The Cardinals wasted little time finding a replacement for franchise icon Yadier Molina following his retirement, inking longtime division rival Willson Contreras to a five-year contract in free agency. That solidifies the lion’s share of catching time in the immediate future, but there’ll at least be some competition with regard to who’ll back Contreras up in 2023 and perhaps beyond. While Andrew Knizner was Molina’s backup in recent seasons, MLB.com’s John Denton tweets that manager Oli Marmol “made it clear” that the backup job behind Contreras is a competition. Specifically, non-roster invitee Tres Barrera has made strong impressions early in camp.
Knizner, 28, has appeared in 160 games and tallied 478 plate appearances for the Cards over the past two seasons, but he’s managed just a .200/.294/.276 batting line in that time — about 33% worse than that of a league-average hitter (67 wRC+). Knizner has been good at controlling the running game in his career (29.8% caught-stealing rate), but he’s posted poor framing marks and been dinged with a minus-15 Defensive Runs Saved mark dating back to his 2019 MLB debut.
To his credit, Knizner was a well-regarded prospect and has a strong track record in the upper minors (.318/.368/.445 in Double-A; .283/.362/.453 in Triple-A). Scouting reports throughout his minor league tenure praised him as a bat-first option at catcher, but he’s yet to match those expectations. He’s also rarely had stable playing time in the big leagues, but with Contreras signed that’s unlikely to change.
As for the 28-year-old Barrera, he’s spent his entire career to date in the Nationals organization, receiving very limited looks in the Majors. He’s tallied just 51 games and 162 plate appearances, batting .231/.317/.315 with a pair of homers. In parts of six minor league seasons, Barrera has put together a .251/.332/.388 batting line, including a .228/.320/.356 slash in 402 Triple-A plate appearances.
Barrera has drawn average or better framing marks in his small MLB sample, but he’s had the opposite problem of Knizner, throwing out a woeful three of 34 attempted thieves on the basepaths (8.8%). However, he’s been far better in the minors over a much larger sample — 106-for-421, for a 25.2% rate — so there’s reason to expect him to improve on that currently unsightly number.
Not mentioned in Denton’s report but also in camp is top prospect Ivan Herrera. Once regarded as the heir-apparent to Molina, the 22-year-old Herrera made his big league debut in 2022 and went 2-for-18 with eight punchouts in 22 plate appearances. However, he also turned in a solid .268/.374/.396 batting line in Triple-A (111 wRC+) and has generally been an average or better bat at every minor league stop. He’s a career .276/.375/.415 hitter in parts of five minor league seasons and placed 75th among all prospects on FanGraphs’ rankings prior to the 2022 season.
With Contreras now installed behind the dish, Herrera’s main role with the Cardinals — at least in the short term — would appear to be a backup. He’s on the 40-man roster and has a minor league option remaining, so for now he can be sent to Triple-A to keep getting regular work in the event of an injury to Contreras. Longer term, there’s no longer a clear starting spot on the roster for Herrera. Having an overqualified backup isn’t a bad thing, though, and Contreras has enough bat to play some designated hitter as a means of keeping him fresh, which could theoretically open some additional playing time. There’s also the obvious likelihood that other clubs will come calling on Herrera’s availability, but to this point there’s been little indication the Cardinals have seriously entertained any overtures.
Tres Barrera and Ivan Herrera look decent to me, Knizer has always been that backup-pinch hitter/defender type guy, but who knows.
Their best bet is to use Barreras as backup, send Herrera to Memphis, and trade Kisner.
I don’t think Flaherty is going to stay. Come free agency – he gone.
Herrera needs daily at bats to improve, which he can only get at Triple A.
Not as simple as that…I think the cardinals are looking for a good backstop because Contreras won’t be playing everyday like Molina…plus Herrera has more control than Kitzner and considered a better prospect…this article pretty much told me that Kitzner is trade bait and won’t be around much longer…just my opinion
Knizer could win a few mvps if given the opportunity he’s been held back
That’s quite the stretch.
Kznizer was the starter for 2 months last season while Molina was on the IL, and he still sucked.
Besides, a contending team like the Cardinals can’t afford to give extensive playing time in the Majors to a middling prospect until he proves he deserves it by playing well in the limited opportunities he does get.
Most teams lose in the playoffs, and it’s better than weakening the team to risk not making the playoffs at all.
I still can’t believe that Contreras was the big bat they wanted to help with the 1-2 punch of Goldy and Arenado. Having Contreras and Jordan Walker both batting after Goldy and Arenado would make more sense, assuming Walker is able to sustain what he has been doing thus far in ST. Might be a big if though.
Knizer is a great clubhouse guy he’s treated with great respect thanks to the incredible helicopters he pulls off in the locker room. He would be a massive loss for the cardinals.
There’s an assumption in the article that Contreras is going to eat up the lion’s share of innings behind the plate, but last year he spent more time at DH (I believe) and missed a lot of time over the last few seasons due to injury.
Caveat emptor…
He played 72 games at catcher and 39 at DH while missing most of September to injury. He still played a lot more at C and will get the majority of the playing time there when he’s healthy.
I also don’t expect him to DH as much this year in St. Louis as he did last year in Chicago, as the Cardinals have better alternate DH options like Yepez and Gorman than the Cubs did last year. He could gradually see more time at DH as the contrat progresses and Herrera develops, though.
I would guess the Cubs were trying to keep him healthy by using him at DH
If I’m picking between equally uninspiring options, I’ll stick with Knizner. He knows the staff and despite what the metrics might say, he did a decent job behind the plate last season. His playing time was based on Yadi’s desire/availability to play. His results at the plate were dismal, but his approach isn’t bad and I saw improvement toward the end of the season.
While I don’t agree with the other commenter about his potential MVP candidacy, I like Knizner well enough.
“DESPITE what the metrics might say…” Well said.
Keizer is not even average at defense. He’s got a solid arm but he’s a huge net negative at framing.
Yeah, and he’s not that good at blocking, either.
Start with Knizner until he struggles or one of the AAA guys rakes or improves defensively
I hope Herrera wins the job. I don’t buy into the need for him to play everyday in AAA in order to improve. Also, Contreras isn’t an every day catcher, so I think Cardinal fans might be a little disappointed if they’re expecting him to be as tough as Yadi when it comes to innings behind the plate. He caught 72 games last year, and spent another 40 or so as DH. I wouldn’t expect more than 100 games catching.
I also can’t imagine Herrera being a trade piece and them being happy with Kninzer or Barrera as back up for the future. I think Herrera is well regarded and more important than we know.
Backup C isn’t a “for the future” position. It’s for the now. Lots of backups are available cheap in the off season each year. If Herrera is a total package, his best value would be as trade bait.
It’s a for the future position when you expect your #1 catcher to be behind the plate for about half the available games. Herrera won’t be used as trade bait when there’s such a surplus of outfielders. Our need at catcher is still there despite the signing of Contreras.
Even if Contreras starts a significant majority of the games behind the plate this season, you have to expect that Contreras will concede more and more playing time behind the dish as his contract progresses. By years 4 and 5, Herrera could very well be the primary catcher with Contreras starting more often at DH.
Whichever catcher posits the greatest quantity of woke talking points can secure a spot as Flaherty’s personal catcher.
@natzihamforest13
Please tell us about what you consider a woke talking point.
You know- using the right prinouns when referring to each of the pitchers, advocating the consumption of meat substitutes, driving a Tesla to work, and wearing a Ukranian flag t-shirt under his uni.
Woke is now a term used mainly by feebs who can’t spell colloquialism much less pronoun
Best Fans in baseball!
Do you always hold a grudge as long as you have with Flaherty? When was the last time he said anything that would cause you drag him into this topic?
Flaherty is living rent free in his head, and he can’t enjoy baseball now!
I hope Herrera continues to hit and wins the job. No other catcher is going to give 120 to 130 games per year the way Molina did. The Cardinals can’t hide an anemic bat like Kizner’s in the backup catcher role moving forward. Barrera can’t control runners at all. Herrara has the best potential to add value on both sides as the backup catcher.
100% agree
That backup catcher position will be rather important. As a cubs fan, watching Contreras play is fun and also sometimes maddening. He gives his all, wears his emotions on his sleeve, but will do some stupid things because of that, especially when running the bases. He tends to peak offensively in May and June and then usually starts to have a hamstring problem. He’ll usually miss about a good month of play and never be quite as good once he returns. Still good, but not cream of the crop good as far as you’d want from his offense (as a catcher or DH for that matter). When his swing and timing is right he will hit the ball hard up the middle. When he’s shooting it to right center you know he’s locked in! If he stayed locked in and healthy he could hit a good 25-30HR and 30-40 doubles per year with that approach, and that’s even without using a home run swing, but he never stays healthy for an entire season.
Behind the plate his framing has improved over the last couple years, but still he doesn’t get some calls like other catchers can. He’s got a great arm, especially good at the back pick throws to first base. That will come in handy with the new rules and the way some teams will be running or at least getting bigger leads off first after the pitcher disengages twice in an AB. He’s not the greatest at blocking balls, and there’s been rumbles about pitchers usually pitching better to our backup catchers and that’s usually shown to be the case in looking at pitchers era splits with their different catchers.
I like Contreras and wouldn’t have minded the Cubs resigning him, but not for that much money. I’ll enjoy watching the cubs play against him since he’ll be trying really hard to show the Cubs that they made a mistake which means he’ll probably make a couple bad decisions that the cubs would benefit from. Should be fun watching these teams play each other this year.