Oakland catchers’ poise, presence belie their inexperience
Flash back to midJuly, before the A’s rolled to the American League West title, earned the right to host this week’s openinground playoff series against the White Sox and stirred visions of the franchise’s first World Series berth in 30 years.
Back then, pitcher Chris Bassitt fretted. He kept it to himself, but he wondered about the A’s straying from baseball’s timehonored script of pairing a promising, young catcher with a wise, weathered pro as his mentor.
Rookie Sean Murphy was set to start at the allimportant position, but Oakland opened the season with Austin Allen — not technically a rookie but similarly inexperienced — as the backup. Then, on Aug. 24, the A’s replaced Allen with Jonah Heim, who arrived with exactly zero majorleague games on his resume. So much for any script. “I didn’t admit it to anyone, but I was really worried about not having a veteran catcher to kind of guide Murph and then Jonah,” Bassitt said last week. “To not have a bigleaguecaliber veteran as a catcher is crazy to me.
“But the way Bob (Melvin) and (bullpen coach) Marcus Jensen and those guys have kind of molded Murph and Jonah … Murph approaches a game like he has 10 years of service time. It’s incredible. So he’s changed my thought process.”
Murphy, who turns 26 on Sunday, and Heim, 25, quickly acclimated to the abundant demands of the position. Now, not coincidentally, the A’s steam into the playoffs with two rookie catchers, a rare happening.
How rare? Consider some historical context, courtesy of stats guru David Feldman:
The A’s started a rookie catcher in 51 of their 60 games this season, more than any team except the Giants (59). Oakland surpassed the 2008 Cubs as the postseason team with the highest percentage (85) of regularseason games started by a rookie catcher since 1969.
Allen, who started Oakland’s other nine games, barely missed qualifying as a rookie in 2020; he collected 47 days of service time before Sept. 1, and the cutoff is 45. Otherwise, the A’s would have become only the sixth team in majorleague history to start a rookie catcher in every regularseason game.
The A’s are trying to become the first team since the 1944 St. Louis Browns to reach the World Series after starting a rookie catcher in more than 80% of its regularseason games.
Only three teams in the past 53 seasons won the World Series with a rookie at catcher: the 2016 Cubs (Willson Contreras), 2010 Giants (Buster Posey) and 1979 Pirates (Steve Nicosia).
Curiously, this is not exactly new territory for the A’s, who also started a rookie catcher in last year’s wildcard game (Murphy) and in the 2012 Division Series (Derek Norris) and 2013 Division Series (Stephen Vogt).
At any rate, Murphy’s poise and eagerness to digest scouting reports accelerated his development behind the plate. It helped to have Melvin, a longtime bigleague catcher, as his manager. Murphy also credited Jensen (who spent parts of seven seasons catching in the major leagues) and pitching coach Scott Emerson.
“I think it boils down to a great coaching staff, and a pitching staff willing to work with me and be patient with a group of younger catchers,” Murphy said.
Then he joked, “I don’t know that there’s ever been a group of catchers more inexperienced than what the A’s have had this year.”
The position requires meticulous preparation and exacts relentless bodily punishment. Witness the barrage of foul tips Murphy absorbed in recent weeks, fastmoving baseballs bouncing off his 6foot3, 228pound frame.
That’s part of the multilayered job description. Melvin commended Murphy’s ability to block pitches in the dirt — an important skill, allowing pitchers to throw low pitches even with runners on base — and Bassitt spoke of Murphy’s willingness to scold pitchers for shaking off his signs.
Melvin took it further, predicting Murphy will be an AllStar one day.
“The deeper you play into the season, the more experience you get,” Melvin said of his young catchers. “Sean played in some great series against tough teams. At the end of the season, you don’t really feel like they’re rookies, and it feels like that with Jonah, too.”
Heim always wanted to be a catcher while growing up outside Buffalo, despite the rigors of the position.
“I don’t know why — we get beat up pretty much every day,” he said. “It comes down to being into every single pitch every single night. I like that responsibility.”
Murphy and Heim are not imposing hitters: Murphy hit .233 this season and Heim hit .211. But Murphy brings some power, with seven home runs (tied for fourth on the team) in 116 atbats — including a 464foot blast Sept. 11 in Texas that nearly took out a cameraman beyond the centerfield fence.
He also has a sharp eye, which helped him draw three walks two nights earlier against the Astros. That prompted Houston manager Dusty Baker to lament his pitchers’ lack of control, saying, “We’re pitching Murphy like he’s Johnny Bench or something.”
Murphy took no offense at the comment, though he enjoyed teammate Mike Fiers’ retort: “He could be (Bench) if you throw him strikes.”
This backandforth seemed to amuse Murphy, whose maturity belies his age. He understands his main responsibility for the A’s is working with pitchers and anchoring the defense, though smacking long homers obviously doesn’t hurt.
“I’m only oneninth of the offense,” he said, “but I’m onehalf of the battery.”