Curt Casali

Casali joined the Giants last season and had a .663 OPS while operating as the backup to Buster Posey. Casali and Joey Bart are set to split catching duties this season in the wake of Posey's retirement. While Bart has the better bat, Casali is a more reliable defensive catcher who also hit .210/.313/.350 with five home runs and 26 RBI last season.

Casali has now put together three partial seasons with an OPS north of .800, four if you want to count 2017 with the Rays when had just 13 plate appearances. After posting a .224/.366/.500 line with the Reds in 2020, he was still non-tendered by the team in December, one of a slew of players who got such a treatment despite seemingly having a good year. Of course, the Reds have Tyler Stephenson waiting in the wings, and he is a legitimate prospect and comes at a cheaper price, which was important to the Reds heading into the 2020-21 offseason. Casali is a lefty-masher who now joins the Giants, behind not one but possibly two generational catchers, depending on what they do with Joey Bart to begin the season.

Casali served as Tucker Barnhart's backup in his second season with Cincinnati in 2019 and performed pretty much as a backup catcher should, registering a .251/.331/.411 slash line with eight home runs in 236 plate appearances. The batting average was a 42-point dropoff over the mark he posted in 2018, though it came with a modest increase in ISO (.159) and a more significant jump in walk rate (10.6 BB%). Casali's lower average is partly attributable to a downturn in contact rate, which dropped from 77.1% in 2018 to 71.5% last season. He also seemed to make a concerted effort to leave the yard more often, increasing his average launch angle from 13.5 to 19.0 degrees and his flyball rate from 21.8% to 31.8%. Casali figures to fall behind Barnhart again next season, which is just fine for a team with more pressing priorities. From a fantasy perspective, Casali is likely to remain irrelevant.

In nearly every season you can find a handful of backup catchers who post good rate stats in a limited sample, but who are also unlikely to produce at that rate the following season, let alone play often enough for you to roster them on your fantasy team. That pretty much applies to Casali, who hit .293/.355/.450 in 156 plate appearances as Tucker Barnhart's caddy in 2018. He even played six games at first base when Joey Votto was on the DL. Unfortunately for Casali, Barnhart is the superior defender behind the plate and is signed to a multi-year deal, so the path to playing time is blocked for him in Cincinnati. Oh well, at least he'll have a good Strat-o-Matic card this year.

Following a disappointing 2016 campaign, Casali spent most of 2017 on the farm after Jesus Sucre beat him out for the backup catcher job out of spring training. He hit .263 with a .351 on-base percentage across 85 games with Triple-A Durham, but didn't see the majors until rosters expanded in September due to the strong play of Sucre as the team's backup and his own lack of power with the Bulls (15 extra-base hits in 343 plate appearances). The 29-year-old did compile a .333/.462/.667 line with one homer in 13 plate appearances with the Rays last season, though the sample size is too small to draw any conclusions from. He owns a career .199/.285/.385 line across four major-league seasons. After signing with the Angels in the offseason, he'll have a chance to win the backup catcher job with his new team.

Casali endured a mostly miserable 2016 campaign at the plate, slashing just .186/.273/.336 over 256 plate appearances, although, as he had in 2015, he was able to offer some pop. The 28-year-old blasted eight homers, and 18 of his 42 hits went for extra bases. Casali figures to split time with Luke Maile to begin 2017, but they will simply be buying time for Tampa Bay until Wilson Ramos is healthy. Casali will chip in the occasional long ball, but due to what is once again likely to be limited playing time, he would only be worthy of consideration in very deep formats.

Not typically regarded as a major offensive threat, Casali surpised many with his productivity and power in 2015. In a small sample size of 113 plate appearances, the backstop hit 10 home runs and posted an .898 OPS despite a paltry .238 batting average. This was a stark contrast to the .674 OPS he posted with Triple-A Durham, but is still promising considering the lack of strong-hitting catchers the Rays have recently had. The 26-year-old has plenty of competition at catcher for the Rays, including Hank Conger, Rene Rivera and Justin O'Conner, but if he can show that his production wasn't a fluke, Casali could see more time with the big club in 2016.

Let’s be frank – the Rays care more about how catchers handle the pitching staff and frame pitches than they do offensive abilities at the plate. They haven’t developed an offensive catcher since Toby Hall and Casali is not going to end that trend. The organization likes how he works behind the plate, but his bat has been exposed since he got to Triple-A. With the offseason acquisition of Rene Rivera, Casali will go to Durham and split playing time with bigger prospect Justin O’Conner who has more offensive upside. Even in deep, two-catcher AL-only leagues, Casali is unlikely to offer a useful contribution.