Red Sox add Holaday to the catching mix
By Drew Peabody
Red Sox add veteran catcher Bryan Holaday to their catching rotation
The Boston Red Sox added catcher Bryan Holaday to the 25-man roster yesterday to take the place of Ryan Hanigan, who went on the 15-day disabled list with a strained tendon in his ankle.
This could be a case of trying to get Hanigan a breather from the miserable slump he has been in of late. Hanigan, the Andover, Mass. native, is zero for his last 20. In August, nagging injuries start to take their toll on players, which could also be the case with the Red Sox backup catcher. Hanigan also missed time this season with a strained neck, which opened the door in June for the phenomenon that is Sandy Leon.
Generally, people like to use the term journeyman with catchers who don’t play very much. Holaday was not the number one catcher in Texas, so he was designated for assignment when the Rangers acquired Jonathan Lucroy at the trade deadline. Detroit drafted him in the sixth round of the 2010 draft. He caught 68 games over parts of four seasons there, going back and forth between the minors and majors. The Tigers traded him to Texas at the end of Spring Training this year after the Tigers acquired old Red Sox friend Jarrod Saltalamacchia.
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Holaday has batted .248.285/.356 over 376 big league plate appearances. In his career, Holaday has thrown out just 27 percent of would be base stealers. He is also considered a below average pitch framer, so the Red Sox are not looking for a defensive specialist here. They are picking up a guy with decent offensive skills who might only be here for a short time while Hanigan recovers.
Holaday may be getting the nod to catch David Price tonight against the Dodgers. They were teammates for Detroit when Holaday caught Price on September 17, 2014 against the Twins. The night did not go terribly well for Price as he surrendered five runs on eight hits in an 8-4 loss. Leon has been catching Price exclusively of late. Price has a 3.19 ERA in six starts this year with the hot-hitting Leon. Hanigan has not caught Price a single time this season. Leon has started five of the last six games so perhaps he is due for a break today in Los Angeles.
The pick up of Holaday could be looked at as the team not having faith in their current catchers, especially Christian Vazquez, but as my fellow BoSoxInjection writer Chris Wehner pointed out to me in an email, perhaps the injury to Hanigan is not serious. Getting Vazquez to the majors just to sit on the bench two-thirds of the time might not help him as much as getting more regular work in the minors.
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Another possibility is Holaday’s offensive skills, which might help the Red Sox in the short term as opposed to Vazquez’ struggles at the plate this season (.583 OPS in 176 major league plate appearances this season).
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