Over the course of seven seasons as a Milwaukee Brewer, two of which he was named to the NL All-Star team, catcher Jonathan Lucroy terrorized the Pittsburgh Pirates. Over those seven seasons Lucroy made the NL All-Star team twice while batting .284 and being among the best defensive catchers in the game.
Since being traded to the Texas Rangers at the 2016 trade deadline Lucroy has been on five different teams and has had his struggles. In 2017 Lucroy had his last really good stretch of baseball in Colorado, after a mid-season trade from Texas, he hit .310 and was the main stay behind the dish for the divisional round appearance by the Rockies.
Since then Lucroy has been, well, not good enough to be any team’s true number one catcher. Seeing time with the Athletics, Angels, and Cubs, he hasn’t been able to find his groove behind the plate and his defense has been slowly regressing.
After this rough stint and at the age of thirty-three, he will be looking for a one-year deal on the cheap side to try to regain value and then enter the market again next off-season. With ten seasons and plenty of NL Central experience under his belt the Pirates should look at taking a chance on the one-time superstar. The Pirates wouldn’t be getting the elite 2012 through 2016 Jonathan Lucroy, and that’s okay, they just need him to be average and provide leadership for this young team.
If the new front office believes that Jacob Stallings can become that everyday catcher the organization is in desperate need of, or if they think that they need to give him a chance to prove that he can be that guy, a veteran catcher with experience is exactly what Stallings needs in his corner. Out of all the catchers left on the free agent market, very few can bring that to the table the way Jonathan Lucroy does. On a one-year deal, Lucroy could prove to be a very good signing for 2020 and beyond.
