Mitch Garver: The Minnesota Twins next long term catcher

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MINNEAPOLIS, MN – JULY 30: Mitch Garver #23 of the Minnesota Twins celebrates after hitting a walk-off double against the Cleveland Indians during the ninth inning of the game on July 30, 2018 at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Twins defeated the Indians 5-4. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images) /

The Minnesota Twins haven’t had a solid everyday catcher for more than 2 consecutive years since Joe Mauer, but Mitch Garver is here to change that.

Amidst the Minnesota Twins season full of disappointment, I thought we’d take some time to look at a few of the bright spots we’ve found this year. One of these is Mitch Garver. Since Joe Mauer switched from catcher to first base, the Twins haven’t ever had a consistent, solid option at the catcher position. Drew Butera, Juan Centeno, Ryan Doumit, Eric Fryer, Josmil Pinto, Chris Herrmann, John Ryan Murphy, Kurt Suzuki, Wilson Ramos, Bobby Wilson, the list goes on and on. Jason Castro has been the most consistent catcher we’ve had since the Joe Mauer era, but as all Twins fans know, while he’s great defensively, he doesn’t bring much to the table offensively. Catcher has been a very volatile position for the Twins for nearly the past decade.

After Castro tore his meniscus in mid-May, the Twins were forced to give Mitch Garver a bigger role, whether they were ready to or not. With no ill will towards Castro, this injury has been a blessing in disguise, of sorts. The 2018 season won’t amount to anything, so we might as well give our young guys a shot to prove themselves at the major league record and work through some struggles now, rather than waiting until next year when we have a shot at competing again and struggling then. This has worked out perfectly for Garver.

The Basic Stats

Success didn’t come immediately for him. In Garver’s first 26 games after Castro went down, he hit just .200 with 15 hits (only 4 for extra bases, all doubles), 7 walks, and 20 strikeouts in 75 at bats. The next day, though, he recorded a 3-hit outing which seems to have sparked an abrupt turnaround. Since then, the Twins have enjoyed a slash line of .309/.377/.515 from Garver in 44 games, with 9 doubles, 2 triples, and 5 home runs. His K:BB has also drastically improved since his rough stretch after taking over as the primary catcher, coming in at 27:16 over the past 44 games.

The monthly splits show a very similar story:

Months
Split	G	GS	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	TB	GDP	HBP	SH	SF	IBB	ROE	BAbip	tOPS+	sOPS+
April/March	12	8	34	32	4	9	2	0	2	3	2	13	.281	.324	.531	.855	17	1	0	0	0	0	2	.412	124	134
May	18	16	68	60	5	12	3	0	0	5	6	15	.200	.294	.250	.544	15	2	2	0	0	1	0	.267	48	53
June	21	15	57	52	7	15	3	0	0	0	5	13	.288	.351	.346	.697	18	1	0	0	0	1	0	.385	88	97
July	19	16	68	57	7	18	4	1	3	14	10	11	.316	.418	.579	.997	33	0	0	1	0	0	1	.349	164	167
August	20	18	74	69	11	18	5	1	2	14	4	14	.261	.297	.449	.747	31	3	0	0	1	0	2	.296	97	101
Sept/Oct	1	1	3	3	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	.000	.000	.000	.000	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	-100	-100

Things started off fine in April and March, though he wasn’t seeing much playing time. Then in May, the month that Castro went down and Garver’s playing time doubled, we saw some struggles. His OBP was actually not terrible at .294, but the glaring stat in that month is the poor .200 batting average. After May, though, Garver took off. Give it a look, the stats speak for themselves.

July was clearly Garver’s best month, but June and August were pretty good as well. A dip in BA from .316 in July down to .261 in August is a little bit concerning at first look, but there’s actually not much to worry about. The months are very similar- A few more runs scored in August, same number of hits, one more double, one less home run, same number of RBIs, though a few less walks and a few more strikeouts. The biggest difference is that he simply had 12 more at bats in August than July. The production really didn’t drop off much at all from July to August, so good news!

The Advanced Stats

If we check out Garver’s expected stats on Baseball Savant, MLB’s Statcast-based tool, to try and see if he’s playing beyond what he should be, there’s good news there too. Savant lists Garver’s expected batting average (xBA, a measure using Statcast data such as launch angle and exit velocity to predict what a player’s batting average should be) to be a bit lower than his actual season average (.250 vs .264), but that’s not a drastic difference.

Additionally, it is worth mentioning that there’s currently no way to view expected stats over a specific time frame, so this .250 xBA does include his early season struggles, which I’m guessing helps suppress that estimate. If we turn our attention to slugging percentage and expected slugging percentage (xSLG), good news there- Savant has calculated a xSLG of .418, which is dead on with his season total.

Finally, we’ll look at weighted on base average and expected weighted on base average (xwOBA). Bear with me on this one. Per MLB, weighted on base average is a measure that takes into consideration “how a player reached base, instead of simply considering whether a player reached base”. Put more simply, it uses more information than the traditional on base percentage statistic in attempts to get a better idea of how good a batter is regardless of how an individual at bat may have turned out. Expected weighted on base average again just uses Statcast data to predict what a reasonable wOBA for a player may be.

Say, for example, Garver were to smash a line drive down the third base line with an exit velocity of over 100mph off the bat, but the third baseman were to make an incredible defensive play to turn an easy double into a lineout. xwOBA wouldn’t punish Garver as much for that result since even though it was an out, it was a great hit off the bat, whereas wOBA or OBP would simply see that Garver made an out, not caring that it really should have been an extra base hit. Anyways, what you really need to know is that Garver’s 2018 actual wOBA sits at .325 while his exOBA sits at .322, which is a negligible difference.

Apologies for the quick advanced stats tutorial, I know it can get pretty cumbersome, but there is a lot we can learn from using some of these newfangled statistics. The bottom line that we can take away from these advanced stats is they support the notion that Garver is a quality major league hitter performing at a sustainable level.

Say, hypothetically, that Garver’s actual batting average sat at .300 on the season, but his expected batting average sat at .200. This is an extreme example, but it would suggest that Garver, for whatever reason, is hitting much better than he should be, and that he’s due for significant regression in the future. That’s not the case here, these advanced metrics are very near to Garver’s actual stats for the season, which tells us that what he’s doing is sustainable and it’s not at all unreasonable to expect him to keep up what he’s been doing.

CLEVELAND, OH – AUGUST 07: Mitch Garver #23 of the Minnesota Twins celebrates with teammates after a 3-2 victory over the Cleveland Indians at Progressive Field on August 7, 2018 in Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Ron Schwane/Getty Images) /

The Eye Test

While the stats clearly show Garver got off to a slow start for the Minnesota Twins in the beginning of the year but has been playing much better since June, one additional measure I like to take into account here is the eye test. In the first few months of the season, Garver simply looked nothing like he does now. He didn’t look completely helpless at the plate or anything, this is more of a testament to how much he’s improved this season. His demeanor is much more confident and comfortable than it was before, which makes complete sense. Early on, he’s still getting used to the big league setting (he got a little bit of time with the Twins last year, but only 23 games worth). The injury to Castro may have had an adverse effect on Garver initially as well. Nobody expected Castro to suddenly be out for the season, and it’s reasonable to assume some of the growing pains for Garver came as he transitioned from a backup role to splitting time with Bobby Wilson, to eventually becoming our starter. It’s likely going to take some time to get used to everything.

Try it for yourself. Go to Youtube and look up one of the Twins games from earlier on this year (MLB’s account uploads lots of old games periodically). Take a look at Garver’s at bats then, and then watch a Twins game this week and see what he looks like now. He just seems to be much more comfortable and relaxed at the plate, and the results have followed. Take their game against the Rangers on Friday night. Garver came up to the plate with the bases loaded and the Twins down by 3 runs. Early on in the season, this probably doesn’t amount to anything. But now? Garver took a few pitches and then laced a 1-2 pitch to the gap for a bases-clearing the bases which tied the game.

A video serving of hot #GarvSauce ribbies. #TwinsWin #MNTwins https://t.co/DQ6MeBQikW
— Minnesota Twins (@Twins) September 1, 2018

The difference is night and day. It’s difficult to quantify, but Garver just looks much better than he did early on in the season.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN – AUGUST 19: (L-R) Jason Castro #21, Chris Gimenez #38 and Mitch Garver #43 of the Minnesota Twins celebrate winning against the Arizona Diamondbacks after the game on August 19, 2017 at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was Garver’s Major League debut. The Twins defeated the Diamondbacks 5-0. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images) /

Future outlook

So where do we go from here? Garver has given the Twins good reason to have faith in him to be our next long term catcher. He is under contract for the next 5 years, so we can count on seeing a lot more of him moving forward. 2019 and 2020 are team control years where he will likely make close to league minimum each season, and then he enters arbitration in the 2021 season where, if he keeps up the good work, he can expect a nice upgrade in salary. Given that he still has 5 full years of control left, I wouldn’t expect there to be any news of an extension anytime soon. There’s just no reason to with a guy like Garver, who is 27 years old, is under team control for a long time, and plays a position where players typically don’t last long into their 30s at. With that said, there’s no reason the Twins should want to move on from him anytime soon. It’ll likely just be quiet for at least a few more years in regards to Garver and his contract status.

The Twins don’t have a whole lot of catching talent in the minor leagues behind Garver either, so he’s probably safe for now in that aspect. Ryan Jeffers, the Twins’ 2nd round draft pick this year, has played quite well this season, but he’s only 21 years old and still has several more years in the minors before being ready for the MLB. That’s really about it on the farm. There’s some guys similar to Willians Astudillo that are in the system and can play the role of backup catcher in the big leagues if needed, but these guys won’t challenge Garver for the starting job anytime soon.

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The biggest complicating factor right now is Jason Castro. He won’t return to play this season, but should be back at some point next year, potentially ready for the start of the season. He’ll be on the last year of his contract with the Twins, earning $8 million. That’s not exactly a salary you want to have sitting on the bench, but if Garver keeps up his play, there’s no reason Castro should be starting over him next year.

In any situation, the Twins figure to have both Garver and Castro as their two major league catchers for the good majority of next year, but it remains to be seen exactly how they’ll be used. Castro has much more experience and is better defensively, while Garver brings much more to the plate offensively and is under contract through 2023.

Personally, I’d love to see Garver be named the starter with Jason Castro in a backup role. That would allow Garver to continue to grow as a player while Castro acts as a mentor to him, particularly helping out with his defense and game calling ability. If Garver is going to keep of the offensive production, the Twins simply cannot him in any role other than starter.

Next. First wave of September call-ups underwhelming. dark

This lineup has really struggled with getting quality offensive production out of the catcher slot, again dating back to the Joe Mauer days, so the organization should be jumping at the opportunity to have Garver’s bat in the lineup most days. Castro is much better suited for a backup role anyways. He doesn’t bring a whole lot to the table offensively, but is one of the better defensive catchers out there and really helps our pitching staff out. If he can pass off some of those defensive attributes to Garver, man, we could have quite the catcher on our hands. It’ll certainly be fun to continue to follow Garver’s career.

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