SURPRISE, Ariz. — The thing about a catcher’s workload, it turns out, is that the individual catchers who’ll be asked to support it don’t exactly have boisterous opinions on the matter.
“I kind of just do whatever’s asked,” Texas Rangers catcher Higashioka said Tuesday morning. “I’ve never been a guy who caught every day, but I’ve never been a guy who never catches. It’s just kind of whatever’s asked of me.”
His positionmate, signed at the tail-end of last year to fortify one of the club’s largest offseason needs, used even fewer words to express the same sentiment.
“Whenever my name is on the lineup card,” Danny Jansen said, “I’m going to be ready to go.”
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It sounds like two players with one shared perspective. Or, more accurately, like two veterans who’ve combined to catch 1,012 big league games and recognize the circumstances of their arrangement.
Rangers manager Skip Schumaker said the workload behind the plate will “probably” be close to an even split between the two. He said it’s unlikely either reaches the 110 game threshold — a mark that fewer than a dozen catchers leaguewide reached last season — but was noncommittal to any specific figure beyond that and as to whether the club would carry three catchers on the roster. Higashioka caught 71 games last season for the Rangers; Jansen caught 93 for the Milwaukee Brewers and Tampa Bay Rays.
“They’re both veteran catchers that have caught every day before in their lives,” Schumaker said. “Both of them are going to get at-bats. I just don’t know what the catching and DH and everything looks like just yet.”
The Rangers improved at the position in no uncertain terms when they signed Jansen to a two-year, $14.5 million deal to replace a regressive Jonah Heim after he was non-tendered. Jansen’s .721 on-base-plus-slugging percentage last season was a better mark than any single Texas catcher posted in the previous two seasons.
“There’s a lot of scenarios that I’m walking through right now with the staff and [research and development],” Schumaker said of the catcher alignment, “and just trying to figure out what the best optimal lineup is.”
Schumaker and company should benefit from the fact neither catcher is inherently neutralized by a certain split. Jansen historically performs better against right-handed pitchers — with a career 102 wRC+ (Weighted Runs Created Plus) against righties and a career 96 wRC+ against lefties — but was more impactful against southpaws last season. Higashioka’s track record against left-handed pitchers trumps his track record against righties, but, like Jansen, his metrics were flipped last year when his OPS and wRC+ were better against right-handers.
Higashioka’s usage at designated hitter will play a not-so-insignificant hand in the final tally. If the Rangers take the same approach as they did last season, when Joc Pederson took 93% of his plate appearances against right-handers, that leaves Higashioka as a prime candidate to take reps at designated hitter against southpaws. Higashioka played 21 games at designated hitter last season — the third-most among all Rangers behind only Pederson and Heim — and had a .621 OPS in 63 plate appearances.
“You’re getting at-bats, you’re staying sharp at the plate,” Higashioka said, “but not having the workload on the lower half. That’s always nice.”
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