Is Catcher Prospect Carson Kelly The Answer For The Atlanta Braves?
By Alex Burke
Who is Carson Kelly?
To put it simply, Kelly is a very highly-touted catching prospect. He’s mentioned in both MLB.com (#37) and Baseball America’s (#65) top-100 prospect lists for 2017.
While the two sites differ on whether he’s the best catcher in the minors right now (MLB thinks so), they both agree that he has great defensive tools.
MLB.com graded Kelly’s arm a 60, with a 65 for fielding. These are both above-average, especially the fielding, which was the only 65 given for fielding among any of the top-10 catchers in the minors. Baseball America has Kelly’s arm at a 60, with his fielding at a 70.
Kelly would immediately bolster Atlanta’s ability to throw stealing base runners out. Last season, Tyler Flowers threw out only three base runners in 63 tries, or just under 4.8% of the time. This ranks as the worst by a catcher with at least 600 innings logged as the next worst was 13.6% by Nick Hundley.
Carson Kelly, on the other hand, had a CS% of 31% in 90 games between the Cardinals’ AA and AAA affiliates last season. This comes a season after Kelly won the Gold Glove Award for catchers in the minor leagues. So… yeah– this guy is good.
He’s just 22 years old from Chicago and was a former third baseman until the Cards moved him behind the plate in 2014, a move that’s certainly paid off.
Kelly is now knocking at the door of the major leagues after going through every level in the minors, even seeing a little bit of time in the majors last year.
But now… Yadi is gonna be sticking around for a while. Whether the Cardinals factor that into their price is a matter for debate.