Red Sox Catching: Bard, Montero, Kottaras

Varitek should have never been resigned. Bard is the better hitter, and should have gotten the opportunity to start.

Bard and Kottaras was a better plan, now they are stuck with 2 weak defense catchers in Tek and Bard and will lose Kottaras who can hit in the long run for either nothing, or close to it and end up paying Tek 8-10M.. What a shame for a team that usually lets old vets walk when they are finished.

Hopefully Kottaras has a good spring and they at least trade/release Bard instead.

Yes, Bard will be better offensively than Varitek but, frankly, Josh just isn't that good at catching. Hard to believe that the Bos front office let themselves get put in this position. I look for a deal by the break. They're going to have to resign themselves to giving up value for a Salty, Teagarden, Montero or Shoppach. The rest of the league just isn't going to hand over a catcher for nothing because the Sox need one.

"People should get it out of there heads that a catcher should be a productive position, hitting wise."

Yeah. It's not like you only have nine positions, so you really need to maximize your production from each position.

You may not need great production from the catchers spot, but offensively, a good team can't afford to have any black holes in their lineup. It gives the pitcher a chance to rest while wasting an opportunity to score.

If Varitek bounces back some offensively, he can be a decent catcher, but his performance last year was awful.

By the way, that whole Varitek knows the pitching staff thing is a load of crap. The staff as a whole had a better ERA with Cash behind the plate than Tek last season. He may be good at calling games, but the value of that is amorphous and difficult to determine, while it's easy to determine the value of a guy who can hit and play solid defense from the catchers position.

Red Sox do have young catchers in the system and decent ones. Just not the next Joe Mauer or Carlton Fisk. :P

"I want at least 1 Greek guy in the Yankees."

ARod doesn't count?

Melonis, Johns and Scribble: good posts. I do hope the Sox closely scrutinize all the catchers in Spring Training this year, because both Pawtucket guys had terrific years in '08 and it would be a shame to lose one, or especially both of them just because Tek is back. The chances are good that Tek is a $3MM back-up next year, and there probably won't be any top-notch catchers available via trade anytime soon, so it would be best to determine which guy is the best option to be able to catch 100 games over the next several weeks. And, as elmedius says, if the best option is Kotteras or Brown, then Bard could/should be the odd man out. (This would be a shame, and is why I didn't want Boston to resign Tek.)

Every Sox pitcher prefers Varitek and will be pissed if they are stuck with Bard who is a mediker at the catching part of catching.

Wakefield will have to be caught by Tek since Bard had about four passed balls per start last time around.

If the Sox aren't willing to give up Buccholz for Salty or Bard for Montero, the most I see the Sox giving up for Iannetta is Bowden and even then they'd probably rather keep Bowden.

Boston failed to focus on getting a legit young backup catcher several years ago and it turned into a near nightmare for them this year. I don't think they'll make that mistake again regardless of how well Varitek does. Unless Kotteras suddenly turns into McCann or Soto during spring training the Sox won't wait too long to find V's future replacement, and it makes perfects sense to do it while V is freshly signed, head in the game and can mentor to the max.

Iannetta has over 100 MLB games played (far more MLB experience than Salty or Tea) and in 333 ABs posted stats of .390 OBP, .895 OPS, .264 ave., 65 RBIs and 18 HRs. He hit almost equally well against both righties and lefties. He's 6' and 225#, a near perfect size for a catcher. And he's a 'real' catcher...not a soon-to-be 1st baseman. In virtually all aspects of experience and stats Iannetta is clearly better than anything Texas can offer...and to top it off he's from Rhode Island and has said he'd like to play for Boston. What's not to like.

a trade probably won't happen....but it won't be because it isn't a very good match for both clubs.

I have to disagree, johns. Boston certainly needs a bat but a good young catcher is second only to a good young pitcher in overall value, and takes awhile to develop. Boston has the pitching, the need, the opportunity and the perfect tutor in place. Its time.