The Best Catcher in the National League East

[Guest AG/DC]

It's not even close. After that it's Jesus Flores' in part-tkime work and whole bunch of catch-and-throw guys vying fore a distant third.

He may be the Braves most valuable commodity, and I'm fully aware that Chipper Jones is hitting .400.

[metirish]

McCann scares the crap out of me at the plate.

[Guest AG/DC]

Yeah, one of two catchers (with Mauer) in baseball head-and-shoulders above the rest, and still a baby.

Kinda chubby, but he's not the first catcher to carry a little extra.

[Guest Vince Coleman Firecracker]

AG/DC wrote: Yeah, one of two catchers (with Mauer) in baseball head-and-shoulders above the rest, and still a baby.

You wouldn't include Russ Martin on that short list? Or, maybe the best catcher in baseball this year, Geovany Soto?

[Guest AG/DC]

Yeah, Martin belongs up there. I think of him as a good hitter who catches, but he's probably fine back there and I'm not giving him enough credit.

Most importantly, McCann is the best catcher in the NL East.

[Guest Vince Coleman Firecracker]

But Schneider can handle a pitching staff!

[soupcan]

And Willie's a winner!

[bmfc1]

I wish the Mets had Flores. Oh....

[smg58]

The Flores situation is kind of strange. They signed him at 17, but he didn't play any professional ball here for two years after that. So five years after he was signed (and thus became Rule 5 eligible), he had three years experience in the system and had done very nicely in high A at age 21. Did Minaya not realize that he was Rule 5 eligible? Or did he simply think that, despite the early investment that had been made on him, his promise with the bat, and the entire system's complete lack of depth at his position, Flores wasn't worth protecting? Either way, I'm beginning to get the feeling that this will turn out to be Minaya's biggest blunder.

[Guest AG/DC]

I'm sure that "not worth" is almsot never the case, so much as "not worth as much as the other guy I did protect."

The gambler's assumption with some of those guys is that they have so little experience that it would be too challenging for another organizaiton to keep them in the bigs for the full year.