I Cannot Take One More Minute Of Watching Welington Castillo Play Baseball
So last night I watched Welington Castillo catch, again, and while doing so watched him steal countless strikes from his pitcher, again, while going 0-4 with 3 strikeouts, again.
Now I didn’t hate the signing at the time. I also didn’t realize how much his production relied on taking needle in the ass steroids, either. In 2018 he was popped for whatever banned substance and suspended 80 games. Since he returned on 9/3 of last year, he’s put together these numbers:
those numbers are beyond pathetic. 27% worse than league average as a hitter, low power/ISO numbers, 30% k rate, below average walk rate. It’s SO GODDAMN BAD.
And this is all while being rated as one of the very worst defensive catchers in baseball.
He steals strikes from his pitchers with so much regularity. His reactions are piss poor at best and it leads to balls, which lead to hitter’s counts, which in the end lead to more runs for the opposition. Teams will deal with bad defensive catching should they make up for it with great hitting, but I’d rather see a dominant defensive catcher who’s a mediocre hitter 10x out of 10.
Now I’m no math wiz but being the very worst offensive catcher in baseball while simultaneously being the very worst defensive catcher in baseball aside from throwing is not a good combo.
ESPECIALLY…
…when you have a former 1st round pick who happens to be home grown DOMINATING in AAA. I’m talking of course about Zack Collins.
What he’s doing in AAA right now while Welington Castillo pisses away at bats/burns his pitching staff at the big league level has my brain in a pretzel. But it looks as if it finally “clicked” for Collins. Prior to his month long call up where he hardly even played, he put up these numbers:
Pretty decent at best. But Collins was the 10th overall pick. Was said to have the best power potential in his draft class paired with the best eye/approach. Though he was pretty decent to start the year in Charlotte, he wasn’t putting up the numbers you expect out of a 1st round pick. 32% K rate at AAA is NOT good and will obviously worsen in The Show. Everything else checks out decent enough, but we want a great middle of the order bat out of Collins. Someone who hits 25 HRs and gets on base at a .400 clip as a backstop. Not some decent enough 3 outcome hitter that are a dime a dozen around baseball.
Apparently the Sox called him up because they were somewhat fed up with him. Now I’m not sure how true that is, but that’s the rumor in the street. How does that make sense though? Call a player up because you’re pissed at him?
Well I guess they wanted him to see how it’s done first hand at the big league level. The knew he’d REALLY struggle and almost wanted him to get his tits waxed and look like an asshole, all so they can say “I told ya so.” And that’s what happened in his brief stint:
It was downright ugly. People screaming BUST at the top of their lungs. But he took his learning experience to heart and has DOMINATED since being sent back to Charlotte.
Those are the kind of numbers you want to see out of a 1st round pick with Collins’ hitting pedigree. He slashed his K rate by 13%!!! His ISO has surged, his OBP through the roof and he’s still walking at that same elite clip. So why in the hell is he rotting in Charlotte with Welington Castillo still getting decent playing time in Chicago? It makes no sense to me for so many different reasons.
1. Collins is already on the 40 man. So nobody has to be removed for him to get called up.
2. Castillo has a 3rd year option for $8MM but a $500,000 buyout, which will undoubtedly be paid
3. Castillo would only be due the prorated $7.25MM due to him for the rest of the year
4. Collins needs big league at bats, not at bats against AAA/AAAA pitching which he’s destroying right now
5. Semantics here, but Collins platoons better with McCann anyways
it just makes no sense to me. I don’t care about a AAA championship and neither do the players I’d guess. So call him up, let him face big league pitching with his improved plan of attack and let him FLY next year. He’s earned it and Castillo hasn’t, needless to say.