The Angels have reinstated catcher Jonathan Lucroy from the injured list and designated fellow backstop Dustin Garneau for assignment, the team announced.
Lucroy’s back after an awful July 7 collision at home plate with Astros outfielder Jake Marisnick sent him to the shelf. Lucroy suffered a concussion and a broken nose that day. He later had to undergo surgery on his nasal fracture. Before the injury, the 33-year-old former star hit an underwhelming .237/.307/.364 with seven home runs in 264 plate appearances. Lucroy’s once-pristine defense also continued to trend downward.
Garneau, whom the Angels already designated once this year before Wednesday, has performed respectably at the plate this season. The 31-year-old owns a .232/.346/.362 line with a pair of homers in 82 trips to the plate. If Garneau doesn’t end up with another team in the next week, he’ll be able to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency should he choose. For now, he’ll go into DFA limbo as the Angels opt for a Lucroy-Kevan Smith setup at catcher.
Garneau is possibly the worst defensive catcher I have ever seen. He can’t block balls in the dirt, is awful at framing and is pathetic at throwing. The Angels have needed an everyday catcher since Benjy Molina left in 2006.
Chris Iannetta says hi.
Jose Molina for the Angels was pretty good actually too. But yeah it’s been some time.
Ummm, he’s thrown out 23 of 60 (38%) would-be base stealers. League average is 27%. But he can’t throw
And if you check Baseball Savant, you will see that he is league average in framing. Almost identical to Lucroy. Want to know who is waaay worse? Kevan Smith. But Garneau can’t frame.
He ranks 16th out of 65 MLB catchers in average pop time (1.97)
And Garneau just caught a no-hitter.
If he could hit consistently, he would be a starter on over 1/3 of the teams in baseball.