today, anyway 🙂

zerobs

Let’s not forget that they could add wins by simply subtracting Covey, banuelos, Castillo, Herrera, Ostich, Detwiler, etc. It’s actually somewhat encouraging the Sox have as many wins as they have with so much negative production on the roster.

PauliePaulie

And they could subtract wins by not having 1/3rd of their line-up with .380+ BABIPs and a Closer with a .192 BABIP. These “if now, then 2020” comps. are fruitless.

Trooper Galactus

Are you one of those “glass half empty” people I keep hearing about?

phillyd

Does this feel like a 73 win team though? The Pythag record says no.

Lurker Laura

I guess we’ll find out.

karkovice squad

The mistake is basing anything off this year’s overall results. Banuelos, Covey, Despaigne, Detwiler, and Santana had something like 30 starts this season. They’re not part of the baseline expectations going forward.

roke1960

Barring any more TJ surgeries, we should go into next season with Giolito, Lopez, Cease and Kopech as 4/5 of the starting rotation. Even someone as incompetent as Hahn should be able to find a 5th starter better than those 5 Karko mentioned. But as someone mentioned in a different post, we need to add two competent starters because it’s inevitable that someone goes down with at least a minor injury. Cole, Wheeler, Odorizzi, Gibson, Hamels, Bumgarner, Keuchel and possibly Strasburg will be available this winter. There is no reason there should be any starts next year from a group as bad as the one Ricky sent out this year.

lil jimmy

and Hector. Don’t forget Hector

karkovice squad

But he’ll be pitching for the Sox in 2020.

As Cirensica

Stop Hectoring!

zerobs

Every roster is going to wind up with one or two negative production guys. The goal is to not have 8 or 9 of them.

roke1960

The goal would be to not have Rick Hahn making personnel decisions, because no GM with a brain would employ 8 or 9 negative production guys when there are better players available.

phillyd

Which is true of every team every year.

karkovice squad

Which is why projections exist and teams don’t rely on the run differential from last year’s roster when making offseason decisions.

phillyd

Well its a good thing JofP and I are just some dudes on a message board then and not running teams 🙂

As Cirensica

How rude…I can do better than Hahn. It ain’t hard.

Trooper Galactus

WSB 2013-19(?): It ain’t hard.

(looks down) Also yes.

Trooper Galactus

I thought this year’s payroll was $10-20 million higher than last year’s.

Trooper Galactus

That link says $71 million last year and $88 million this year, or am I misreading something here?

As Cirensica

It states exactly the opposite…. am I misreading something here? Please look again

Nevermind…You are correct

I am tired. It has been a really long day with loads of tax filings

I still would do a better job than Hahn

Trooper Galactus

I could literally see Hahn making this same mistake and being all, “look at all the money we saved while improving the team record!”

Trooper Galactus

Regardless, Hahn’s primary offseason trades and signings (McCann, Herrera, Colome, Alonso, Jay, Banuelos, Nova) account for 3.3 bWAR for an investment of $40 million, a lefty catcher with an OPS+ of 119 last season (and his $581k salary), and four low-grade prospects.

Well done, Rick.

Greg Nix

I didn’t realize Alonso was hitting well for Colorado. Another little ray of sunshine on this franchise. 

roke1960

Alonso has a 1.157 OPS with 3 HRs in 38 plate appearances. His OPS is more than double what it was for the Sox.

Milky✌️

The mountain air did him some good?

roke1960

Leaving the White Sox probably did him the most good.

phillyd

2 of his dingers came in SD, so small sample size?

Greg Nix

It’s obviously small sample size and I’d guess he’s cooked regardless. But OF COURSE his only hot streak of the year comes after the Sox finally cut him loose and are giving his AB’s to Matt freakin’ Skole.

As Cirensica

The Rookies are using Alonso sparingly limiting his exposure. Ricky didn’t, and even worse, he used him as a clean up hitter countless of times.

yinkadoubledare

Right on cue he’s in the lineup at DH for some reason today. Positive: can’t have passed balls when not on field. Negative: still gets to hit.

As Cirensica

Putting one of our worse hitter at DH is so White Sox…As Carly Simon would sing….nobody does it better than the White Sox

Trooper Galactus

His season OPS is literally 57 points higher than the White Sox DH position has produced this year (though his 37 PAs as DH are part of that). It’s been an embarrassment all season no matter who’s hitting there.