San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
CAMPUSANO MAY GET EARLY CALLS
Padres won’t rush Nola back; Caratini hasn’t been regular
There are not many players the Padres expect more of in the coming years than Luis Campusano.
He is their third-ranked prospect and one of the untouchable young players that virtually every trade partner has asked about and that the Padres have refused to even consider moving.
Campusano homered in his fourth (of four) major league plate appearance last September. He doubled off the Dodgers’ Dustin May in a game Saturday. The organization thinks he can be a productive hitter at the major league level right now and a highly successful one over the course of his career.
But he has never caught a game above Single-a.
“His being 22 years old and being in the mix already to be a big-league catcher,” Padres catcher coach Rod Barajas said Saturday, “there’s not many guys, kids (drafted out of) high school, especially, that are getting thrown in that mix.”
Campusano is considered to have an above-average arm. He played arguably his best game of the spring behind the plate on Saturday,
including deftly fielding a ball in front of the plate. But his overall catching skills at present, baseball people who have watched him this spring say, make it less than optimal that he would be pressed into catching a significant number of games for a championship contender.
With less than two weeks remaining before opening day, Campusano catching at least a couple games in the
season’s first week is a possibility, as primary catcher Austin Nola is dealing with a fractured middle finger on his catching hand.
Padres manager Jayce Tingler said Saturday that Nola is expected to grip a bat in the next couple of days and expressed optimism he will be ready for opening day.
The general timetable for return to play for a catcher with a finger fracture on the catching hand is four to six weeks. April 1 will be slightly less than three weeks since Nola was injured.
There can be little doubt Nola will persevere through pain, if that is the only remaining concern come the beginning of the month. He played with a fracture in his foot at the end of last season. The Padres, however, don’t want to expose their primary catcher to potential further injury by bringing him back too soon.
“We’d obviously love to have him,” Tingler said. “At the same time, he’s going to progress the way he’s going to progress, and we can’t really punch the gas and make something happen there. So it’s obviously a bone and we have to wait and see how that reacts. So, the most important thing is that he gets right and we don’t push him, force him to play at 40, 50, 60 percent. We want to make sure he’s good, strong, healthy, has the range of motion, has the strength in his hand. We know it’s going to be a long year. I think the main thing is making sure he’s in a good, healthy spot so when he gets back in the lineup he can take off.”
The earliest a player can be placed on the injured list is March 29, which means the earliest a player can come off the IL is April 8. That would be seven games into the season. If Nola is expected to be able to play before then, the Padres wouldn’t have to place him on the IL. However, that would require them to carry three catchers for those games Nola is out, meaning one fewer utility player or one fewer pitcher.
No one is saying Victor Caratini and Campusano filling in for a week or so is a disaster.
Caratini, who came over with Yu Darvish in the December trade with the Cubs and has been Darvish’s personal catcher the past season-and-a-half, likely would get the bulk of the work in Nola’s absence. The reviews on Caratini’s receiving and handling of pitchers have been tremendously positive. But he has started just 87 games at catcher and caught on successive days just 13 times in his career. He has caught three days in a row once and four days in a row once.
The Padres play seven games in a row to start the season and then start a 17day stretch without a scheduled day off.
Campusano will have to play if Nola can’t, and Campusano is still learning the pitching staff, remains relatively rough blocking and receiving the ball. And then there is the matter of calling a big-league game for a team that believes every game will count this season.
He has caught just 142 games between rookie ball and high-a and, like all minor leaguers, didn’t get to play a season last year.
“There’s not a lot for him to go off of,” Barajas said.
Campusano did spend all last season around the bigleague club, mostly at the alternate site and catching in the bullpen. He served as the designated hitter in his major league debut on Sept. 4 in Oakland, struck out twice, was hit by a pitch and homered to the opposite field. He was in the lineup at catcher the next day but was scratched after feeling pain in his left wrist and was placed on the injured list. He struck out his lone time up in the National League Division Series.
Barajas has noticed what he considers a crucial difference in Campusano this spring.
“There is growing going on,” Barajas said. “There is maturity I’m seeing this year I didn’t see last year. Last year he was really quiet. There wasn’t a lot of talking coming out of Campy’s mouth. This year that has completely changed. He is being more vocal, talking to pitchers, on the bench he is talking to me about game situations. … To me, the most important part of the game (for a catcher) is game management. He’s really taken some big steps forward. The fact he has opened up and … is trying to take in as much information as possible is a huge sign that things are moving in the right direction.”
Several pitchers have reported Campusano has approached them this spring before games to go over what they like to throw and/or discussed their working together afterward.
After working with Campusano last week, Joe Musgrove volunteered a positive review.
“That’s my first time getting to work with him, so he called a very good game,” Musgrove said. “I think that’s a little bit of us communicating before the game and getting to know an idea of what I like to do, telling him that I’m going to trust him to call pitches back there and just be convicted on what you’re calling. I bounced quite a few breaking balls . ... He kept everything right in front of him. He’s aggressive. He’s got a great arm. … I thought he did a really good job. From what I’ve seen from him in a minimal amount of time, I think he’s going to be a good catcher.”
The Padres’ decisionmakers wholeheartedly agree. They are even counting on it. They would just prefer he get a little more time.