Can a Hall of Fame Case be Framed for Brian McCann?

The Atlanta Braves’ season ended on Wednesday when the team was walloped by the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 5 of the National League Division Series. After the game, catcher Brian McCann announced that he was going to retire after 15 years in Major League Baseball. McCann, now 35 years old, leaves as a 7-time All-Star and World Champion.

“I wanted to come back and get a chance at the postseason. This is it for me. I’m going to go home and be a dad, play with those kids.”

— Brian McCann (October 9, 2019)

In recent years, McCann hasn’t been the type of player that would even be considered for the Hall of Fame but, as we’ll see, McCann had prolific pitch framing skills that were never widely recognized during his career. The odds of the left-handed hitting backstop ever getting a plaque in Cooperstown are long but can no longer be dismissed out of hand.

In this piece, I’ll briefly recap McCann’s excellent 15-year career and then assess whether modern metrics will give him a shot at the Hall.

Cooperstown Cred: Brian McCann (C)

• Atlanta Braves (2005-13, 2019), N.Y. Yankees (2014-16), Houston Astros (2017-18)
• Career: .262 BA, 282 HR, 1,018 RBI, 1,590 Hits, 110 OPS+,
• Career: 31.8 WAR (Wins Above Replacement from Baseball Reference)
• 54.5 WAR (from FanGraphs), 62.2 WARP (from Baseball Prospectus)
• 7-time All-Star
• 6-time Silver Slugger
• 282 career HR are the 8th most ever for MLB catchers
• Won 2017 World Series with Astros

(cover photo: Associated Press)

Brian McCann Career Highlights

Brian Michael McCann was born on February 20, 1984 in Athens, Georgia. Athens is a college town (home of the University of Georgia) about 70 miles east of Atlanta. Brian’s father Howard was, at the time, an assistant baseball coach for the Bulldogs. McCann played high school baseball in Duluth, Georgia (an Atlanta suburb) and was selected in the 2nd round of the 2002 player draft by his hometown team, the Braves.

McCann was just 21 years old when he made his Major League Baseball debut, a home game in Atlanta on June 10, 2005. Playing for future Hall of Fame manager Bobby Cox, the rookie backstop went 2 for 3 with a walk and RBI in his first game. The Braves of 2005 won their 14th consecutive division title under Cox so McCann was able to experience postseason baseball in his first MLB campaign. Atlanta was matched up against the Houston Astros in Game 1 of the N.L. Division Series. In his first playoff at bat, McCann hit a 3-run home run off the Astros’ Roger Clemens, helping lead the Braves to a 10-5 victory.

The series, unfortunately, didn’t end well for the Braves or McCann. In the classic Game 4, McCann caught all 18 innings of Houston’s series-clinching 7-6 victory. Although he hit a solo HR in the 8th inning, McCann struck out on three consecutive at bats in the extra frames, including a 14th inning K with one out and the bases loaded. Overall, the rookie went 1 for 8 in the loss.

Perennial All-Star in Atlanta (2006-13)

Brian McCann became the team’s primary catcher in the spring of 2006 and was an All-Star and Silver Slugger in what was officially his sophomore campaign. The Silver Slugger was awarded based on a superb slash line with a .333 BA/.388 OBP/.572 SLG to go with 24 HR, 93 RBI and a 143 OPS+.

McCann would never again match any one of his 2006 slash line stats but he became a perennial fixture in the Mid-Summer Classic, making every squad through 2011 in addition to winning 4 more Silver Sluggers. In 2010, he was the MVP of the All-Star Game, thanks to a three-run double that provided all of the National League’s runs in a 3-1 victory.

After an off-year in 2012 (.233 BA, 87 OPS+), the 6’3″, 225-pound catcher rebounded in 2013, making the All-Star squad once again in his free agent walk year. With another slugging catcher (Evan Gattis) on the team in 2012, the Braves elected to allow the hometown hero to leave via free agency.

In his 8 full seasons with the Braves, McCann averaged .277 with a .350 OBP, 21 HR, 80 RBI and a 119 OPS+. During those campaigns,  Atlanta made the postseason three additional times but never advanced beyond the NLDS round.

Brian McCann’s Yankee Years (2014-16)

In November 2013, Brian McCann signed a 5-year, $85 million contract with the New York Yankees. Fans of the Bronx Bombers salivated at the prospect of the left-handed slugger taking aim at the short porch in right field in Yankee Stadium.

Those dimensions in right (314 feet down the line and 385 feet in the alley) clearly helped McCann but not to the degree that the Yankees had hoped. Now in his early 30’s (which is when many catchers start wearing down), McCann’s hitting skills were clearly not what they had been in Atlanta. In three seasons in New York, McCann did hit 69 home runs (46 of them at Yankee Stadium) but hit them with a mediocre .235 batting average and below average 99 OPS+. In his best year in the Bronx (2015), he hit just .232 but with 26 HR and 94 RBI, which was good enough for a 6th Silver Slugger Award.

McCann’s years with the Yankees coincided with a rare period in franchise history that did not involve multiple playoff games. From 2014-16, the Yankees participated in only one postseason game, the 2015 Wild Card game which they lost 3-0 to the Houston Astros.

The now 32-year old catcher was traded to those Astros in November of 2016.

Finally a World Champion (2017 with the Astros)

The Astros followed up on their acquisition of Brian McCann by signing his former Yankees’ teammate Carlos Beltran to a one-year contract a couple of weeks later. The ‘Stros were a team filled with talented young players; management felt that more veteran leadership was needed and they could not have found a better pair than in McCann and the 39-year Beltran. A final veteran piece was added at the end of August when the team traded for the Detroit Tigers’ ace right-hander Justin Verlander, then 34 years old.

McCann in 2017 showed that he could still provide some pop from behind the dish, swatting 18 home runs to go with 62 RBI and a 106 OPS+.  As a team, Houston won 101 games in 2017 and the three veterans all enjoyed the bubbly that accompanies a World Championship for the first time. McCann’s importance as an experienced backstop was recognized by the fact that he started 17 of the team’s 18 postseason games (after a regular season in which he started just 94 games behind the plate).

Brian McCann’s Final Seasons (2018-19)

McCann followed up the 2017 World Series win with an injury-plagued campaign in 2018. Playing in only 63 games (with 216 plate appearances), the 34-year old veteran set career lows with a .212 BA and 86 OPS+. In that limited playing time, he hit just 7 HR with 23 RBI. In the postseason, which ended in a 5-game NLCS loss to the Boston Red Sox, McCann started just 2 out of 8 games and went 0 for 8.

In what would ultimately be his final MLB campaign, McCann returned to Atlanta for his age 35 season. He started 79 games, platooning with Tyler Flowers, hitting .249 (86 OPS+) with 12 taters and 45 ribbies.

The 2019 season ended for the Braves in their 5-Game NLDS loss to St. Louis. McCann started all 5 games, going 3 for 16 with no runs driven in.

The Shift

After his first nine seasons (2005-13), Brian McCann truly did look like a potential Hall of Famer in the making. He was a perennial All-Star and a top level hitter at the position. After all, he was good enough to command $85 million on the free agent market as a 29-year old backstop. His offensive production waned, however, in his 30’s. There were the nagging injuries that all backstops get but there was also a change in baseball strategy the severely impacted the left-handed hitter’s offensive production.

The change I’m referring to is the widespread use of “the shift,” a defensive alignment that is common now in which the team in the field puts three players on the pull side of the diamond. The shift has impacted left-handed pull hitters more than anyone. That’s what McCann was and it started to impact his numbers in his second to last season in Atlanta (2012). According to his Baseball Reference profile splits, McCann either pulled the ball or hit it up the middle on 85% of his at bats in his career.

Take a look at McCann’s numbers on pulled balls from 2005-11 and 2012-19:

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From 2012-19, there were 80 MLB players who were left-handed hitters who pulled at least 500 balls. McCann’s .312 BA was the 10th worst out of those 80. His .214 BAbip (“Batting Average on Balls in Play”) was the worst among all 80, a full 20 points below Pedro Alvarez’ .234. The only thing that made him a still somewhat productive hitter was the fact that he hit 110 home runs on those balls in play, which was the 5th most among those 80. For McCann in the era of the shift, it was home run or bust.

Is there an “Old School” Case for Brian McCann for the Hall of Fame?

OK, let’s get to the meat of the conversation. What is the Hall of Fame case for Brian McCann? As I noted at the top of the piece, pitch framing metrics provide fuel to his Cooperstown case. Before we get to those, allow me to briefly analyze whether there’s any reasonable argument to be made that McCann deserves a plaque based on traditional numbers.

Many decades ago, sabermetric pioneer Bill James developed the “Hall of Fame monitor,” a formula which analyzes a player’s statistical accomplishments in comparison to already enshrined players at his position on the diamond. On this scale, in which 100 “points” puts a player “in range” of the Hall, McCann scores a 84, which puts his stats below the bar.

Another Jamesian creation is the “Similarity Score,” which looks for the closest statistical match to any MLB player. The top 5 matches for McCann are Jorge Posada, Lance Parrish, Bill Freehan, Javy Lopez and Benito Santiago. Although Posada and Freehan have their advocates, none of these five backstops managed more than one appearance on the BBWAA ballot, all disappearing when they failed to get at least 5% of the vote.

Power Hitting Backstop

So, is there any good news?

Well, McCann’s 282 career home runs are the 8th most for catchers in the history of baseball. That’s behind six backstops who are in the Hall of Fame (Mike Piazza, Johnny Bench, Carlton Fisk, Yogi Berra, Gary Carter, Ivan Rodriguez) and one (Parrish) who isn’t. Right behind McCann on the list are Posada and Lopez. Not much help there.

Regarding McCann’s tater totals, he is one of only 4 catchers ever to log 10 or more seasons with 20+ home runs. The others are Piazza, Bench and Berra. That’s pretty good but it’s also a somewhat contrived stat. McCann did this despite never hitting more than 26 long balls in a season. Piazza hit over 30 dingers in 9 different seasons; Bench did it 4 times with a career high of 45; Berra’s a little bit closer but still exceeded McCann’s career high in 6 individual campaigns. This stat isn’t good enough.

How do McCann’s 6 Silver Sluggers compare to other backstops since the Award was created in 1980? Here’s a list of the catchers with the most:

• 1. Mike Piazza (10)
• 2. Ivan Rodriguez (7)
• T3. Brian McCann (6)
• T3. Lance Parrish (6)
• T5. Gary Carter (5)
• T5. Jorge Posada (5)
• T5. Joe Mauer (5)

That’s pretty good but, since that Parrish and Posada have the same number or one less, not ultimately helpful enough.

Considering also that McCann’s postseason hitting record is poor (.172/.252/.297), there’s no Hall of Fame case that can be made based on the most tangible statistics that we’re used to.

What do the Baseball Reference Leader Boards Say?

There’s no help here either. According to Baseball Reference’s WAR rankings, Brian McCann (with a 31.8 bWAR) is the 33rd best catcher in MLB history. That’s behind all of the 15 Hall of Fame members who donned the tools of ignorance as their primary position.

Among his contemporaries, McCann is behind Russell Martin, Victor Martinez and Yadier Molina and far behind Joe Mauer and Buster Posey.

McCann was known as a hitting catcher, evidenced by those 6 Silver Sluggers but no Gold Gloves. Of the 118 backstops with at least 4,000 plate appearances and 50% of their games behind the plate, McCann’s OPS+ (110) is tied for 29th best. Among Hall of Famers, he’s ahead of only Rick Ferrell, Ray Schalk and Ivan Rodriguez. Schalk was highly respected for his defense (he threw out 52% of all base runners) while I-Rod won 13 Gold Gloves (with 46% of runners caught stealing). Ferrell is widely considered to be one of the worst of the Veterans Committee selections.

Speaking of the running game, McCann’s record is poor. In his career he threw out just 25% of all would be base thieves; in 10 different seasons he was in the top 5 of stolen bases allowed in the league in which he was playing. It’s because of this that McCann’s overall bWAR is relatively low, with his defense metrics dragging down his rating.

The Art of Pitch Framing

There is one key statistic, one that has only recently become available to the public, that elevates Brian McCann to a potential Hall of Fame candidate. According to the metrics compiled by FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus, McCann was one of the best in the game at helping his pitchers get extra strikes and fewer balls by his ability to frame their pitches.

Before getting into the numbers, let’s think about this in human terms. It’s often said that one of the most difficult things to do in sports is to hit a baseball. A batter has a split second to decide whether to swing or take, using their experience and knowledge to detect if they’re getting a ball in their happy place or if the pitch is about to dart out of the strike zone.

Similarly, it takes an extraordinary amount of experience for a human umpire to correctly make the instantaneous calculation about whether a pitch is a ball or a strike. According to The Sporting News, MLB umpires missed 34,294 ball-strike calls in 2018, an average of 14 missed calls per game. On these borderline calls, the best catchers at pitch framing receive the ball with virtually no perceived movement. If a catcher sets up on the inside corner and has to reach across to catch a ball on the outside of the plate, the jerky motion creates the appearance that the pitcher badly missed his target. That may be true (the pitcher missing his target) but the pitch may have been a strike anyway.

The point to this boring story is that highly intelligent people who could probably work for NASA have been able to quantify how many runs the best pitch framing catchers save or cost their teams by their ability to turn balls into called strikes.

Brian McCann: Pitch Framing Maestro

When calculating Brian McCann’s career fWAR (the FanGraphs version) or WARP (the Baseball Prospectus version), the value of his pitch framing skills as it applies to his career value is truly stunning.

As we’ve seen, Baseball Reference, which does not include pitch framing in its WAR calculations, lists McCann as the 33rd best backstop of all time, with a 31.8 bWAR.

FanGraphs gives McCann a 54.5 fWAR, which is the 10th highest value for a backstop in baseball history, behind Bench, Carter, Rodriguez, Fisk, Berra, Piazza, Joe Torre, Bill Dickey and Russell Martin. Yes, Russell Martin: more on that to come.

Baseball Prospectus assigns McCann a WARP of 62.2, which makes him (wow) the 5th most valuable catcher of all time, behind only Piazza, Fisk, Bench and Carter. His ranking is just above Berra, Rodriguez, Martin, Molina and Ted Simmons.

Is Brian McCann Really the 5th or 10th best Catcher Ever?

Absolutely NOT. And, I guarantee you, there is nary a writer at either FanGraphs or Baseball Prospectus who would make that claim. The reason should be fairly obvious if you take a time to think about it. The reason is that we have no idea what the pitch framing skills were for the likes of Bench, Carter, Berra or defensive stalwarts of the first half of the 20th century such as Schalk or Gabby Hartnett.

The FanGraphs (FG) version of pitch framing goes back just to 2008 (using PITCHf/x from 2008-14 and Statcast from 2015-19). FG Senior writer Jay Jaffe (one of the leading experts on the Hall of Fame) wrote in March that the addition of pitch framing metrics added 18.8 WAR to Brian McCann’s career total. With the magic of “enter” on a FG programmer’s keyboard, McCann’s fWAR (through 2018) went from 36.7 to 55.5, vaulting him from “no shot at Cooperstown” to having a legitimate case.

Similarly, on FG, Russell Martin’s fWAR rose by 17.2, jumping him from 37.4 to 54.6. Yadier Molina’s also rose from under 40 to 53.2.

Note: The fWAR for all are slightly different now because they include 2019 but also because there have been some adjustments made to the numbers by the human wizards behind the FG curtain.

The Baseball Prospectus Pitch Framing Data

The Baseball Prospectus (BP) version of pitch framing uses pitch count data, which goes back to 1988. The BP version does bring into play the recently inducted Hall of Famers Piazza and Rodriguez. This is why 6 of the top 9 catchers on the BP WARP leaderboard for backstops played from 1988 to the present day. It is notable that BP does list Brian McCann ahead of the first-ballot Hall of Famer Rodriguez because of superior rate stats (for hitting) and because of his vastly superior pitch framing numbers.

As an aside or tangent, it’s interesting to note that Piazza was derided for his fielding skills because he threw out only 23% of all base runners while Rodriguez was lauded (and rewarded with 13 Gold Gloves) because he threw out 46% of would-be thieves. However, according to BP, Piazza was quite excellent at framing pitches while I-Rod was actually slightly below average. The latter’s overall defensive rating is still higher but it’s not as wide a gap as you’ll see on Baseball Reference. Piazza’s all-time great hitting for a catcher plus his underrated defensive skills put him atop the BP leader board for the position.

Of course, we will never know what value the defensive stalwarts from previous decades (Bench, Bill Freehan, Jim Sundberg, Bob Boone and Thurman Munson come to mind) brought to their teams regarding their pitch framing skills. Of course, in today’s game, catchers are keenly aware that framing is a part of their job. To what degree catchers of previous decades were aware of their own abilities to “steal” strikes is unknown.

This is the most important point to understand and repeat: the leader boards on FG and BP show each catcher’s fWAR or WARP. The extra value added (or subtracted) for pitch framing only applies to the last 12 years on FG and the last 32 years on BP. So, modern catchers have an unfair advantage over those from previous eras. The FG and BP versions are valuable only if used to compare contemporaries.

There are aspects of the Baseball Reference (BR) WAR calculations that are (by necessity) different in the distant past because of the lack of availability of certain statistics. Still, BR remains the place to go to compare players across eras, especially now for catchers. Its founder Sean Forman confirmed to me yesterday that his site has no plans to add pitch framing numbers to its catcher calculations.

Comparing Brian McCann to his Peers

Since its clear that any Hall of Fame case to be made for Brian McCann must start with his pitch framing skills, we can only compare him to the other top catchers of the past 32 years. In these comparisons, we’re going to include McCann, Molina, Martin (the pitch framing champs), Piazza, Rodriguez, Jorge Posada, Jason Kendall, the recently retired Mauer, and the still-active Posey. Posada and Kendall are included here because they top McCann in bWAR.

First, let’s forget about pitch framing and WAR for a moment and just look at their hitting stats, caught stealing percentage and accolades earned.

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It’s hard to draw much of a conclusion from these numbers other than that Rodriguez and Piazza are Hall of Famers for a reason and that Mauer has a good case due to his ability with the bat. Posada also looks strong offensively.

Baseball Reference Advanced Metrics

Let’s look next at the Baseball Reference advanced metrics, including OPS+, bWAR and the component elements that go into it.

Rbat = runs above or below average due to batting

Rfield = runs above or below average due to fielding

Rbaser = runs above or below average due to baserunning

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What can we learn from these numbers in conjunction from the previous graphic? Well, first of all, Mauer and Posada were terrific hitters. Posey was a superb batsman too but he’s 32 years old now and comes off a pretty awful campaign in which he posted a 84 OPS+.

In addition, among the pitch framing studs (Molina, Martin, McCann), Yadi is clearly the king defensively when it comes to cutting down runners on the bases. Of the three, McCann is the best hitter but we already knew that.

Putting this together with the Pitch Framing Stats

So, let’s now get back to the main point, the pitch framing skills of our man of the moment, Brian McCann. and how it alters his overall value compared to his peers of the last 32 years.

This graphic includes numbers gleaned from Jay Jaffe’s piece in March, along with the current numbers shown on FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus. The first column shows each catcher’s bWAR (from Baseball Reference); the second column displays their fWAR (from FanGraphs, the number you would see if you went to the site today). The third column (“Framing”) shows the estimated number of runs saved by each catcher by combining the numbers from BP (1988-07) and FG (2008-19). The final column (“Adj fWAR”) is what each backstop’s fWAR would look like if his pitch framing numbers from ’88-’07 were included.

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What’s interesting here, if you believe the numbers, is that McCann shows up as “only” the 4th best catcher of the 21st century. If you do a leader board search on FanGraphs from 2000-19, he’s in second place, behind our man Martin. What’s the difference? The 2000-07 pitch framing data from BP actually helps Mauer and Molina more than McCann. Regardless, these adjusted fWAR numbers are all really close, within a reasonable margin of error.

Meanwhile, pitch framing data drops Posada and Kendall far below Martin, Molina, Mauer, McCann and Posey among catchers from the last three decades.

What Else Does this Tell us about Brian McCann’s Worth?

McCann’s years as what one might call the “Pitch Framer in Chief” were from 2008-12, when he saved, according to FanGraphs, 133.2 runs from his excellence at stealing (or “revealing”) strikes. If you do a FanGraphs leader board for the top players for those five seasons, McCann comes out as the #1 position player in baseball, with a 32.7 fWAR.

You read that correctly. According to fWAR, Brian McCann was the best position player in all of baseball, edging out Albert Pujols. During these five years, Pujols’ slash line was .315/.406/.591 compared to McCann’s .271/.351/.467. Pujols hit 84 more home runs, drove in 177 more runs and scored 240 more runs. McCann trumps Prince Albert in fWAR because the pitch framing numbers cause him to rank as the best defensive player in the game for those five years, slightly ahead of Molina.

By the way, if you take a longer sample size (let’s say, seven years from 2007-14), McCann’s fWAR is second best, behind only Miguel Cabrera during his back-to-back MVP peak.

Do you believe this, that McCann was the most valuable position player from 2008-12 and the second most valuable from 2008-14? If you do, then he’s peak performance a Hall of Famer. Personally, I’m not buying it to that extent but pitch framing is real and it’s valuable.

There’s another problem with these numbers. If you look at “Defensive Runs above average” for all position players from 2008-12, the top eight are all catchers, with McCann clocking in with 280% above the best non-catcher (Brendan Ryan). If those numbers are truly correct, that the top eight defensive backstops were more valuable than every other position player, so be it. Call me skeptical. The creators of WAR consistently tinker with the formulas. It wouldn’t surprise me to create a new board in a year or two and see the numbers come out a little differently.

Choosing between Mauer, Molina, McCann, Martin & Posey

As we saw earlier, there are five 21st century catchers (McCann, Molina, Martin, Mauer and Posey) who are head and shoulders above the rest. They all have a fWAR between 52.5 and 55.2. The sixth best backstop by fWAR (from 2000-19) is Jonathan Lucroy, who is way back at 37.0. Posada (whose career began in 1995) is ranked 7th by fWAR at 35.7 because of his very poor pitch framing metrics.

This next tidbit is rather stunning. Besides Lucroy, whose career seems to be near its end, there are only two active catchers with a career fWAR of 20.0 or higher. They are Milwaukee’s Yasmani Grandal (32.6) and Tyler Flowers (way back at 20.1). Flowers is 33 and was McCann’s platoon mate in Atlanta this season. It’s virtually impossible that he would go from 20.1 to over 50.0 in his late 30’s.

If you’re choosing between the first five for the Hall of Fame, how many do you choose and who would you choose?

Molina seems to have the strongest overall case because he has the hardware (the 9 Gold Gloves) and, although his overall batting record is barely average, he’s had multiple big moments in postseason baseball, including his game-tying single and game-winning sacrifice fly in Game 4 of last week’s NLDS against McCann’s Braves.

Early in his career, Posey looked like a future Cooperstown inductee for sure but he is really wearing down and may be finished as a productive player. In his favor are his 3 rings and MVP trophy. Still, he has only 5,133 career plate appearances, which is fewer than all Hall of Fame catchers except for Roy Campanella, whose career ended early due to a car accident and began late due to the color barrier.

Mauer would be a peak performance Hall of Famer due to a 9-year run in which he hit .323 with a 135 OPS+, phenomenal numbers for a backstop. On the downside, Mauer was merely average in his last five seasons (as a first baseman).

What if one were to choose between McCann and Martin? The latter outperforms McCann in fWAR and the adjusted version based on the pitch framing data but McCann was a clearly superior hitter. It would be hard for me to rank Martin ahead solely on the basis of those pitch framing metrics.

Conclusion

OK, we’re over 4,000 words into this piece now. It’s time for the verdict. Does Brian McCann belong in the Hall of Fame? The answer will be perhaps unsatisfying. It’s “probably not” but “we don’t know yet for sure.” Based on traditional criteria that has been mostly used to judge Hall of Fame caliber players for the first 84 years of its existence, McCann doesn’t make the cut.

We are, however, in a new era, one that gives us data that was previously unavailable. This is an era in which players (especially catchers) can create immense value that is mostly hidden from the casual fan. That’s what the pitch framing metrics have done for backstops. McCann has the 10th highest fWAR and 5th highest WARP among all catchers but we’ve already established that you can’t use those metrics to compare the catchers of today to the catchers of days gone by.

This is why we don’t know yet whether McCann deserves to be in the Hall. Because of his announced retirement, McCann will first appear on the BBWAA ballot in December of 2024. If he’s able to get at least 5% of the vote on that first ballot (certainly not guaranteed), he’ll be on the ballot up until 2033 at the latest.

Why does this timeline matter? It’s probably obvious by now unless you have fallen asleep or scrolled through the stat-intensive sections. The timeline matters because, by December 2024, we’ll have 17 years of pitch framing data on FanGraphs. By December 2033, we’ll have 26 years. How will McCann’s numbers look 5 years from now? How about 15 years from now? Will he and Martin be surpassed by multiple current catchers?

Finally, will pitch framing even matter in 5 years? Say hello to the robo umps!

Whatever the ultimate Hall of Fame verdict will be for Brian McCann, he did have an excellent career, one filled with All-Star recognition and one that culminated with a World Series ring in his penultimate season. At least one former teammate feels that McCann belongs in Cooperstown.

“He’s going to be a fixture in this organization for a long time. I’m looking forward to going to his Hall of Fame (induction) — Braves Hall of Fame, and in my opinion the Baseball Hall of Fame, too. One heck of a player. Better person. One of the best offensive catchers I’ve ever seen. Not many catchers can say they had a thousand RBIs in their career. All the accolades — he has them all. Literally has them all. Special, special player.”

— Freddie Freeman (Braves 1B), reported in The Athletic (October 9, 2019)

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