Frustrating Crisis at C Position

Kaymoney

Collected some gold today using the free gold method and found myself at a little over 1,000. Since I have no use for Lucas Duda or Juan Uribe in this weekends gold spending offer, I figured I'd see what I can get off of a few first round picks. The first pick ends up being Devin Mesoraco...

Although I'm happy to get a player of his caliber, I am not happy that Mesoraco is a catcher. The reason being, my top 2 bats in Jonathan Lucroy and Yan Gomes, also happen to be catchers. When I drafted him, it auto-placed him AS the catcher on my squad, bumping Lucroy out and keeping Gomes as my DH. This is not an easy decision for me to make, both Lucroy and Gomes are batting at phenomenal levels for me. Let me break down numbers for you so you can see how important each guy has been to my lineup, and I'd like some suggestions on what you guys would do. Hate to get rid of any of them, really wish I would have snagged a 2B or SS instead to make things a bit smoother but it was bound to happen eventually.

Lucroy (8-4-4, R) 536 AB, .374 BA, .427 OBP, .916 OPS, 10 HR, 69 RBI
Gomes (7-7-1, R) 323 AB, .356 BA, .406 OBP, .959 OPS, 16 HR, 73 RBI
Mesoraco (6-9-2, R)

First glance tells me that Gomes earned one of the two available slots over Lucroy, he gives me the better overall game of hitting and power. 200 AB less and still has more HR and RBI. But I'm having a hard time sending a guy batting .374 in pretty much a full seasons worth of AB down as a Sub... They are both my most valuable bats along with Freddie Freeman. If you had these 3 catchers and only room for 2 in your lineup, which two would you pick?

bizzle

I would keep Lucroy and Mesoraco. As you noted Lucroy is hitting .374 for you; there is no reason to take him out of your lineup. I'd keep Mesoraco over Gomes because of his power. Gomes has better contact but the upgrade from 6 to 7 isn't enough to compensate for the drop-off in power.

StarCat

I had Mesoraco and I loved his power. However, for me he was very weak against lefty pitchers and his average fluctuated between .260-.270. I wish I had Lucroy, and I don't have experience with Gomes.

I know this post has been extremely helpful to you, Kaymoney

Robotstove

Forget about Mesoraco, he sucks badly compared to both Lucroy and Gomes. I know it doesn't look like it now, but you will thank yourself in the future when you ditch Mesoraco.

Clark22

Short term, don't use Mesoraco.

Long term he and Lucroy are most likely to see a steady hit rating and/or rise the next time players are ranked.

~Lawman~

Kaymoney:

Lucroy should remain your starting catcher. When assessing a batter, an 8 will always outhit a 6. I even like Gomes over Mesoraco, but it's a little closer.

Listen to Clark, keep them all, as both Gomes and specifically Mesoraco should have A ratings increase the next time there is a players update.

Amused_79

As usual I agree with Lawman. Go with the 8 hitter in Lucroy. But the other two do have an upside in the future. Lucroy will be coming off an injury at the season's start.

Kaymoney

I appreciate the advice, and I also appreciate verifying the decision I made to go ahead and keep my current lineup intact with Lucroy as my catcher and Gomes as DH. My decision was based mainly on my key to success in TSB, which is the ability to string together base hits to score a large majority of my runs. With guys like Gomes, Kyle Seager, and even Freddie Freeman contributing in the HR department, power is not as important to me as it might be to others. I am not willing to take a 1 or 2 stat decrease in the hit department for a little bit more power, so I'm happy with the decision to make Mesoraco a Sub and for him to be a go to guy in the clutch during a tight game.

You think Mesoraco is due for a stat increase next update? I'm not gonna lie, I was a bit shocked to see just how good he was in this game. Great player no doubt, just thought 5-7-2 would be reasonable stat lines for him. On the other hand, Lucroy looked absolutely phenomenal for a good stretch last season and wouldn't be surprised if he got a small bump in one of the 3 departments to make him a bit more envied. I can definitely see Gomes getting a bump up, that guy has killed my Tigers in the recent past. Him and Chisenhall are two of the most under appreciated guys in the league, Cleveland has definitely got a couple of potent bats.

Has anyone noticed the guys from Cincy seem to be a bit overrated? When I first landed Cingrani, his arm stat at 8 blew me away. Being an AL guy and not seeing tons of him I may be wrong, but isn't he more of a 90-93MPH guy? Mike Leake has also performed at an exceptional level for me as well.

bizzle

RE: Cingrani

Someone on here did an extensive study and found that arm rating is directly correlated to K/9, control to BB/9, and stuff to ERA. A lot of the arm ratings don't make sense if you compare it to real life arm strength. Yordano Ventura was the hardest throwing SP last year and his arm rating is only a 5. This is because his k/9 rate wasn't very high.