

Michael McKenry has had a great year. A non-roster afterthought in Spring Training, he’s since leap-frogged Jordan Pacheco and then Wilin Rosario to the top of the Colorado Rockies catching depth chart… and hit like Buster Posey.







That’s not hyperbole. Here is the current leaderboard for total offensive contribution by catchers, as measured by wRC+ (100 PAs minimum):

1. Devin Mesoraco 151

2. Russell Martin 139

3. Buster Posey 139

4. Michael McKenry 136

That’s pretty incredible, and all of us – fans, the Rockies brass, and McKenry himself – should be thrilled with the production he’s banked this year. But as we all know, 2014 is a lost year for the club. The players and coaches are probably still focused on winning as many games as possible these last few weeks, and rightly so. However, most of Rockies Nation – including, I’d venture to guess, the Rockies front office – has already cast its eyes towards 2015 and beyond. In that light, let’s take a closer look at just how valuable a player McKenry really is, and the degree to which his 2014 production is sustainable going forward.

How’s the Defense?

Defense matters, of course. This is true of every position on the field, but is especially true of catchers. Michael was kind enough to spend a few minutes chatting with me before the game Saturday night, and I asked him about how he approaches the defensive side of the game.

“Defense comes first,” McKenry said, “and then whatever you can do with the bat is a bonus. If you can call a shut-out or keep the ball in front of you or keep a runner stranded at third, that’s way more important.”

The problem for those of us attempting to impartially assess defensive value is that the measures available to us are quite poor. While I am a big believer in the power and accuracy of offensive metrics, I remain highly skeptical of defensive metrics. And my skepticism is amplified even further with regards to catchers. So much of what a catcher does on the field is inextricably linked to what his pitchers do. Most of the defensive statistics we keep for catchers – throwing out runners, catcher’s earned run average, passed balls and wild pitches (distinguishing between the two is difficult) – depend as much on the pitcher as the catcher. And then there’s the art of deception we call pitch framing. The sabermetric community has brought to bear significant intellectual and analytical resources on this topic lately, but quantifying a catcher’s contribution behind the plate is still quite inexact.

With all those caveats being issued, let’s take a look at what the various metrics have to say about McKenry’s defense, and at least see if we can identify any broad themes or trends. We’ll start with Total Zone, which uses nothing more than the basic play-by-play data that’s been around almost from birth of the sport. Total Zone, driven in large part by McKenry’s poor results in throwing out base-stealers, believes that McKenry has been, at best, neutral as a defender, and a net negative in most years. You can find the raw numbers at Baseball Reference.

The Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) metric, which uses more advanced Baseball Info Solutions data and human observation/assessment, likes McKenry better than that, deeming him a little better than average in some years, and a little below average in others. DRS agrees with Total Zone in its assessment of McKenry’s ability to control the running game, but gives McKenry more credit for overall play-making ability behind the plate. By the catching metric Passed Pitch Runs (RPP), McKenry is a good pitch blocker; RPP says he’s been better than average in this respect each and every year. The DRS and RPP numbers for McKenry can be found at Fangraphs.

Finally, let’s check in with the folks at Baseball Prospectus, who have perhaps done more than anyone else in tackling the pitch-framing issue. They’ve come up with a fascinating methodology to quantify it’s impact, and have applied that methodology to assess pitch blocking, as well. BP generally agrees with DRS and RPP: McKenry has been a better than average pitch blocker in all but one season, 2014 being the exception, usually falling somewhere in the 50-80 percentile. BP doesn’t, however, like his pitch-framing, putting him somewhere around the 20-30 percentile every year. The raw data can be found here.

I asked McKenry about pitch-framing in particular, and he had some interesting things to say.

“I think it’s huge,” he said. “I think it’s an art. It’s something I’ve studied a lot this year.”

He mentioned pitch-framer extraordinaire Jonathan Lucroy as a role model, and talked a lot about his experience playing with Russell Martin last year, another noted pitch-framer. McKenry feels like he learned a great deal over the last year, but regrets how his injury prevented him from being able to practice that skill during the offseason.

“This offseason it’s going to be one of my main focuses.”

My general rule of thumb when it comes to a player’s defensive evaluation is to trust the scouts more than the stats, especially with regards to catchers. Again, allocating credit and blame between pitcher and catcher is just so dang hard. Others will disagree, of course, but for whatever it may or may not be worth to you, the scouting reports and other narratives around McKenry’s work behind the plate have been favorable over the years. A McKenry-related Google search won’t yield the word “elite,” but you’ll see the word “solid” quite a bit. Managers say he “calls a good game.” Pitchers like the guy. He’s got an elite nickname – “Quadzilla” – due to his freakishly large legs. All this, combined with the advanced stats we have, makes me feel quite comfortable in my belief that McKenry gets it done just fine back there.

Is this Downright Offensive Version of McKenry for Real?

Any discussion of this sort usually begins with: What’s his Batting Average on Balls in Play (BABIP)? Based on the theory that there’s only so much a batter can directly control outside of the “three true outcomes” (strikeouts, walks, and homers), BABIP is the go-to proxy for “luck” in baseball analytics. Good hitters can and do create their own “BABIP luck” by hitting the ball hard, but a sudden and unexplained increase in BABIP suggests that a player’s batting average – and, by extension, many other offensive statistics – is being inflated by a disproportionate number of groundballs finding the right creases, defensive ineptitude by the other team, and so forth. Since this sort of luck is unlikely to continue, so to is the player’s overall level of production unlikely to continue. The league-wide average BABIP is about .300. Michael McKenry’s career BABIP is .296. Michael McKenry’s BABIP in 2014 is .381.

So case closed, then, right? He’s just been lucky, right? Well, no doubt there’s some luckiness going on here. Almost every career best season – even for the best players – involves some combination of good talent and good luck. That’s just baseball. What’s relevant here is exploring just how much of McKenry’s offensive production is luck, and how much of it is due to McKenry having elevated his underlying skills.

I asked McKenry if he’s made any changes this year. He told me that he tried to make the most of the down time imposed upon him by a knee injury last year by becoming a full time student of baseball.

“It was an opportunity to really grow. You get to see the game in a completely different light when you can’t play it.”

He mentioned studying the swings of Miguel Cabrera and Ryan Braun in particular (swings you yourself can study here and here), and talking a lot about hitting approach with Andrew McCutchen, a close friend of his from his Pirates days. These are all excellent players to emulate, of course, and if he has indeed incorporated some of those player’s attributes into his own game, then that would certainly make a difference.

The first place I go when trying to separate these two factors – luck and skill – is ESPN’s Stats and Info, which calculates each player’s Hard-Hit Rate. As the moniker implies, this is simply the rate at which a player hits the ball hard. A laser off the bat that just happens to find the third baseman’s glove is credited just the same as one that flies a few feet askew and into leftfield for a hit. The league-wide Hard-Hit Rate is 16.5%. The league leader (at least 100 PAs) is at 24.1% (Tulo). McKenry is at 18.1%. I did a whole piece on this subject last month. McKenry wasn’t included in that analysis because, at the time, he hadn’t accumulated enough plate appearances. If I were to run that analysis again, McKenry would be in very good shape, solidly in the upper right-hand quadrant, suggesting that he is truly “earning” a healthy batting average by hitting the ball consistently hard.

There are other measures akin to Hard-Hit Rate that we can use to determine just how much of McKenry’s stat line has been earned. Line Drive Rate, for example. Line drives – as opposed to groundballs and flyballs – generally yield the best outcomes. The league average line drive rate is 22.4%. The league leader (100 PAs) is at 31.8% (Joey Votto). McKenry is at 28.9%. Being in the same company as Joey Votto is a good thing, in case you didn’t know.

Lastly, let’s take a look at his average home run distance. The average HR distance league-wide is 395.4 feet. The best number this year (100 PA’s) is 422.0 (Price Fielder). McKenry is at 414.7. Once again, that’s a very good number: closer to the league leader than the league average. And if you stand next to the man, these HR distances would immediately make sense to you; he’s one of the most powerfully built athletes I’ve ever seen in person. In this case, it’s important to note that Coors Field bonus is NOT accounted for. However, he’s only hit half of his HRs at home, so it’s not all altitude. And this is as good a time as any to note that his road performance is also very good.

Split G PA HR BA OBP SLG OPS Home 25 83 3 0.329 0.427 0.486 0.913 Away 23 73 3 0.299 0.356 0.507 0.864

As home/road splits go, this one is very narrow. So, at this point, we can say all of the following with confidence. He’s hitting the ball very hard. He’s hitting the best kind of batted balls at a high rate. His homeruns have been crushed. He’s not a Coors Field creation.

Yes, that BABIP is still very high. No player, no matter how good, sustains that kind of batted ball profile over the long term. The current leader amongst active regulars in BABIP is (surprise, surprise) Mike Trout at .359. So, McKenry’s BABIP will come down eventually, and with it will come down his batting average and other batting-average-dependent statistics like OBP and SLG. But that doesn’t diminish the key take-away here: McKenry’s production this year is no fluke. You may fairly discount some of it, but only some. Also of note: McKenry has posted Walk Rates – both in 2014 and over his overall career – above the league average (it’s at 10.9% right now). He’s been adept at drawing walks going all the way back to the minors. This is a very repeatable skill. Bottom line: McKenry’s earning it.

Predicting the Future

Where hesitancy is deserved, however, is with regards to our sample size, which is currently only about a quarter-season’s worth of playing time. McKenry might not be all that luck-fueled in 2014, but it’s certainly possible that we’re seeing little more than a solid hot streak. Think Charlie Blackmon at the beginning of the year. That start of his wasn’t wholly luck-fueled either, and Charlie’s overall production for the year is still very good. But it isn’t Charlie-in-April good. Very few players in the sport are Charlie-in-April good, including Charlie. McKenry may just be having his version of Charile’s April right now.

As a 7th Round draft pick who put up good but unspectacular numbers in the minors at age-appropriate levels, McKenry has had a back-up catcher profile for most of his career. To be clear: there’s absolutely no shame in that. Most 7th Rounders don’t make the majors at all, and steady catchers with some power and a good batting eye can stick around in this league for years. But there’s also a reason he was traded away by the Rockies in 2011 for nothing more than a flyer on a relief pitcher (who didn’t pan out), why he was traded again just a few months later for even less, and why the Rockies only had to offer him a minor league deal this past offseason to get him back in the fold. The player that he’s been for most of his career is the sort of player that every team needs, but also the sort of player that most teams can also easily replace.

The question, then, comes down to this: Who is Mike McKenry, the player he’s been over most of his career, or the player he’s been the last couple of months? A deeper look at this statistical history uncovers some clues. In 2012, while with the Pirates, McKenry worked his way into a starter’s role and enjoyed some success, posting a wRC+ of 109 over 275 PAs. That’s an above average mark for all players, and it wears even better on a catcher, a position where offensive production is often limited. In many ways, that season provides a reasonable picture of what a luck-neutral McKenry can do. His Hard-Hit Rate was actually higher that year, a whopping .220. His Walk Rate in 2012 was very similar to this year’s at 10.5%. Working against him was a .278 average on balls in play, which is actually a little below the league-wide norm. And what was the single biggest difference in his statistical profile from 2012 and 2014? His Line Drive rate. As I mentioned above, this year he’s been downright elite in that regard; Votto-esque, if you will. In 2012, it was an almost-unbelievably low 13.9%, with extra flyballs making up most of the difference. Turning that many line drives into fly balls will certainly depress a player’s batting average and overall output.

Could this be evidence that McKenry really has improved his approach at the plate this year? Has he really “put it all together,” as the say, maybe incorporated some of Cabrerra’s or Braun’s or McCutchen’s game, and reached a higher talent level through study and hard work? At 29 years old, McKenry is an unlikely candidate for a true breakout – seeing a player genuinely increase his skill level at this point would be rare. But could he be the Rockies’ version of Jose Bautista? Well, of course it’s possible. It’s just so hard to believe something so rare will happen.

With that in mind, it would probably be a mistake for the front office to pencil in McKenry as the opening day starter in 2015 based solely on his recent performance. What McKenry has done, however, is nevertheless of great value to the Front Office. Even a version of McKenry that falls somewhere between Career McKenry and 2014 McKenry – which is a version of McKenry I think we can reasonably expect to get – represents a significant upgrade to the backup catcher position. And that version of McKenry may also be just good enough to start if whatever the Rockies’ Catcher Plan A for the offseason doesn’t pan out (as often happens with Plan A’s in baseball). No matter what happens, Rockies fans should feel very good about what McKenry’s doing this year, and he’s given us just enough to justify dreaming big.

Post Script: I swear to you what I’m about to write is true. I typed that last sentence from the press box in the 2nd inning of Saturday’s game – not 20 seconds before McKenry hit a home run.