Q. OK, he's tough, he brings MLB(TM) game behind the plate and he'll punish some mistakes.
But at 32, is Olivo going to hit the wall as a catcher?
A. Olivo has a ton of partial seasons, notably the ones with the Mariners...
He's got 820 games total: that's five seasons. Wear-and-tear is no issue, end of story, though age-32 bat speed might conceivably be.
.
Q. What if Olivo does crash-and-burn as a Mariner?
A. Then he probably gives the Mariners what they project from Moore and Johnson -- a 70 OPS+ catcher not giving them much. At $3M per, there isn't any significant downside here.
.
Q. What if Moore emerges?
A. The 2011-12 Mariners have two feasible scenarios:
- 110 games of Olivo at 90 OPS+ ... 50 games of Moore at 70 OPS+
- 110 games of Moore at 110 OPS+ ... 50 games of Olivo at 90 OPS+
First one's cool. Second one is a legit championship-level catching scenario.
.
Q. OK, how do the Mariners maximize Olivo's value?
A. Olivo has the slider-speed bat.
He wears out LH'ers. You give him an 89 fastball and he'll go 458 feet.
Give him his days off against young, wild flame throwers. You don't want him in there doing the Danny Corteses of the game a favor, swinging at their 96 fastballs outside the strike zone.
................
Interestingly, Olivo has like a .570 career SLG, if I recall correctly, as a DH. There might be somethng to that. I like finding catchers who thump when their legs aren't stiff.
Would be quite a platoon partner with Cust, mayhaps. If Moore jells, Olivo could go 60 games at catcher and another 50 at DH, or something.
.
Q. Exec Sum?
A. Let's wrap this up another way:
- Adam Moore 2010: -16 batting runs
- Rob Johnson: -9 batting runs
- Josh Bard: -4 batting runs
- Miguel Olivo: League average (-2 runs 2009; +1 runs 2008 .. 400 PA both years)
In a full season, Olivo's saving you what, 20-30 runs with the bat.
Defensively, Olivo was worth a demonstrated +17 runs just with his arm.
.
Q. 2011 projection in Safeco?
A. .239 AVG, .290 OBP, .450 SLG based on 20 homers and 25 doubles.
An 85-90 OPS+, an excellent defensive catcher on every level. A +20 or +25 runs player, in the middle of the field, playing for peanuts. A good year's time for Adam Moore to get his bearings.
That's a plus 20, 25 runs as opposed to another -10 or -20 runs that they might have had without him -- as they in fact had in 2009.
.
As Blengino preaches, and as we all know, it should be easy to replace a terrible player with a decent one, and get 30-40 runs better.
The M's showed us just how easy it can be.
.
B'lee Dat,
Dr D