Defense is Murphy’s ticket to Colorado
Isotopes catcher developing skills behind the plate
Tom Murphy knows his road to a long, sustained career at the big league level isn’t going to be about what he does in the batter’s box.
For the 26-year-old Albuquerque Isotopes catcher, his path back to Denver and the Colorado Rockies has much more to do with what he does about 18 inches away from that batter’s box.
“It’s one of those things I’ve worked really hard at in the past couple of years because I feel like that’s what’s going to make me a better player overall,” Murphy said of his defense behind the plate and ability to manage a pitching staff. “I’ve been focusing on that and it seems to be paying off.”
Murphy, who started for the second consecutive night in Wednesday’s 6-1 Isotopes loss to the visiting Sacramento River Cats, continues to make strides behind the plate this season after a broken forearm in spring training derailed what had been a promising start to the season.
Hitting is not the concern of the big league club for Murphy, despite his 1-for-20 showing in eight games with the Rockies this season or even Wednesday’s 0-for-4 showing with three strikeouts.
Proving he can not only hit (he hit .327 with 19 home runs and 59 RBIs in 80 games with the Isotopes last season), but be a steady force defensively is his focus now.
That is why Tuesday night’s gem of a performance with Murphy helping orchestrate a 2-0 shutout that might have been his biggest bright spot of the season, and certainly as promising a sign for the Rockies as he’s shown since that great spring training.
After throwing eight innings of three-hit, shutout baseball, including 10 strikeouts and no walks on Tuesday night, Isotopes starter Sam Howard made it very clear who deserved the credit.
“Tom Murphy had a game plan,” Howard said. “...He called the great game. He used all my pitches, and kept me guessing. He caught a great game. It was just a lot of fun out there having Murph take control of the game.”
While Howard said he was surprised Murphy called such a great game for him since they’d never worked a game together before, the catcher had a different opinion of why the newness of it all worked.
“If anything, I kind of see it as the other way around,” Murphy said. “I don’t have any experience with him, so I don’t have any preconceived notions about what he can and can’t do.”
In Howard’s eight innings, on Tuesday, he didn’t shake off a pitch called by Murphy all night, a rarity in any baseball game but a sign of how in sync the two were.
Murphy said his role is to know his pitchers and work to their strengths as best he can, as well as the obvious mechanics of mastering the defensive demands of catching at the highest level.
It’s all something he feels he’s seen improvement in this season.
“Yeah, I really do, especially receiving and blocking,” Murphy said.
Isotopes pitching coach Mark Brewer said a catcher’s ability to manage a staff is vital, and something the team takes very seriously when they work together to establish a game plan before every game.
“He followed the plan perfect — not just because we had a 2-0 shutout (on Tuesday), but because he stayed within the circle of what Howard was able to accomplish and execute,” Brewer said. “That’s what it’s all about and he really managed to get the most out of what we were trying to do.”