Now, we do not really know where Realmuto really stands as a prospect. He has succeeded and struggled at times in his young career, but looked like he was finally finding his stroke in his second season at AA. He is still just 23 and by all accounts he is a very good defensive catcher already. So the prospects of his bat progressing like it was thought it would was welcome.

 

Then Jarrod Saltalamacchia gets injured. In the middle of what could very well be Realmuto's breakout season as a catching prospect, he gets called up to the main roster...and sits. He doesnt see the field for 5 days after his callup.

 

The Marlins have played 11 games, including tonights, since the callup and Jeff fucking Mathis has started 8 of them. In those 8 starts, Jeff Mathis has hit .125/.276/.125 with 11 K's in 24 at bats.

 

So Realmuto finally gets a start, 5 days after he is called up, and proceeds to go 2-4. A nice little debut. And his reward for that nice debut performance? Benched for two more games in favor of Jeff fucking Mathis.

 

You DO NOT call up a catching prospect who is having a breakout season offensively to sit him behind Jeff fucking Mathis, who is statistically one of the worst hitters in major league history. This has been a waste of time and it could very well have completely hampered all the progress Realmuto had made to this point in Jacksonville by taking the bat out of his hand for absolutely no reason.

Agreed. I am incredibly annoyed every time I see Mathis over Realmuto

 

If all they wanted was a bench catcher, call up the turds that are Brantly or Skipworth

I really like Realmuto. I would be ok leaving him starting and forgetting the rest.

 

Just based on how good of a defensive catcher he is because Saltalamaccia couldn't throw out a turtle trying to steal 3rd.

 

If he provides good offense that's a bonus but I get that you can't rush a prospect.

The point is it was just beyond dumb to call him up and sit him, especially when you are giving those starts to Jeff fucking Mathis of all people. If you call Realmuto up, he should have been getting the majority of the starts, just working on his normal off days he had been observing in Jacksonville and Mathis should have been the backup. They went the complete opposite direction and it is just mind boggling.

Realmuto is not that good anyway.

I didn't know Jeff Mathis's middle name was fucking. You learn something new everyday.

Spike, you been makin' too much sense lately.

 

And Erick, Realmuto may not be "that good," but >> Mathis.

I didn't know Jeff Mathis's middle name was f***ing. You learn something new everyday.

As long as Jeff fucking Mathis is mornically used as a regular starter fucking is going to be Jeff fucking Mathis's middle name.

I think Realmuto should be everyday catcher from now

I don't see Realmuto as "not that good", he's just not a finished product yet. He's a guy that really needed two more seasons in the minors to refine his defense behind the plate and hopefully keep his hitting stroke going. I enjoy watching him hit at the major league level, but like Spike said the team is likely stunting his growth as a player by having him sit most games right now when he could be getting everyday starts in AA.

 

I'm still a fan of Realmuto and he's our best catching prospect at the moment, but it was obvious from the call up this was a premature major league experience. Unlike most of you, I don't have too big of an issue of Mathis starting once Salty went down with an injury. He has proven in the past that he's above average behind the plate, does a great job managing the game and our starting pitchers (even if it hasn't shown in his appearances too much this year), and for a stretch of what will likely be two or three weeks I would've been 100% fine with Mathis getting the majority of starts, calling up somebody like Brantly and letting Brantly fill the role Realmuto has so far (even if it would've been worse results, two or three starts of Brantly doesn't hurt the team's season).

 

It's not the worst thing calling up Realmuto. Gives the 23 year old a taste of the majors and gives him incentive to work hard when he gets sent back to the minors to get back to that level. But yeah, he shouldn't be here.

This by far not the dumbest thing this organization has done! True Realmuto was really starting to hit in Jacksonville, but I don't think this will be detrimental to his development, I think this will motivate him to make his return to The Show once he deserves it not just because of an injury. Of course several of the brain trust behind the "development" of Skipworth are still on board, so this could be a colossal mistake!

Honestly watching last nights game convinced me of one very major issue with our team. We have two black holes in our lineup and unless furcal has a year like a few years ago we are about to have 3. (mind you furcal is no where near as bad as mathis and hech) We need to start realmuto every day we can, and honestly furcal should be playing shortstop. That second base prospect we sent to triple A for furcal, I don't know if you guys remember him, has 4 homeruns in 7 games. This team currently lives in the dream world that defense is more important than offense, and hechavaria is a good defender. Until we realize this is false we will not make the playoffs and we may not even finish over .500.

The only way I don't see Realmuto being as a waste of time is that it was only to cover a concussion injury, so they probably didn't think he'd be up more than two weeks so it's not like they called him up to sit on the bench for half the season. It was meant to be a short term thing so it is what it is . He'll be back in the minors any day now. What it does show is how little confidence the team has in Rob Brantly. It's amazing how much they can support some lackluster players to the very end and how they give up on others so quickly.