Line-Up Maximization and Roberto Perez

Going into the season,  the Indians had a last second worry when Roberto Perez showed some concussion symptoms after one of the final Spring Training games in Texas. It wasn’t until the last second that they were able to make sure he passed the concussion protocol and were able to add Joba Chamberlain to the 40 and 25 man rosters instead of a third catcher, Adam Moore.

After that, postponed games and planned off days lead to the Indians back-up catcher, who has often been heralded as so good he would start for almost any other team, not playing in a game until April 14th. It is possible that some of this early rest had to do with the possible concussion, but now that he has played, it is safe to say he is ready for full time action.

Now the question remains about how he will be used. For years, the Indians had major issues against left handed pitching, leading to the myth of the right handed power bat. Michael Brantley, Jason Kipnis, Lonnie Chisenhall, Michael Bourn were all starters over the past few years and all have significant splits (some much more significant than others). In the past few seasons, it was easy to work Perez into the line-up, even when Gomes was healthy, against left handers. With Carlos Santana at first base, the designated hitter was open and there were many roster manipulations possible.

Almost every off-season acquisition this year was right handed, however, and now the Indians have right handed starters (including switch hitters) or platoons at every positions except Kipnis at second. This will change once Chisenhall and Brantley return, but for the moment, it remains the case. Because of this, there is a quandary on when to use Perez. He is best against left handers, but so are Mike Napoli, Santana and Gomes. Their numbers can be seen below:

These are career numbers (as of 4/16) and for the sake of fairness, it should be noted that to this point, the Indians have opted to bench Gomes against RHP to the point where 38% of Gomes’ at bats have come against LHP while Perez has had just 27% of his against LHP.

To this point in his career, Perez has the least extreme stats of any hitter, actually hitting for a little more power against right handers while reaching more often against lefties. The term “better” also has to be qualified. For one, Santana is a “better” hitter against left handed pitchers, but he still has a .353 OBP against RHP, a number nearly equal to Perez against left handers and better than Gomes. In this group, as much as he is hated for his low average and lack of ability to reach his lofty expectations, Santana is still the best hitter and needs to play every day.

In the same mode, Perez is the worst hitter, which shouldn’t be a surprise as defensive minded reserve catchers aren’t usually sluggers as well. Even so, Perez’s numbers aren’t too far from Gomes’ against right handers, especially compared with the difference between their left handed splits. Simply put, Gomes is a Silver Slugger quality catcher against LHP and Perez is a bench player against both sides.

This provides the answer that Terry Francona has already been using since Perez has been on the team and continues to use this season. Since there is such a small difference between Gomes and Perez against RHP, that is the preferred time to use Perez and since Napoli and Santana have generally been better against right handers as well, giving Gomes a full day off makes the most sense over having him DH.

This is not to say that Gomes should never DH, but in general, unless one of the two first basemen needs a day off, there is no production based reason to do this. That doesn’t, however, means Perez is being used as efficiently as possible. Currently, Perez’s numbers against all pitchers look better than those of Rajai Davis, Marlon Byrd, Juan Uribe and Collin Cowgill this year, all right handed hitters. The Indians haven’t played many right handed pitchers this year, but these numbers generally are worse against that side.

It can be a scary proposition to use the back-up catcher as a pinch hitter, but the Indians still have both Napoli and Santana, who have enough experience at the position to get them through a few innings if there is an injury. With either Tyler Naquin, Collin Cowgill or Jose Ramirez available off the bench most games, there is little reason the Indians couldn’t use Perez as a pinch hitter, then replace with one of the others as a pinch runner and defensive replacement. Francona has been using Naquin and Cowgill as late inning defensive replacements already, so if there was a point when Byrd or Uribe came up in a pivotal at bat, it would be potentially beneficial to have Perez pinch hit before they were replaced in the field anyway. The fact is that Perez has only played once in the first two weeks of the season and the Indians should be doing anything they can to get him in the line-up often enough that he isn’t completely cold every time the Tribe does need his bat.