Former big league catcher and current “Foul Territory” host Erik Kratz says Orioles catcher Adley Rutschman is “primed for an incredible season” following a rough second half in 2024 and has a suggestion for the Orioles as catching prospect Samuel Basallo inches closer to the major leagues.
Rutschman, 27, has been one of the best backstops in baseball since making his big league debut in 2022, hitting .261/.351/.421 with 52 home runs and racking up 13.1 bWAR in three seasons. However, he hit .189/.279/.280 from June 29 on last year, covering 290 plate appearances.
Some observers felt Rutschman had to have been playing hurt to perform so poorly down the stretch, pointing to a foul tip that hit his right hand on June 27 and lower back discomfort that forced him to be a late scratch on Aug. 16. Kratz remains confident in Rutschman regardless of what led to the second-half struggles.
“Can I say zero concern? And then Baltimore is going to say, ‘Yeah, but I saw it. I watched it. There’s definitely concern,'” Kratz said on Glenn Clark Radio Feb. 26 after visiting Orioles camp in Sarasota a couple of days prior. “I don’t know how to say there’s zero concern other than I got some insight about what he went through and how he made the change, and I’m going to say there’s zero concern.”
Kratz caught in the big leagues for nine different teams from 2010-2020, so he knows what catchers fight through physically throughout the course of a 162-game season. Never a primary starter behind the dish, Kratz had his best season with the Phillies in 2012, when he hit .248/.306/.504 with nine homers in 157 plate appearances.
Kratz explained that players sometimes go through various challenges — like health or off-the-field difficulties — that affect their performance on the field. Players can’t press pause on the season, so they’re going to fight through those challenges if at all possible.
Kratz says to bet on Rutschman to bounce back.
“This is probably my naïve, positive player self. I would push all my chips into Adley Rutschman,” Kratz said. “… To me, when you talk about elite players and they have a struggle and there’s not something where you’re like, ‘Well, you know, he’s on the wrong side of 33 years old,’ I would double down on what you think Adley Rutschman can do because I think he is primed for an incredible season.”
The Orioles signed veteran Gary Sánchez to a one-year, $8.5 million deal to back up Rutschman in 2025, but the club may very well have an exciting young backstop to pair with Rutschman by 2026 in Samuel Basallo, one of the top prospects in baseball. He is expected to spend most or all of the 2025 season at Triple-A Norfolk but could be ready to contribute at the big league level by next year.
Basallo, 20, is a career .286/.364/.477 hitter with 121 extra-base hits across four minor league seasons and has a big-time throwing arm from behind the dish. He’s listed at 6-foot-4 and 180 pounds, but he’s much bigger than that at this point. Could Basallo and Rutschman split the catching duties in 2026 while finding at-bats at first base or DH when not catching?
“If the players buy in, if it helps the team be the best team, yes, it’s very practical,” Kratz said. “Is that fair to Adley Rutschman? Let’s say you really, really love Samuel. Everything I’ve heard, they love him. Everything I’ve seen, I love him. But … you have an All-Star at the position and you sit there and you go, ‘Is it fair to Adley?’ Each year you’re getting closer to free agency. Is it fair to not have him extended and do that to him?”
Rutschman is scheduled to hit free agency after the 2027 season. Kratz has an idea for how to eliminate any potential awkwardness once Basallo arrives.
“If you want to do that, go ahead and extend Adley right now,” Kratz said. “You extend him and you get that certainty, and I guarantee you he’s good with playing first base — not in his walk year. If he’s doing that in his walk year or the year before his walk year, it [takes away] some of his value. It’s not saying he’s a selfish person. It’s saying he’s played a long time to get to free agency and you need to give him that opportunity to freakin’ play his position.”
For more from Kratz, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox