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2008 Note to all red asses: your job security is entirely tied to your performance, and your act gets old fast when you stop hitting. In the first half of last season, Barrett had significant problems making contact with anything other than Carlos Zambrano's face and was promptly shipped to San Diego, where the only thing he hit was the disabled list following an August concussion. Barrett surprised the Padres by accepting arbitration, and thus starts the year as Bard's backup. He's a strong candidate to be traded should his bat returns. 2007 Protective gear in baseball has come a long way, but it wasn`t enough to save Barrett from a foul tip. Barrett took a hit that broke his cup, leaving him with an interscrotal hematoma that ended his season in early September. The shame of it was that he was on his way to a career year at the plate. His already poor defense took a turn for the worse in 2006, though much of that may have been related to turnover on the pitching staff. He threw out only 15 percent of opposing baserunners, and he`s had his problems handling power stuff. Another poor year behind the plate could put a big dent in his 2008 date with free agency. 2006 Since Ron Santo`s day, Cubs fans have fetishized their concern over third base. But their catching hasn`t been too solid either, not since Randy Hundley was Santo`s teammate. An underrated player, Barrett became the first Cubs starting catcher to post back-to-back good seasons since Jody Davis nearly 20 years ago. He should make it three in a row this year. Concerns about his weakness against the running game are overstated; the Cubs feature a lot of slow-delivery power pitchers and it would take a small howitzer to compensate. 2005 Analysts don't like to give a lot of credence to the notion that a change of scenery ought to produce a marked change in outcomes. But one wonders whether expatriates from the Montreal/San Juan traveling road show warrant an exception, particularly somebody like Barrett, whose minor league numbers had always suggested a player who was underachieving his skill set. It surely also helped that Barrett stayed healthy the entire season and was given the comfort of a regular job at a regular position, and it may be that he is one of those players who benefited from getting the good, mentoring half of Dusty Baker. Barrett enters this season just a hair shy of five years of MLB service time, so the Cubs will have two years to determine whether he's a quick fix or a longer-term solution. PECOTA thinks it's the former. 2003 Though much has been made of his 1999 rookie season and the promise it offered for the future, Barrett has mostly been a hitter who looks good when a few more balls drop in for hits, mediocre when they don’t. After ringing up 53 extra-base hits in Harrisburg in 1998, Barrett’s gotten by largely on his knack for slapping pitches to the opposite field. His .348/.418/.638 April offered a world of hope, then faded from view as the year wore on and his production waned. Barrett may be a few small adjustments away from breaking through. Whether the Expos want to wait on the talented catcher who can’t bring himself to pull the ball enough to be dangerous is another matter. The Expos had a great trade match with Texas staring them in the face, but John Hart blinked and overpaid for Einar Diaz instead, making another year of Barrett likely, at a non-bargain price. 2002 The Expos came to their senses, stationing Barrett behind home plate and leaving him there all season. In last year’s book, we theorized that such a move would cause Barrett’s offense to resurface, but we were mistaken—at least so far. There is a school of thought that says catchers develop more slowly with the bat because they have to focus so much on their defense. The Expos hope that Barrett is enrolled there; if not, he won’t graduate to the level he appeared headed towards in 1999. 2001 Michael Barrett’s core skills are like those of a hockey goalie: he’s all whip-snap reactions, bordering on downright twitchy. That kind of athleticism got him in trouble, because it was impressive enough to coax people into thinking he could play anywhere and everywhere when he’s best left at catcher. He was shut down early with elbow problems that affected his throwing and batting. Barrett is a great bet to start meeting the expectations of a year ago, before the distractions about his position became a problem. 2000 Barrett is an interesting player because his talents are basically all quickness-oriented. Not speed, but quickness: quick wrists as a hitter and quick reactions and nimble footwork at third base or behind the plate. His opportunity came a few months sooner than expected when both Chris Widger and Bob Henley were hurt in spring training, but it helped that he was an already an Alou favorite. Whether they’ll let him become a regular at catcher or third base is up in the air, but he’ll do them the most good behind the plate. 1999 The phenom, as the Montreal press is fond of calling him, took a nice step forward this year by crushing Eastern League pitching. He just switched to catching in '96, so his solid defense there is quite impressive. Still, mentioning him in the same breath as Sir Vlad is premature; Barrett's OPS of .883 pales next to Vlad's Harrisburg OPS of 1.050, and Vlad was only 20 at that time. Like nearly all Expo farmhands, needs to get on base more often. 1998 This former first-round pick is a kind of reverse Biggio, a shortstop-turned-catcher. Hard to know what to make of such a conversion. On one hand, the Expos deserve credit for trying something unusual, but it seems likely Barrett’s progress as a hitter will not be helped by the on-the-job training he’s getting behind the plate. Only 21, plenty of time to develop.
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