September 1st is here, and the White Sox have already begun the process of September callups a couple of days early. With one of those callups guaranteed to be Josh Phegley, the Adrian Nieto experiment can be brought to an end. Technically, he could sit on the bench the rest of the way and the Sox would still keep him. In the end, it turned out as well as could be expected.
Nieto seemed to hold his own offensively most of the season. Unfortunately, his .240/.305/.323 line was partially fueled by a .367 BABIP so his August line of .158/.238/.158 might be more of what to expect was more regression to the mean than a bad month. One positive is his plate discipline. His 7.4% walk rate has been fueled by a 25.0% out of zone swing rate. In the strike zone, his lack of experience with good pitching caught up with him. He has a 32.4% strikeout rate. Of the strikeouts, he was looking 31.4% of the time which is much higher than the 24.7% major league average. Even with these results, Nieto looked hitter-ish. He seemed to have a good approach at the plate and hit the ball up the middle or the opposite way when the situation dictated. He was also 3 for 3 on sacrifice attempts. While overmatched much of the time, there is something to work with.
Defensively, he's looked more like a catcher who hadn't played above single-A. He moved a lot. He went to his knees to catch fastballs that caught the plate. He threw out only 17% of all base stealers. His framing skills were sub-par leading to 15 fewer strikes and two extra runs according to Baseball Prospectus. Since he was catching Hector Noesi and Scott Carroll mostly during the second half of the season, this probably led to more runs indirectly due to lengthened innings and more men on base.
While it's hard to quantify "handling the pitching staff", White Sox pitchers had a 5.52 ERA while he was catching. With Tyler Flowers, the team ERA was 4.09. Flowers did get one huge advantage. Flowers has caught every pitch Chris Sale has thrown this season and all but 7⅔ innings Jose Quintana has thrown.
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Tyler Flowers began the season very much in doubt. There was little doubt that the Sox had been looking to get a new catcher in the offseason, but the market was mostly bare. As spring training started, the Sox anointed Flowers as the starter with so little enthusiasm that you'd have thought Leury Garcia was the only alternative. His 1.2 fWAR so far this season firmly puts him in the "capable" category.
In the end, he has rebounded to be the defensive catcher they expected him to be. He was entrusted to be Chris Sale's pitcher and caught most of Jose Quintana's games as well. His pitch framing rebounded this season to his career levels. His pitch blocking continued to be a bit of a problem this season, but his size, being the guy that catches Chis Sale's slider, and the Sox bullpen this season are all handicaps.
The more impressive part is that he withstood the grind of a whole season where his backup was a once a week catcher. After dealing with a broken hand, shoulder surgery, and back spasms starting last 2012, he's not been off more than a game at a time. In a season where the Sox needed Flowers to be healthy, he certainly showed up. Oddly enough, Hawk Harrelson hasn't noticed this. With his talk lately about how catchers don't hold up anymore, Flowers is second in the AL in games caught this season at 111 and will easily pass 120 games this season.
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Josh Phegley ends the season in Charlotte today. With two other catchers on the roster, I'll put his chances of playing today at 0%, and could be on his way to Chicago already, Of all the players talked about returning to the Sox, Phegley was one of the few that Sox management has said he'd definitely be back. And that's one of the things about Phegley. He seems to make everyone very vocal about him.
After being sent down in spring training, the Sox were uncharacteristically vocal about the specific issues that sent him to Charlotte. One issue was calling the game based on the hitters' weaknesses as opposed to the pitchers' strengths. Even during last season, John Danks called Phegley out specifically on that. It sounded as if Phegley was calling for high heat from Danks which just isn't going to happen. The other issue was receiving the ball. While just catching pitches has been brought up here, providing a stable target, a problem for Adrian Nieto too, was another issue that was brought up by Mark Parent late in spring training.
Offensively, as bad as Flowers season was last season with a bad right shoulder, Phegley's was worse. While Gordon Beckham's 62 wRC+ was difficult to watch this season, Phegley's was 34 last season. With Adrian Nieto showing moments of competence at the plate, Phegley's going to have to look a lot more like the batter he is at Charlotte this September in Chicago.
Overall, I don't know how much more we now about Adrian Nieto. He definitely belongs to the Sox now since he can ride the pine the rest of the season if that's what the Sox want. My guess is that he'll spend a good portion of the offseason in winter ball for the added reps, coaching, and evaluation. In the meantime, Tyler Flowers used his time wisely too. He's pretty firmly cemented a spot back with the Sox next season. While he isn't the offensive catcher the Sox wanted when they traded Javy Vazquez for him, he's got the defensive tools they want and the confidence of the pitching staff. He'll also get a well deserved break for the rest of the season dropping to two or three games a week the rest of the season. With that time off, Josh Phegley gets a chance for a little redemption. With the Sox being very vocal about their issues with Phegley's catching, he'll need to show improvement offensively and defensively to keep the Sox from thinking about going with Kevan Smith, Adrian Nieto, or someone else in Chicago next season.