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Brian Cartwright ran a study on catcher basestealing prevention for Fangraphs. "The task is to seperate the catcher's ability to throw out base stealers from that of the pitchers they are teamed with," Cartwright wrote. Among his findings …
1) New Dodger backup Brad Ausmus has been trending sharply downward in effectiveness, though the low rate of stealing attempts against him implies that opponents haven't realized it.
2) Henry Blanco, signed for cheaper dollars by the Padres on the same day the Dodgers agreed to terms with Ausmus, has the best caught-stealing percentage for a catcher over the past six years. "At age 36, Blanco has shown no signs of slowing down, having a normal CS% over .500 in 3 of the past 4 seasons," Cartwright said.
3) Dodger starting catcher Russell Martin fared above-average in the study, with a normalized caught-stealing percentage of .325 that ranked sixth in the majors last season.
In the comments on the study, Dodger Thoughts reader Xeifrank questions its viability.
Kent was a very good player for a long time, and an often misunderstood one. His lack of charisma and his businesslike approach made him an easy target, though his humorlessness should never have been confused with a lack of passion for the game. From this vantage point, he looks to be a borderline Hall of Famer at best. Even with no particular love lost for him as a fan—one who spent years rooting against him as a Giant before settling down and appreciating his uneven virtues with the Dodgers—I'll admit that this still contradicts my gut instinct, but then that's one of the reasons for the five-year waiting period before a player reaches the ballot. Nonetheless, I strongly suspect he'll find his way into Cooperstown in due time, and if that's the case, it will hardly be the crime of the century.
Either that or Ausmus typically only gets put in the game at a point when opponents are unlikely to steal (i.e. when one team is way ahead).
Blanco will test that theory because Padres have given up a lot of stolen bases in the past few seasons.
Finally, I think teams like the veteran backup because he usually has an idea about the hitters in the league.
GB to Left 37/142 .261
GB to Center 20/45 .444
GB to Right 8/18 .444
Lex, use Kemp as an example for getting out of the box :)
No question, Martin played a lot last year but he only started 3 more games than Mauer, 6 more games than McGann and Benji Molina. Now, he did play more games at catcher than those other players but I think Martin isn't going to go down to 120-125 starts no matter who the back up is going to be. But also remember this, Martin has said this off-season that he is beginning to realize that he does need to take more days off (I believe he had at least some say in this with Torre last year) so I would not be surprised if he takes more time off, even in the early going of the season.
Either way, hes no Milton Bradley.
But to answer your question, I'd rather see him around 145 than 155, with more rest in the first half.
He also started 8 games at 3B.
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