“He was an Opening Day catcher two months before wrecking his ankle while playing left field. He crams four varieties of gloves into one spring training equipment bag. And although he is out of minor league options, his career could still go in more directions than a ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ novel. He is Blake Swihart, and he’s the most interesting player in the Boston Red Sox’s camp.”
Mmmmm… okay, let’s see where this is going. We haven’t read Scott Lauber's whole article yet, but I could make a legitimate argument that Blake Swihart is the least interesting player in the Red Sox’s camp.
“Just ask opposing scouts, many of whom can’t take their eyes off him. ‘To me,’ a National League talent evaluator said Friday, ‘he’s a legit trade target.’ A former first round draft pick in 2011 (No. 26 overall), Swihart was regarded as recently as three years ago as the Red Sox’s catcher of the future. But criticism of his defense behind the plate, an ill-advised decision to move him to an unfamiliar outfield position and a serious left ankle injury torpedoed his 2016 and 2017 seasons and put him on an alternate course, one that now has him attempting to make the big league roster -- Boston’s or perhaps another team’s --- as a super-utility player.”
Alright, this is really dumb. Where in the world does Blake Swihart's value come from? The hype around him when he was coming up through the farm system was that he was a hitting catcher--a relatively rare commodity in baseball. So he had the potential to be good at hitting for a catcher, but he isn’t even a catcher anymore; that leaves us with a below-average hitter. It’s like when the Red Sox were considering moving Xander Bogaerts to the outfield in 2014 to make room for Mookie Betts. Because outfielders are expected to be better hitters than shortstops, a good hitting shortstop who is playing left field is an average left fielder, not an all-star. If you’re okay at the plate and you play a position where being an okay hitter is unusual, you shouldn’t switch to another position; it will destroy your value.
The idea that Major League executives look at him as a “super-utility player” also makes me laugh and is exactly why I think I could be a World Series-winning general manager if I ever got the chance. These people are beyond stupid. In what world is Blake Swihart a super-utility player? Coming into the league, the knock on him was that he was bad at playing catcher. Then, he was so horrible behind the plate that the Red Sox tried to move him to the outfield last year, but he was terrible at that and eventually hurt himself. So Blake Swihart can “play” a lot of different positions? I mean I guess. I could “play” a lot of different positions at the Major League level and have a .600 fielding percentage (.200 higher than Swihart's would probably be), but how is that valuable? According to this article, teams around the league are willing to prioritize being bad at everything--hitting, playing the outfield, and catching--over being good at one single thing. Dumbest strategy in human history.
I hope the Red Sox ship this bum out of town to one of the dumb teams that want his worthless lack of talent, and let’s not let this weird golden opportunity go to waste.
(Photo courtesy of chatsports.com)
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