Philadelphia Phillies Greatest Catchers: Andy Seminick, Darren Daulton and…Jack Clements?

Who was the greatest catcher in Philadelphia Phillies history, at least based on their contributions while they played for the Phillies? If we limit our discussion to those backstops who played for the Phillies in a minimum of five major league seasons, it’s a position that has nine receivers worth mentioning, and one that has some quality depth.

How deep? The one-time major league career leader in games played behind the plate, and a fine defensive catcher, Bob Boone, doesn’t even make the first cut.

You see, the awful truth is that Boonie wasn’t much of a hitter; his Adjusted OPS for the Phillies was just 90.

A better hitter, in fact a better hitter than many people thought he would be, was Mike Lieberthal. A skinny kid out of high school when the Phillies drafted him with the third pick of the 1990 draft, Lieberthal was often dismissed as an inadequate hitter, right up until he took over the regular catching job and hit 20 home runs in 1997. Although injuries sometimes derailed his play, he spent most of the next 10 years as the Phillies regular backstop, eventually hitting 150 home runs and topping .300 twice.

Still, his OPS+ with the Phillies was just 102, and there were several other catchers who were demonstrably better hitters than Lieberthal. Quite oddly, two of them played in Philadelphia at basically the same time.

Phillies fans of a certain age will recall the catcher for the Whiz Kids, Andy Seminick, who, it might be noted, had the highest OPS+ for the team in 1950. Seminick, the first of the Whiz Kids to join the team, played for the Phillies from 1943 to 1951, and from 1955 to 1957. However, almost at the same time (1948 to 1958), Stan Lopata also caught for the Phillies, and, hitting out of his distinctive crouch, he had both a higher OPS+ overall for the Phillies (117 to 110) and his Wins Above Replacement (WAR) came in two higher (17.7 to 15.7) than Seminick’s. Not surprisingly, his slash line was better as well, .257/.355/.459 to .244/.351/.419 for Seminick.

So, it looks like Stash was the better hitter, but, the more important question is, who was the regular? One opinion comes from Bill James, in the “New Historical Baseball Abstract.” James rates Seminick the 57th best catcher of all time, but he also notes that Seminick never batted more than 406 times in a season, and concludes by saying, “He never was a true regular.”

That’s an interesting take, but what exactly is a “true regular?” There are a lot of ways you can define that concept, but it seems like the simplest might be to give the tag “regular” to anyone who played more games at that position than anyone else on his team for a specific year. At the very least, that person would be more regular at the position than anyone else.

Seminick was the Phillies “regular” catcher for eight of the 14 seasons he spent with the Phillies: 1945-1951 and 1955. Here are the top three Phillies catchers, in terms of games played, for each of Grandpa Whiz’ 14 years in Philadelphia.

 

1943

• Mickey Livingston 84
• Bob Finley 24
• Andy Seminick 22

1944

• Bob Finley 74
• Johnny Peacock 73
• Andy Seminick 11

1945

• Andy Seminick 70
• Gus Mancuso 70
• Hal Spindel 31

1946

• Andy Seminick 118
• Rollie Hemsley 45
• Dee Moore 6

1947

• Andy Seminick 109
• Don Padgett 39
• Al Lakeman 23

1948

• Andy Seminick 124
• Al Lakeman 22
• Don Padgett 19

1949

• Andy Seminick 98
• Stan Lopata 58
• Ken Silvestri 1
• Hal Wagner 1

1950

• Andy Seminick 124
• Stan Lopata 51
• Ken Silvestri 9

1951

• Andy Seminick 91
• Del Wilbur 73
• Ken Silvestri 3

1955

• Andy Seminick 88
• Stan Lopata 66
• Gus Niarhos 7

Once Seminick was an established major leaguer, he was the Phillies No. 1 catcher. It wasn’t until after he came back from the Reds (the Redlegs in those post-Joe McCarthy days) that Lopata really challenged him for playing time, finally taking the regular job in 1956 when he caught 102 games to Seminick’s 54.

So, yes, Seminick was a regular for eight seasons, it’s just that he never caught a huge number of games, nor did he get a lot of at-bats.

The following chart shows where Seminick ranked in terms of games caught among National League catchers during those eight seasons, as well as the number of games caught by the league leader each year. Seminick never led the NL in games caught, in fact he was only a close second twice.

Year Andy Rank Leader 1945 70 8 (T) 96 1946 118 2 124 1947 109 4 (T) 132 1948 124 2 125 1949 98 2 127 1950 124 3 139 1951 91 4 140 1955 88 7 131

While the league leader was catching an average of 127 games during those eight seasons, Seminick was catching an average of just 103 games per year. Plus, he only had more than 300 at bats in a season five times (1946-1950) for the Phillies in 14 years. And, he only had a quality backup—Lopata—in three of those years (1949, 1950 and 1955). So why didn’t Seminick catch more? Maybe it was injuries, he was a ferocious blocker of the plate—Robin Roberts described him as being tougher than an old boot.

Or maybe it was because his defensive WAR for the Phillies was -2.1, meaning he was sub-par defensively. It’s also worth noting that he led NL catchers in errors five times (despite never leading the league in games played), and in fielding percentage once. His caught stealing and steals allowed numbers weren’t great, but that could as well be blamed on the Phillies pitchers.

Balance it all out, and Seminick is a viable candidate for the greatest. Still, he only comes in third.

Among the others who don’t make the cut are Tim McCarver, a similar story to Lopata. Although he played in parts of nine seasons with the Phillies (OPS+ of 109), he only actually caught in 367 games in Philadelphia, an average of just about 40 per year (and no, those weren’t the 40 games a year Steve Carlton used to start), so he wasn’t a regular catcher, either.

One other candidate, Virgil “Spud” Davis, put up a pretty good slash line in Philadelphia over nine seasons (only four as a regular): .321/.374/.449, but that was in the 1930s, when everyone hit that well, especially if they played half their games in Baker Bowl. His career OPS+ with the Phillies was 111; pretty good, but he never played in the postseason, and except for a high average, he wasn’t really exceptional—his WAR with the Phillies was an unexciting 12.6 for 814 games.

Davis was essentially the same player (didn’t walk much, not much power) as Ed McFarland, who posted a 112 OPS+ over five years with the Phillies at the turn of the 19th Century. He only played a lot in one season (1898) and played in just 423 games in a Phillies uniform, posting a WAR of 10.8.

If you’ve been keeping count, you’ll know there are just two candidates left: one of whom you’ve heard of, and one of whom you may not have heard of. Different players, in more ways then one, they nonetheless proved to be very difficult to choose between. Years ago, before fears of left-handedness (or something like that) took over, a species known as Sinister Backstoppius, or the left-handed catcher, roamed the ballparks of America. And that’s not the cameo appearances of your Dale Longs or Mike Squires.

There were real left-handed catchers back in the 19th Century, and the best (and the last) of them was Jack Clements, the pride of Norristown and the Philadelphia Phillies. Clements played for the Phillies from 1884 to 1897, most of the time as their regular catcher, although in that era catchers didn’t typically play every game, since the pounding they took on their poorly protected anatomies tended to pile up during a season.

Still, Clements played 1000 games for the Phillies, and he could hit, topping out at a .394 batting average in 1895 (still the major league record for a catcher), and a 171 OPS+ that same season. His Phillies career produced a .289/.352/.426 slash line, an OPS+ of 118 and a WAR of 29.5. His defensive part of his WAR was 6.2, so statistically he was a better than average catcher, although logic would also dictate that he must have been pretty good behind the plate to have stayed there for as long as he did, when all the other left-handed catchers were being turned in to first basemen or farmers.

The counterpoint to Clements is one Darren Daulton, also known as Dutch, the leader of, as John Kruk called them, a bunch of gypsies, tramps and thieves also known as the 1993 Phillies that went from worst to first to the World Series. Although his early years (1985 to 1989) with the Phillies were pretty worthless except for 138 at bats in 1986, when he showed both power and the ability to take a walk, Daulton (to the surprise of many, including Bill James) eventually became a superb offensive player, with peripheral stats to die for.

As it turned out, his eight home runs and 38 walks in 1986 were indicative of the type of offensive contributions he could, and did, make later in his career. Although typically he didn’t hit for a high average (outside of a .300 mark for 69 games in 1994), his slash line for his 1109 Phillies games was .245/.357/.427, which shows how good his Isolated Discipline and Isolated Power were.

Leaving out the five games he played in 1996 (when one of his knee injuries kept him out almost the entire year), Daulton’s last five OPS+ figures for the Phillies were 156, 135, 137, 101 and 124. And, he also became a very rare catcher to lead his league in major statistical category, topping the NL in RBIs (109) in 1992. For his Phillies career, his OPS+ was 114, with a WAR of 21.9. He was also a slightly sub-par defensive catcher (based on a negative defensive WAR).

However, to judge Darren Daulton fairly, you have to go beyond the obvious. He was the de facto captain of a team that went to the World Series (his on base percentage for the 1993 postseason was just under .400). He had some power and got a LOT of walks (his on base percentage for the 1993 season was .392).

But there were some other things he could do. His career stolen base totals were 50 steals and only 10 caught stealing—a percentage in the top 10 all-time for those individuals with 50 or more steals. And, he only hit into 34 double plays as a Phillie, an average of less than three a season. Richie Ashburn, for goodness sakes, hit into more double plays per year than Darren Daulton.

It’s a difficult choice, but, even though Clements had a better OPS+, a better WAR and was a better receiver, Darren Daulton, based on his leadership, his peripherals, his postseason performance and his slightly longer Phillies career, gets this vote as the Phillies all-time greatest catcher.

Read more Philadelphia Phillies news on BleacherReport.com