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2007 Lo Duca wouldn`t have been blamed if he had done his traditional second-half fade last year, or even a first-half fade, given that his marriage imploded in full view of the public when his wife filed for divorce and his affair with a 19 year old hit the tabloids. Instead, Lo Duca seemed to thrive on the adversity, `enjoying` his most consistent season since 2001. Reversing his historical pattern, he was actually better in the second half, batting .338/.369/.450 after the break versus .302/.343/.409 before it. Defensively, Lo Duca has some problems. Catchers` fielding percentages are misleading because they receive a putout for each strikeout caught, thereby disguising their rate of errors on plays in which they actually are active participants. With the strikeouts removed, the fielding percentage for all catchers who caught 100 or more innings last year was .919. Lo Duca made 10 errors in 80 chances for a .875 percentage, which ranked 59th in a group of 72. Limit that group to catchers with 400 or more innings caught and he was 29th out of 33. Over the last three seasons, the `true` fielding percentage of catchers with more than 1000 innings caught was .933; Lo Duca`s .920 ranked 27th of 36. Lo Duca`s contract is up at the end of the year, and given his age and the weakness of his game beyond batting average, the Mets should be considering possible replacements. 2006 Here`s a Frank Loesser/Hoagy Carmichael tune going out to all of the L.A. writers from the gang at BP: `Heart and soul, I fell in love with you? Heart and soul, the way a fool would do, madly, because you held me tight? and stole a kiss in the night?` The erstwhile heart, soul, and solar plexus of the Dodgers, for whom sun coast scribes still nurse giant, unfulfilled man-crushes, turns out to be a run-of-the-mill ballplayer when it comes to doing the things like hitting? and fielding, only the main parts of a ballplayer`s job. Leadership doesn`t compensate for shortcomings in those departments, no matter how much willfully na?ve romantics would like to believe otherwise. Traded to the Mets, he`ll be the scrappy, popular esophagus of the club, and he may even pick up a home run or two he lost to Dolphins Stadium, but not many more than that. Signed through 2007; he won`t be a Met past that point. 2005 That 690 OPS as a Marlin includes a hot first week in teal. Just as he'd done in '02 and '03, he fell apart in August and September. Lo Duca's ability to stay in the lineup and hit for decent averages will earn him a pretty penny in arbitration, far more than he's likely to be worth on the field. The Dodgers got the best years of his career for less than $8 million, or near what Lo Duca will make in 2005 alone. 2003 In last year’s book, we wrote: “His fundamental skills are very good, so there’s no reason to believe he won’t perform as well as the projection above indicates.” So what went wrong? Maybe not as much as you’d think. Lo Duca’s home runs plunged from 25 to 10, but his doubles spiked to 38 from 28, suggesting bad luck more than sudden skill erosion. Lo Duca’s still a solid hitter for a catcher—he rarely walks, rarely strikes out and drives the ball into the ample Dodger Stadium gaps. He has worked hard to become an asset behind the plate too. The victim of two late-season fades in a row, the Dodgers hope Todd Hundley can soak up enough starts to keep Lo Duca fresh into September. 2002 Uh...okay. We don't know where his 2001 performance came from, but we're impressed. LoDuca came out of nowhere to have a great, insanely strange season, and he was a big part of keeping the Dodgers in contention when they really didn't belong there. LoDuca is solid defensively, and most of the pitchers like working with him behind the plate. His fundamental skills are very good, so there's no reason to believe that he won't perform as well as the projection above indicates. 2001 Along with Kreuter, Paul LoDuca gives the Dodgers a couple of good #2 catchers. If Angel Pena doesn't get over his weight problems, the Dodgers can get by in 2001. Beyond that, they'll have to find a more permanent solution. 2000 The current organizational frown directed at Angel Pena could earn LoDuca some more time towards his pension. He may actually be a better fit than Pena for the platoon/defensive replacement role. LoDuca deserves a major-league job, certainly ahead of the Kirt Manwaring and Joe Girardi types. 1996 He was converted to catcher this season, after primarily being a first baseman and DH, and between Piazza, Huckaby, and eventually Ryan Luzinski, he has no future in the organization.
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