The Christian Vazquez Effect Is Real, And We Saw That With Rick Porcello Last Night
Christian Vazquez made his 2016 debut last night behind the plate for Rick Porcello, and his impact was felt almost instantly.
It seems like the dialogue from Red Sox fans surrounding Vazquez’s call-up had to do with his game calling, but that’s really not even the biggest reason. It helps, but that’s not the main reason. For one, look no further than that snap throw to first to get a strike ‘em out, throw ‘em out double play. He’s a game changer. He’s also more than capable of doing that at second base, as he cut down baserunners at a 52% clip in 2014. But perhaps Vazquez’s greatest strength is his ability to make the strike zone wider for his pitchers. He’s one of the best catchers in the league when it comes to framing pitches, and the numbers reflect that.
Here’s what all this means. The oStr% is the percentage of pitches that a catcher catches outside of the strike zone that an umpire calls for a strike, AKA balls that are called strikes. The zBall% is the percentage of pitches that a catcher catches inside of the strike zone that the umpire calls for a ball, AKA strikes that are called balls. Then we have +Calls, which is the amount of calls that a catcher has gotten in favor of or against his pitcher.
As you can see, Vazquez gets substantially less pitches called for a ball when they’re actually a strike than Blake Swihart and Ryan Hanigan, and he also gets noticably more pitches called for a strike that are actually balls. This is a HUGE advantage for the Red Sox pitching staff when he’s behind the plate. He’s also a leader. He’s a guy that’s going to instill confidence in the guy that’s standing on the mound, and his passion and energy for the game rubs off on his teammates.
By the way, the people who were giving Rick Porcello shit for being upset that John Farrell took him out of the game are idiots. That’s EXACTLY what you want to see from these Red Sox starters. Show me that you have a pulse. Show me that you give a shit. Show me that you WANT the ball in these tough situations. It was the right call to give him the hook with Justin Smoak coming to the plate, who is a .389 hitter with a 1.421 OPS against Porcello, but I love to see that he still wanted the ball. The same people who had an issue with Porcello’s reaction are the same people who would’ve been calling him soft if he just didn’t care, and gave the ball up with apathy.
Either way, the folks who were saying that Vazquez can’t possibly have that great of an impact on a poor-performing pitching staff might be eating their words soon. Because while, yes, they were terrible last year, and they’ve gotten off to a rough start this year, you could point to Clay Buchholz, Joe Kelly and Porcello, and it’s a fact that they’ve all had successful seasons before, so it’s in there somewhere. Whether or not Vazquez is the guy who can bring that out of them remains to be seen, but so far, so good.