Glove isn’t the only thing that a catcher needs now

Brett Lawrie, at 6 feet tall, can dunk a basketball.

He can also hit a baseball. When Canada’s junior national team went on a spring tour of the Dominican Republic, Lawrie hit .486 with eight home runs and 24 runs batted in.

The question is whether he can catch.

Lawrie, an 18-year-old native of British Columbia, did not begin playing behind the plate until last summer, at the suggestion of Greg Hamilton, his national team coach.

That did not deter the Milwaukee Brewers from making Lawrie the 16th pick overall in last month’s major league draft.

The selection of Lawrie, whom Dodgers catcher and fellow Canadian Russell Martin calls the most athletic catcher in the game, points to a recent trend emphasizing offense at that position. Four of the first 16 players selected last month were strong-hitting catchers. And five of the six catchers at Tuesday’s All-Star game were young players with impressive offensive numbers.

Chad Kreuter, USC head coach and a big league catcher for 16 years, said that previously the typical approach was to “put a big kid that can’t do anything else behind the plate.”

Now, rather than taking offense as a bonus to solid defense, Kreuter and many of his colleagues believe teams will sacrifice something on the defensive end if a player is skilled enough offensively.

“Everybody wants to have as much offense at every position as you can have,” said Pat Casey, head baseball coach at Oregon State. “A lot of it depends on how offensive you are at other places. Can you afford to be more defensive behind the plate?”

But many in baseball say that despite the 2008 draft, and the emergence of young stars such as Joe Mauer of the Twins and rookie Geovany Soto of the Cubs -- Tuesday night’s starters behind the plate -- handling pitchers and playing defense remain the most important skills for catchers.

“Offense is secondary,” said Angels Manager Mike Scioscia, a former catcher. “The catcher is going to influence a major league game more than anyone on the field by calling 140 or 150 pitches.”

Added Jason LaRue, backup catcher for the St. Louis Cardinals: “I think they expected more offensive numbers out of some catchers but only a few guys can do it.”

In Lawrie, the Brewers see potential.

“We took what we felt was the best player available,” said Jack Zduriencik, vice president and special assistant to the general manager for player personnel with the Brewers. “He’s played everywhere and this kid wants to be a catcher. We think he’s an offensive player.”

Lawrie was not the only catcher described as an offensive player taken in June’s draft.

Buster Posey, taken fifth overall by San Francisco, led all of college baseball in batting average for Florida State, and Stanford’s Jason Castro, drafted 10th by Houston, led the Pacific 10 Conference in hits. But the one who drew comparisons to Mauer, a former No. 1 pick, was the sixth pick, Kyle Skipworth, who, like the Twins’ Mauer, is a tall, left-handed hitting catcher just out of high school.

According to Jim Fleming, vice president of player personnel and scouting for the Florida Marlins, who drafted Skipworth, every team is looking for a catcher who can hit and excels behind the plate.

“It’s almost like getting two players at once,” he said.

While Skipworth’s defense has been seen and evaluated, Lawrie’s is still mostly unknown. Few doubt his hitting ability or athleticism, and it is the latter that many feel will help him become a great catcher.

“He’s got a long way to go defensively, but he has the athletic ability to be a good defensive catcher,” Martin said.

Despite drafting Skipworth, Fleming is among the many who still believe offense is just a bonus. Others, like Joe McIlvaine, a special assistant for the Minnesota Twins, believe there has been a shift in the game.

“If you come to a manager and are trying to sell him on a catcher, the first question is not can he catch and throw, but can he hit,” McIlvaine said. “It’s almost the same way at every position. It is so offense oriented.”

The bigger question for McIlvaine or USC’s Kreuter is why this shift has happened. Mike Gillespie, head coach at UC Irvine, points to a decrease in base stealing.

“You just don’t see the base-stealing skills among major league players you once saw,” Gillespie said. “There wasn’t quite a concern about the running game. People probably felt you could prioritize offense more.”

With fewer base stealers and pitchers delivering the ball to the plate faster every year, one attribute scouts typically seek -- arm strength -- has become less significant. Yet, most subscribe to McIlvaine’s theory of shifting trends.

“Without a doubt we’ve seen a swing in things over the years,” Gillespie said. He believes that just as shortstop became a more offensive position with the rise of Alex Rodriguez and Nomar Garciaparra, so catcher has with Martin and Mauer.

“I think the game in general has become offensive,” said Eric Kubota, scouting director for the Oakland Athletics. Recent offensive numbers support Kubota and McIlvaine’s beliefs. According to STATS LLC, 31 qualified catchers have hit over .300 since 2000, 11 more than between 1970 and 1990.

With power numbers down across the major leagues this season, what McIlvaine and others are waiting to see is whether there is a swing back.

“A lot of these younger guys these days put the emphasis on hitting,” LaRue said. “It’s starting to revert back. It is a defensive position not an offensive position.”