Guardians officially usher in new era by acquiring Patrick Bailey from Giants

At the end of April the Cleveland Guardians teased fans of what the new era of Guardians baseball could look like by calling up top prospect Travis Bazzana from Triple-A. 

They officially ushered that new era in on Saturday by acquiring catcher Patrick Bailey from the San Francisco Giants in exchange for pitching prospect Matt Wilkinson and the No. 29 pick in this year’s MLB Draft. 

While Bailey likely won’t solve the Guardians’ long-term search for offense behind the plate, it all but confirms the Guardians' long-term future behind the plate is Bailey and Cooper Ingle, who is currently tearing it up in Triple-A. 

Guardians load up on defense with addition of Patrick Bailey

The biggest reason why the Guardians were able to acquire Bailey is because his offense has fallen off a cliff this season, as he’s gone just 12-for-82 (.146) in 30 games. He’s a two-time Gold Glove winner who ranks among baseball’s best at pop time, caught stealing percentage and framing. 

Now he’s going to form one of the best defensive backstop tandems with Austin Hedges, who is highly-regarded for his work behind the plate and has guided Cleveland’s pitchers to a 3.00 ERA in the 126 innings he’s caught. 

Hedges has also provided the Guardians with some surprising punch at the plate (.306 batting average). Even if it’s hard to believe that’ll continue, the quality of his at-bats have been better than they have been in years prior. 

But it seems clear that this catching tandem is a temporary situation until Cooper Ingle inevitably gets the call up from the minors. Ingle’s slashed an incredible .408/.597/.755 with five home runs and 19 RBI in 19 games at Triple-A this season and is clearly big league ready. 

This move opens up a future where the Guardians could roll with a Bailey/Ingle tandem behind the plate with Bailey taking Hedges’ mantle as Cleveland’s defensive savant behind the plate. Plus it’s not like he could do worse than Bo Naylor (.143 batting average in 28 games). 

Naylor has all the talent in the world but he has yet to capitalize on it outside of two separate September surges. 

He’s going to have an opportunity to reset and work on his craft behind the scenes in the minors, but it’s hard to imagine a world where he gets called up unless there’s some kind of serious injury to Ingle. 

Last October Naylor flashed enough of his skillset to make it seem like he was ready to take over as the Guardians’ full-time catcher. Now he’s in Triple-A and is in serious jeopardy of losing his spot on the Guardians’ roster. Life can come at you fast sometimes. 

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