Seby Zavala perks up, and so does White Sox’s catcher outlook

White Sox catcher Seby Zavala
(Photo by Brad Penner/USA TODAY Sports)

Seby Zavala entered Tuesday’s opener against the Yankees hitting .153/.189/.235 with 36 strikeouts over 90 plate appearances, the second-highest strikeout rate of anybody with as many plate appearances as he has.

Yet he’s also catcher, which makes it difficult to single him out, since so many other teams have to wrestle with the same dilemma.

The one guy ahead of him on that K-rate list is Cleveland’s starting catcher (Mike Zunino, 42.4 percent), and Jake Rogers isn’t far behind with Detroit (37.2 percent). It’s hard for teams to find one playable option behind the plate, so the backups tend to be freely swapped about until one works, like so many USB thumb drives.

Yet just like so many USB thumb drives, teams generally like to have some level of trust before plugging and playing, because a bad one can pose larger problems. Basically, if the first two or three options falter, the desperation and dread spike pretty quickly.

While the White Sox had a score of problems while losing a score of games in April, catching wasn’t one of them. But while the rest of the White Sox started showing signs of life in May, their catching situation started caving in on them.

MonthAVGOBPSLGBB%K%fWAR
April.224.297.4057.825.00.4
May.230.275.2876.130.5-0.1

And if you want to itemize those catchers:

CatcherApril PAApril LineMay PAMay Line
Grandal93.241/.323/.44677.296/.351/.352
Zavala35.182/.229/.30354.137/.167/.196

Because Grandal and Zavala are both credible receivers, there managed to be eight teams that fared the same or worse in May, including the Guardians bringing up the rear by a considerable margin.

It’s not necessarily a back-breaker than the White Sox have a bottom-third catching corps, even if FanGraphs’ preseason projections had them at 10th. That initial assessment struck me as bullish; a clumsy attempt to balance Grandal’s sterling track record against a nosedive with very real reasons underneath it. Grandal’s OPS starts with a “7” instead of a “5” this time around, but we’re still seeing the limitations of his leg and back problems. You’d rather him sacrifice some OBP for some ISO if he has the choice because it’s painful watching him run the bases, but he also may not have the choice. He is what he is, whatever that is.

Zavala didn’t have to replace Grandal’s missing production in order to salvage the position, but he had to provide stable second-catcher work along the lines of Reese McGuire prior to the doomed Jake Diekman trade. His May could be masked by the White Sox’s easy schedule, but if it carried into June against a tougher slate of opponents, he, and the White Sox’s catching setup as a whole, could end up failing the stress test.

His performance at Yankee Stadium on Tuesday night was more like it. Zavala doubled his season homer total by going deep twice, and the second one would’ve been a homer in any park at any time in baseball history, because it might still be rolling.

Zavala raised his OPS nearly 100 points in a single day, and if he keeps that up, he’ll be leading the All-Star voting within a fortnight. In reality, he just needs to spend the rest of the month stabilizing somewhere around his pre-2023 career levels (.233/.303/.368) in order to be serving his purpose.

It doesn’t make sense to spend much more time dwelling on Zavala, because has has as many homers as Tim Anderson, Andrew Benintendi, Oscar Colás, Elvis Andrus and Yoán Moncada combined. The White Sox’s larger hopes ride on so many underachievers elsewhere.

But it’s at worth spending a day to acknowledge how critical adequacy is here, because unlike third base, second base or right field, the White Sox can’t address the position with waiver-wire fodder or players who previously wore other gloves. The Sox are probably going to stick by Grandal and Zavala, with the hope that they play well enough to make sticking by an active decision, rather than a passive situation of being stuck with them.

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brianp88

This is much more like it. That game was actually enjoyable to watch, at no point did I feel like they were going to lose the game. I only worried a tiny little bit in the 9th (I wish they’d build Liam up a bit before asking him to close) but if that’s the only complaint, it’s quite an improvement.

itaita

I thought the Sox were done last night when Kelly started giving up a couple hits and walks. Usually for him he either shuts them down 1,2,3 or its 5 runs on the board. So it was nice to see him limit the damage to a run. And i thought Liam did fine. It might not be 2015 Donaldson out there anymore but its Yankee stadium and like we saw with Seby those things happen there. Plus even at his peak Liam was always susceptible to a random dinger. Id much rather have Liam out there at 80-90% who you know has the mentality to close out games then keep testing their luck with Graveman, Kelly or Lopez.

By the way is Middleton dealing with some injury or something? Hes been pretty solid this year but its been a few days since we’ve seen him. I guess one positive about Hendricks back out there the Sox can kinda show a little bullpen depth again.

Right Size Wrong Shape

He pitched Friday and Saturday, which is probably why he didn’t pitch on Sunday. Monday was an off day, and yesterday Giolito got them into the 7th with the lead, so they went to their best 3 relievers.

King Joffrey

Off topic, but Robert seems to save his most egregious screw-ups for when Kelly is on the mound.

ForsterFTOG

Seby’s an easy guy to root for on this team. Gives it his all and isn’t afraid to chirp occasionally.

vanillablue

Sounds like an increasing chance tonight’s game may be cancelled due to poor air quality in NYC from the Quebec wildfires.

asinwreck

Conditions have gotten much worse since noon. AQI at my local weather station in Brooklyn is above 350, and that matches the sensory experiences we are having in this thick smoke. I cannot imagine this game will be played.

vanillablue

They have to cancel it with an AQI in that range. They played games here in the Bay Area during the 2020 wildfires when the AQI was in the 200’s, and afterward everyone agreed that they should have cancelled. And that was during the pandemic season with no fans in the stands.

asinwreck

It got darker than that in Brooklyn at 2:30, but it is considerably lighter now (about where it was at noon when the particulate matter levels began their rapid ascent). Still terrible (and worse than yesterday afternoon), but I can see down the street now.

ElCaballo45

From Joel Sherman: MLB and the 2 teams are meeting at 4pm to decide if White Sox-Yankees will be played tonight.

asinwreck

Sensibly, they are not playing tonight. The game is now part of a doubleheader scheduled to start at 4pm tomorrow. We’ll see if conditions permit that to happen.

As Cirensica

I have a friend who is a teacher in North Carolina, and she told me recesses were suspended today because of the bad quality of the air….in NORTH CAROLINA!

asinwreck

The scale of this reminds me of the Pacific Northwest fires enveloping Washington, Oregon, and California.

Meanwhile the AQI in Brooklyn right now is 413 and there’s a good chance this is hanging around for the weekend.

Last edited 9 months ago by asinwreck
ParisSox

Time to hunker down and break out your 2005 video highlights.

Joliet Orange Sox

The Sox gained a 1/2 game on the Twins on Wednesday. Not playing is not the worst strategy in the AL Central.

As Cirensica

In his last 15 games as a starter, Yoan Moncada has one extra base hit (that triple in the 3 triples game). I think it is time to see a bit more of Burger at 3B.

ForsterFTOG

I know he’s been a decent player at times but to me, Moncada’s been a colossal disappointment.

Alfornia Jones

No question he is a disappointment, just by virtue of him being undependable. It’s time for the manager to make some adjustments, TA shouldn’t be at lead off, and Yoan should be sitting against left ganders. As usual there is no sense of urgency and this manager needs to seize on this totally unexpected momentum.

Right Size Wrong Shape

He’s still playing gold glove third base, but I agree with you. The Sox are going to need to do more to manage his back issues if they want to get the best from Moncada. That might mean some regularly scheduled IL stints, or maybe Burger at 3B a little more often at the very least.

bobsquad

Sosa has played almost half his games at third since heading back to Charlotte, if that might be an indication of the org’s faith in the top of the depth chart.

As Cirensica

Was reading The Athletic baseball fantasy section, and found this gem:

Finally, Jake Burger. He had seven at-bats in the past week and two homers. He’s 26% rostered as a result. Why doesn’t he play? He’s a righty. If you’re a righty and can’t hit righties, you can’t play baseball. Righties should never be platooned. They’ve faced primarily right-handed pitching their entire lives. Burger has eight homers in 93 ABs against righties. How is this guy not playing every day? Yoán Moncada is not a good player. Give it up, White Sox! (They won’t, though.)

Rference: https://theathletic.com/4590827/2023/06/07/statcast-expected-stats-edward-cabreras-cy-young-upside-jose-siris-ruthian-iso-and-more/

ParisSox

It would be so White Sox if the next two games got postponed while the Yankees are down Judge and relying on #7 starters.

HallofFrank

In the context of the Sox season, it’d be hard to draw up a worse time for a weather disruption like this. The Sox have been pitiful, no doubt. But they’ve also been rather unlucky. In a stretch when their bullpen was shaky and they lacked power, cancer and appendicitis hit their best reliever and best power hitter.

It goes without saying all these factors are bigger than baseball. But it’s hard not to notice how they’ve impacted the season for the Sox.

ChiTownMax25

They’ve had well above-average injury luck if you’d pay attention to 29 other teams.

asinwreck

This comment reminds me that the Yankees were hosting the Sox on September 11, 2001.

roke1960

I had tickets for the September 13th game. My old high school friend lived in NY at the time. Obviously, we did not get to use those tickets.

ElCaballo45

Game postponed tonight. Doubleheader tomorrow at 4 and 7 PM.

asinwreck

The NYC Health Commissioner just “strongly recommended” all organizations cancel outdoor activities tomorrow.

itaita

Looking at the schedule maybe they can toss in a doubleheader on August 10th although that would be annoying for the Sox. I for one am rooting for home “road” double headers when the Yankees visit in August. Just for the Sox to be a road team in its own stadium.

Trooper Galactus

They cancelled indoor events too because nobody should even walk outside if they can avoid it.

shaggy65

fWAR rated Seby as the 13th most valuable catcher in baseball last season in only 61 games, mostly on the strength of his defense. If he can pick up the offense just a little bit he’s a really valuable player, which is funny to me because he came through the system as a bat-first guy all the way.

Trooper Galactus

I don’t recall Seby ever being derided heavily for his defense, just wasn’t touted as anything more than average overall.

IIRC, his issue early on was a lot of passed balls, which was likely the result of his efforts to improve his framing.

Okay, I was gonna say, once he was hitting the mid-minors and really showing up on peoples’ radars his defense didn’t seem to be a huge issue. Unlike, say, Zack Collins, who was a train wreck from start to finish, or the human green light known as Kevan Smith.

jorgefabregas

Air quality already in the very unhealthy range early in the morning https://www.airnow.gov/?city=Bronx&state=NY&country=USA

asinwreck

Bronx consistently in high 180s this morning. The good news is that is a massive drop from the peak of 484 yesterday. (The scale only goes to 500.) The bad news is it is worse than the haze they had no business playing in Tuesday night.

The sky this morning is opaque white, worse than it was 24 hours ago but a vast improvement on the end-times dark orange after lunchtime yesterday. The Air Quality Health Advisory for the region has extended into tomorrow afternoon.

jorgefabregas

The AQI is also a bit worse than it was 24 hours ago according to the trends page on the airnow site.