Colleagues George King and Joel Sherman reported in yesterday’s Post that Yankees general manager Brian Cashman told Jorge Posada over the weekend he will come to spring training as the team’s designated hitter in 2010.
That means one thing: The Yankees plan on having Jesus Montero be the team’s starting catcher on Opening Day.
Montero, Francisco Cervelli and Austin Romine reportedly all will get a shot at winning the job outright come spring training. But, in reality, those are false choices.
Cervelli is a backup catcher. He’s not a particularly good hitter, with wholly unimpressive .271/.359/.335 splits in 266 at-bats this season, and he isn’t exactly Ivan Rodriguez in his prime behind the plate, either.
Romine is a solid prospect, a well-rounded player who has received some comparisons to Jason Varitek from scouts. But he struggled at times in his first season in Double-A, and finished the year hitting .268 with 10 homers and 69 RBIs for Trenton. He’s gone on to have more middling success in the Arizona Fall League, and one could argue that he may not be ready for Triple-A next season, let alone the majors.
So that leaves Montero, who was the starting catcher for the entire season for Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes Barre as a 20-year-old. But despite doing exceedingly well as one of the youngest players in the International League — hitting .289 with 21 homers and 75 RBIs — whether he is prepared to be in the majors beginning in April remains to be seen.
Momtero was benched in May after he failed to run out a ground ball against the Durham Bulls. And he struggled mightily in the first half of the season, mainly getting an All-Star selection based on his lofty prospect status.
But the biggest obstacle keeping Montero from being Posada’s successor is his defense. Because he is so big (6-foot-4, 225 pounds), it takes Montero a long time to get his throwing motion started, making it hard for him to gun down many runners, despite having a fairly strong arm. He also isn’t very athletic, which, combined with his size, makes his life even more difficult trying to keep pitches in front of him.
But the Yankees have proven over the past decade they are willing to sacrifice defensive ability behind the plate in order to get a high-powered bat into the lineup, and Montero has the potential to be on another level offensively than even Posada has reached in his Yankees career.
A lot can change between now and then, but if Posada is the designated hitter in 2011, Montero is the only logical option the Yankees have available to succeed him.
