The Catching Conundrum

The Catching Conundrum

Thoughts from Cary Greene

May 13, 2026

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I was the low man on the totem pole regarding Austin Wells this offseason. Offensively, Wells takes his walks at a well above average clip and he appears to understand the strike zone, but while there's a lot to like about Wells defensively and some things to like about him offensively, his main problem in the batter's box this season is that he just doesn't barrel balls up regularly enough. The eye test even confirms this, as it appears he's often taking mighty hacks yet only rarely does he square one up - all too often he fouls pitches off or misses them entirely.

Wells also seems to get under the ball too much, in an effort to smash one over the short porch in right-field, but he winds up popping up way too much and StatCast backs this notion up entirely. This season, he's making too much weak contact and he's struggling to barrel balls up - plain and simple.

Meanwhile, it's as if the Department of Redundancy Department put the Yankees 2026 catching plan in place. While I do loves me some left-handed catching to go with my cornbread, why on earth would a team want two left-handed catchers on the same roster? J.C. Escarra is another fine defensive catcher, but he's far too similar a player to be backing up Austin Wells. It's like ordering rice to go with your mashed potatoes, why on earth would you want not one, but two starches when you could have some greens? In my estimation, the Yankees really ought to stick with Austin Wells for the time being. That said, what they should do is what I was in support of doing this offseason.

My offseason suggestion came and went, I was in support of Cashman trading for a right-handed catcher with a power profile. In fact, I even went so far as to suggest that the Yankees should trade for Alex Jackson, who is a right-hand hitting catcher in the Twins organization. Jackson was originally drafted by the Mariners in the First Round of the 2014 MLB Draft - he was picked sixth overall. If ever there was a catcher to take a flyer on, Jackson is it. He checks all the boxes, he wouldn’t cost a lot of prospect capital to acquire and he wouldn’t even dent the Yankees massive payroll.

 I’d like to revisit this notion today. Rather surprisingly, Jackson didn’t wind up making the Twins opening day roster. Somehow, Jackson cleared waivers near the end of March of this year and he accepted an outright assignment to the Twins Triple-A affiliate, St. Paul, in late March. Presently, he’s serving as organizational catching depth.

The last place Twins traded away most of their bullpen at last season’s Trade Deadline, so they were in need of nearly ready relievers that they would be able to fast track to their bullpen. This offseason I wrote that Jackson qualifies as a quintessential candidate to become the weak part of a catching platoon. He posted a 178 wRC+ last season against left-handed pitching, while also recording an unplayably bad 80 wRC+ against right-handed pitching. Jackson is also a good defensive catcher who features a strong arm and very good pitch framing skills.

Even a Yankees prospect like Brendan Beck would be a huge overpay on the Yankees part, but he’d likely motivate the Twins to make a deal. If not Beck, the Yankees have numerous other pitching prospects that wouldn’t be very painful to deal away.

I’m sick to my stomach that Carlos Narvaez, whom the Yankees traded to the Red Sox for Elmer Rodriguez is worth $31.5 MTV per BaseballTradeValues.com - Cashman really should have hung onto Narvaez, as platooning him with Austin Wells seemed at the time to be a bit of a no-brainer.

Yet here we are. The Yankees need a right-handed catcher and the price of good catchers on the open market is astronomically high - hence my preference of trading for an under the radar type like Alex Jackson.