Can Rookie Catcher Bo Naylor Inject Some Life Into Cleveland Guardians’ Offense?

Here is how discombobulated the Cleveland Guardians season has been so far:

They are paying catcher Mike Zunino not to catch for them.

The players with three of Cleveland’s 12 highest WAR numbers are relievers, and none of them are closer Emmanuel Clase, who leads the American League in saves with 21.

Clase also leads the league in blown saves (5).

Cleveland hitters have been hit by pitches the fewest times in the league (18).

Guardians pitchers have likewise hit the fewest number of hitters in the league (19).

A total of 103 major league players have hit more home runs than all of Cleveland’s outfielders combined (8).

Guardians hitters have drawn the fourth-fewest walks in the league (217), but they have also drawn the most intentional walks in the league, 20, almost twice as many as any other team.

For the defending American League Central champions, it has been a bizarre season. Through 71 games their record is an unimpressive 33-38. At the same point last season their record was an unimpressive 37-34.

Manager Terry Francona’s men tend to do their best work in the second half of the season. Such was the case last season, in which they had, in their first 71 games, a record of 37-34 (.521), but followed it up with a rampaging 55-36 (.604) mark the rest of the way, to finish with an overall record of 92-70 (.568).

This year’s Guardians may have to duplicate that strong finish in order to compensate for another sluggish start.

In the meantime, the expected, and highly anticipated changing of the guard at the catcher’s position took place over the weekend when the Guardians designated veteran Mike Zunino for assignment and called up the organization’s top prospect, Bo Naylor, from Triple-A Columbus.

Zunino, 33, who two years ago hit 33 home runs for Tampa Bay, signed a one-year $6 million contract with the Guardians as a free agent during the off-season, but was a major disappointment both offensively and defensively.

He hit .177 with a .271 on-base percentage, and a .306 slugging percentage, with three home runs and 11 RBI. Zunino was expected to be a major upgrade offensively from the player he replaced, Austin Hedges, but instead Zunino was virtually a carbon copy of Hedges, who, with the Pirates, is hitting .175, with a .231 on-base percentage, a .242 slugging percentage, and one home run and 12 RBI.

Unless Zunino is signed by another team, he will continue to be paid for the rest of the season by the Guardians, after a rare miss in one of their rare dips into the free agent market.

The arrival of Bo Naylor as the team’s new catcher was much anticipated by Guardians fans. Naylor, the brother of Guardians’ first baseman Josh Naylor, was Cleveland’s first round pick, the 29^th player selected overall, in the 2019 MLB draft. The 23-year-old left-handed hitter has made a steady climb through the Cleveland organization.

At Columbus this year the 23-year-old Naylor hit .254 with a .393 on-base percentage, a .498 slugging percentage, with 13 home runs and 48 RBI.

The Guardians typically rely on contributors from up and down the lineup, due to the franchise’s reluctance to spend big in the free agent market, and its inability to develop hitters internally. Prior to the arrival of Bo Naylor, only three every day players in the Guardians’ lineup were home grown: third baseman Jose Ramirez, left fielder Steven Kwan, and right fielder Will Brennan.

Ideally, if Bo Naylor can hit with the power he showed at Columbus, he will be a welcome addition to a team that continues to have trouble scoring runs and, in recent years, has gotten very little in the way of run production from the catching position.

From 2020 through the first three months of this season, Cleveland catchers – mainly Roberto Perez, Hedges, and Zunino – combined for just 21 home runs, only eight more than Bo Naylor hit at Columbus this year.

Based on his production at Columbus, Naylor could eventually become a run-producing catcher, and re-invigorate a tradition in Cleveland of catchers who are also impact hitters as well. In a 16-year span from 2004-22, Cleveland catchers hit 281 home runs, an average of 18 per year.

For example, in a three-year span from 2011-13, catcher Carlos Santana, who ranks sixth on the franchise’s career home run list with 216, hit 27, 18, and 20 home runs. In a four-year span from 2004-07, Victor Martinez hit 23, 20, 16, and 25 home runs. Martinez also holds the franchise record for RBI in a season by a catcher, with 101 in 2004.

More recently, Yan Gomes hit 21 home runs in 2014 and a combined 30 home runs in 2017-18, while Roberto Perez belted 24 homers in 2019.

Since 2019, Cleveland’s catchers, offensively, have been a liability rather than an asset. In the COVID-shortened 2020 season Perez hit .165 with one home run. In 2021 Hedges hit .178 with 10 home runs. In 2022, Hedges hit .163 with seven home runs, and in 2023, Zunino hit .177 with three home runs before getting designated for assignment.

So, offensively speaking, no, Bo Naylor does not have a tough act to follow. The Guardians are last in the majors in home runs, by almost 20, and in the American League, only Kansas City, Detroit, and Oakland are averaging fewer runs scored per game than Cleveland’s 3.9.