In their first real activity of the offseason, the Mariners have done what I hoped and prayed they would do for some time now, and acquired a catcher. Say hello to John Jaso, Mariners fans, and keep in mind that the alternative is Miguel Olivo.
Why do I bring this up? Well, because Jaso is bizarro-Olivo, which is exactly what I like catchers to be. No power, lots of walks, no arm but solid behind the plate: literally all of Jaso's skills are the opposite of Olivo's. What this means is that the front office has either a.) come up with a way to combine two human beings into one, giving us one of the better catchers in baseball, or b.) realizes that Miguel Olivo is a terrible baseball player.
So yes, John Jaso isn't exactly a perfect player. His defense is pretty so-so (at the hardest position, but I digress) and he can't hit too well. On the plus side, he takes tons of pitches and should do better than he did last year, but not as good as two years ago. Remind you of Brendan Ryan? Ryan isn't the .290 hitter he was for the Cardinals in 2009, but he isn't the .210 hitter he was when we acquired him. As such, if Jaso stabilizes into something like a .320 OBP player, he's certainly a perfectly usable catcher and I'm more than happy that the Mariners got him. Who knows, maybe someday soon we will have worthwhile pieces all over our lineup!
I would agree with you about John Jaso. When I read the news I was definitely excited. I think he should be an upgrade over Olivo. He probably wont make the allstar game or anything like that, but maybe for the first time in three years we can have a catcher that can catch.
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