The Padres have agreed to sign catcher Tony Cruz to a minor league deal, per SB Nation’s Chris Cotillo (on Twitter).
Cruz, 30, spent the 2007-15 seasons in the Cardinals organization before playing the 2016 campaign in the Royals’ system. Though he totaled just five big league plate appearances with Kansas City, Cruz logged a solid .264/.347/.387 batting line in 92 Triple-A contests last season. Prior to that, he appeared in 259 games for the Cardinals from 2011-15 while serving as a backup to Yadier Molina, though he’s never provided much in the way of offense in the Majors. Across 638 big league plate appearances, Cruz is a .218/.260/.308 hitter, but it bears mention that he has a .732 OPS in the minors and a .724 OPS in parts of three Triple-A campaigns.
From a defensive standpoint, Cruz has halted 27 percent of stolen base attempts against him in the Majors, and his career 43 percent minor league mark in that regard is quite impressive. Though he once graded poorly in Baseball Prospectus’ pitch-framing metrics, he’s progressed to be a roughly average receiver, by that measure, in recent years.
Austin Hedges and Christian Bethancourt figure to be the primary backstops in San Diego this coming season, but with Bethancourt perhaps shifting into a hybrid catcher/outfielder/relief pitcher role, there could be some room to carry a third catcher on the roster, if Cruz proves worthy of a spot. Others that will be in the mix are Rule 5 pick Luis Torrens and non-roster invitees Hector Sanchez and Rocky Gale.
Left over scraps to fill in triple a
That’s AJ for you! He sucks and needs to go!
I really wanna see bethancourt play catcher outfield and relief pitcher all in one game this season. I mean why not. Gets at bats get experience gets some pitches in.
I doubt that would happen. A reliever needs to warm up at some point, unless he’s just coming into a blowout.
Does him throwing the ball to the pitcher count as warm up? Id say yes.
He could be like the Hispanic Shohei Otani, but not as good.
Haha…. yeah not as good indeed. That’s sort of like saying some basketball player from Japan could be the Japanese Russell Westbrook.
I really want them to trade Beth for something useful like a short stop
I guess i am pretty naive with the stat “pitch framing.” Is that basically trying to convince the umpire it’s a strike on borderline pitches?
lmgtfy.com/?q=pitch+framing
Thanks but i thought maybe MLB and what Google defines it might be different
Probably one of the worst defenders I’ve seen during his time with the Cardinals.
Probably hard to stay sharp when you play like 15 games a year.
There are worst, bethancourt comes to mind
Bethancourt is one of the best defensive catchers in the game with a cannon, what are you talking about?
Tony Cruz was an ideal backup for Yadi in St. Louis. From everything I heard, he came prepared to play every day, understood his role, and apparently worked well with the pitching staff, coaches, and Yadi. And lets not forget his cool walk-up music from the “Wolf of Wall Street.” Good luck, Tony!