San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
A’s catching prospect inspired by Posey
TACOMA, Wash. — Shea Langeliers is quick to name Buster Posey as the catcher he admired growing up, citing a subtle reason that resonated with a young receiver.
“Obviously he raked, unreal defensive catcher,” said Langeliers, the Oakland Athletics’ touted prospect. “But he controlled the game. You could kind of see that just from watching.”
Langeliers, who went to high school in Texas and starred at Baylor, noted how Posey dictated the timing for his pitchers by varying his rhythm putting down signs. He watched Posey affect the running game by throwing out 33% of would-be base stealers in his Giants career.
“And just the trust factor — everybody knows every pitcher throwing to Buster Posey had unreal trust in him,” Langeliers said. “You put all that together, that’s controlling the game.”
It’s an all-around impact to which Langeliers, 24, aspires. Rated the No. 2 prospect in the A’s system by Baseball America, Langeliers is one of four players acquired by the A’s in their March trade of Matt Olson to the Braves, Langeliers arrived amid praise for his defense — particularly his throwing arm.
But his first month at Triple-A Las Vegas hinted at his ability to make an impact on both sides of the ledger, at the plate as well as behind it. He opened the Triple-A season on a tear at the plate. He hit .301 with nine homers in 20 games in April with nearly as many walks (12) as strikeouts (16). He has cooled in May, hitting .226 with two homers and a 3-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio in his first 21 games this month.
“He’s got a simple, leveraged,
A’s prospect Shea Langeliers catches for the Triple-A Las Vegas Aviators, where he had a hot April with the bat.
powerful swing and hits the ball really hard really consistently,” Triple-A manager Fran Riordan said. “He does a nice job of controlling the strike zone and doesn’t chase a lot, and that has led to a lot of hard contact, a lot of damage, in the first month of the season.”
That first month, Riordan said, made Langeliers “the guy that other teams didn’t want to beat them.” With teams pitching Langeliers more carefully,
he’s seeing fewer mistake pitches along with perhaps swinging a bit more out of the strike zone, Riordan said before an Aviators game at Tacoma this past week.
“Now he’s got to kind of counter those adjustments that they’re making against him and think through his at-bats a little bit more, maybe be a little more selective,” Riordan said. “He’s the kind of hitter, with the intelligence he has, that I don’t see problems with him making the adjustments.”
Las Vegas is among the PCL’s hitter-friendly parks, and entering Saturday Langeliers’ stats were much better at home (.322/.410/.667, nine homers) than away (.186/.269/ .329, two homers). Still, his power numbers are not unprecedented. Last year, Langeliers hit 22 homers in 92 games for Double-A Mississippi, playing home games in a less favorable hitting environment.
“Everything felt like it was in sync, it felt like I was on time, and when you’re like that sometimes hitting seems easy, when you’re not like that it seems impossible,” Langeliers said. “Sometimes you’re going to struggle, and all you can do is try to learn from it and the next time you get hot again you’re better for it.”
Signs of offense are still welcome from a prospect already regarded as a premium defender. Langeliers, drafted No. 9 overall by Atlanta in 2019, was widely rated the best defensive catcher in that year’s class even as Baltimore used the first overall pick on another catcher, Adley Rutschman.
Langeliers’ arm is his toprated tool. He nabbed 42% of would-be base stealers at Double-A in 2021 and stated on his first day in A’s camp this spring “throwing somebody out trying to steal a base feels better than hitting a home run.” He’d caught 33% of opponents on their attempts for Las Vegas entering Friday.
Controlling a game from behind the plate means more than throwing out runners. Scouting reports and planning are more prevalent at higher levels. Riordan described Langeliers as “very aware” in “the way he tailors his game calling” to each of Las Vegas’ pitchers. Langeliers said he continues to work on his receiving even as pitch framing loses relevance at Triple-A with the introduction of the automatic ball-strike system.
“He comes with a defensive mind-set,” said A’s farm director Ed Sprague. “His sole purpose is to get that pitcher through the game as long as he can, prepped well, moving fast, on the same page. That’s what his strength is. (A’s catcher Sean) Murphy’s the same way. They really come to the ballpark with everything on the defensive side and then the offensive stuff from both guys is a bonus.”
Langeliers’ inclusion in the Olson trade — Oakland also acquired outfielder Cristian Pache and pitchers Joey Estes and Ryan Cusick — was intriguing. Murphy won a Gold Glove last year and the A’s consensus top prospect, Tyler Soderstrom, was drafted as a catcher.
Murphy, 27, appears to have a firm hold on the job in Oakland. If the A’s were to require a replacement, though, Langeliers is more ready than Soderstrom, who is playing at High-A Lansing. Soderstrom has started more games at first base than catcher for Lansing this season.
Last October, Langeliers joined the Braves’ postseason taxi squad for their World Series run. He did not play, but it indicated Atlanta’s readiness to use him in the playoffs in case of a catching injury.
“Working with him, watching him catch, he’s an athlete, he’s great behind there,” Aviators pitcher Jared Koenig said. “He cares about everything, cares about the right things. Overall, he works his ass off.”