Everyone is biased and loves any numbers that back them up, regardless of the sample size. The fact that people who love advanced stats that specifically say you can't trust small samples also love small samples at times just makes it funnier.
50PoundHead (04-18-2017), Garmel (04-18-2017)
If we're going to try to use Castro's SSS to say anything about him, can't we just point to Flowers' 150 wRC+, 147 OPS+ and prove that Coppy is the true genius?
Kinda wish we gambled on Puig
Dalyn (04-18-2017)
May as well add Freese to this list as well. He was my #1 FA target 2 offseasons ago when the Pirates ended up signing him for $3M. He posted a .270/.352/.412 (.764 OPS) line with average defense at 3B and produced 1.9 bWAR.
The Pirates then extended him for 2/10 with a $6M option. So far this year he was posted a line of .314/.467/.543 (1.010 OPS) with his typical average defense at 3B.
Meanwhile, the Braves have been "seeing what they have" with Adonis Garcia. I don't think I need to post the numbers showing how badly the Braves have been at the 3B position the last couple years.
Hawk (04-18-2017)
Is the problem his pitch framing? I thought he graded well there?
Otherwise, I'm not sure how you accurately grade defense for a catcher. I honestly couldn't care less about how many runners he throws out, and the amount of plays he actually has to make a play on a ball has to be extremely small doesn't it?
Catcher defense only accounts for SBs allowed and passed balls:
http://www.fangraphs.com/library/def...tcher-defense/
It's a bit early to evaluate framing runs since the most pitches any catcher has caught so far is ~600, but the usual suspects are at the top of the 2017 leader board:
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/so...hp?cid=1899425
Grandal, Mac, Posey, Castro...all historically good framers. Flowers has 0.4 framing runs in under 400 attempts, so he is doing pretty well on a per-pitch basis.
On the flip side, Suzuki is unsurprisingly already at -0.3, but some of that has to be attributed to catching Dickey's knuckleball.
I suggested trading for Daniel Murphy numerous times his last few years with the Mets and moving him to his natural third base position. Then I suggested him again as a free agent, now I hate it even more as I always liked Murphy. I didn't know he get so much better like this but I knew he was good.