But how bad is it to trust an old catcher to keep on truckin’? Let’s investigate.

In his efforts to wildly distend the concept of a full-time catcher’s workload, A.J. Pierzynski only once failed to accumulate 500 plate appearances in a season during his White Sox tenure. It was in 2005, when he had yet to really get his hooks into all of us, and even then he still went to bat 497 times.

If we decided to be generous and ask, “How have catchers 36 years and older faired in seasons where they have received over 450 plate appearances while starting behind the plate 70% of the time?” what would we get?

First, just 21 catchers of this age group have logged this workload this since 1901. 17 of these seasons have taken place since 1980. Seven of those have featured above-average offensive performances according to OPS+. Sorry, no, just six. Less than a third, though Birdie Tebbets, Brad Ausmus and Luke Sewell were never above-average hitters to beging with. (Tebbets and Sewell are pre-1950, though)

Half of those above-average seasons were carried out by Hall of Famer Carlton Fisk. The best season on this list is the bright-burning absurdity of Fisk hitting .285/.378/.451 in 521 PA’s as a 42 year-old. Beyond that sorcery, we have:

• 38 year-old Jorge Posada for the Yankees in 2010: .248/.357/.454 in 451 PA
• 36 year-old Ernie Whitt for the Blue Jays  in 1988: .251/.348/.410 in 468 PA
• 37 year-old Benito Santiago for the Giants in 2002: .278/.315/.450 in 517 PA

Doug Padilla:

“It is not something that we have to worry about,” (Rios) said. “It is just going to take time to heal. I felt better this morning but on certain moves I still feel a little pinch there. I had pretty decent progress from yesterday until to today. I feel looser. Let’s see what happens.”

A regiment of electric stimulation and oral medication are part of Rios’ treatment by the team medical and training staff.

“A quiet offseason for the Chicago White Sox leaves them likely to be around .500 in 2013, still enough to be threatening if the pitching stays healthy. One potential issue: There’s not a lot of organizational depth to handle any nasty surprises.”

It’d be nice if he did, but if that’s what the 2013 White Sox relied on, they’re in trouble. Hell, if the 2013 White Sox relied on A.J. Pierzynski himself to replicate the performance of 2012 A.J. Pierzynski, they would be in trouble. A more reasonable request might be to hope for Alexei Ramirez to not be terrible at the plate. At least that’s something that’s been done before.

It’s been hard for scribes around these parts to communicate in traditional terms that Alexei was awful at the plate last season. Sure, fans know that he was the mascot for the offensive hopelessness of the end of the season, but in terms of total production, his .261 batting average was only a career-low by four points, and his insane efficiency with runners in scoring position gave him a 73 RBI total that fits right along with his career averages. He didn’t hit home runs, but home runs are regularly dismissed as an unclassifiable ticket, an he even was an effective base-stealer.

The only raw, old-school total that can be cited to the masses is his 59 runs scored. Ramirez’s previous low total was 65 in 2008, but that came in 112 less trips to the plate. Ramirez stopped walking or effectively getting on base–so he couldn’t be driven in, and he wasn’t driving himself in.

Alexei has never been  for whom patience came to naturally. For his career, he’s only walked in 5.3% of his plate appearances, but has only vacillated wildly around that figure. The two times he finished under that mark, the South Side was treated to displays of his pull power to left field. He homered more (21) than he walked (17) in 509 plate appearances in his rookie season, and he still only walked 27 times in 2010 while smashing 18 home runs. The years in between, he forced patience on himself for the sake of a decent on-base percentage, and lost some of the power that aggressiveness afforded.

But in 2012 he was worse than ever in both regards, and while he’s been contrite about it, it would seem the language barrier prevents him from giving much insight.

“I’m preparing myself really hard for this coming year because I do feel that I could have done more last year,” Ramirez said.

Everyone likes–or demands, in some cases–self-flagellation from struggling athletes, although this quote from Alexei was just confusing.

“”I feel like 2007. I feel like I just arrived,” Ramirez said. “I feel like a rookie. I feel strong and I feel hungry to keep doing what I did when I got here and continue doing it this coming year.”

Since his rookie season was in 2008. He’s either misremembering or actually commenting on his performance during his last year in Cuba. I imagine he yanked a lot of fastballs in 2007, though.  Looking at FanGraphs pitch values can be problematic, because it’s just raw end-results without taking account sequencing, and can vary year-to-year the same way batting performance as a whole can. But when the results are just screaming at you like the way Alexei Ramirez being in the worst in baseball against fastballs over the past two years is.

There are plenty of hitters who make a living on that list, and Alex Rios still being fourth due to just how awful his 2011 was shows how small of a sample two years can be–a great season can be swallowed up with an extreme result. But looking at Texas Leaguers spray charts of Alexei versus four-seam fastballs…

…We have even distribution with home runs pulled to left from 2008-10.

…followed by a bit more skewing to right field from 2011 on…

…and if we drill down to 2012, we see Alexei hardly getting out and around any fastballs at all.

Bat speed tends to travel in one direction, especially for those who have seen 30th birthday candles lit, extinguished, and thrown away.

While there’s not enough here to convict, Alexei’s slow creep away from being able to pull fastballs for power is enough to bring him in for questioning on suspicion of bat speed loss. No doubt a renewed focus and dedication to his craft could produce an Adam Dunn-like improvement, and a nagging wrist ailment last season could have been the culprit, but at this point, there’s reason to be pessimistic about how much Ramirez is going to be able to help Tyler Flowers and Jeff Keppinger make people forget about A.J. Pierzynski. He might have to resort to stepping on people.

Follow James Fegan on Twitter @JRFegan

(A.J. responded in kind with a newspaper ad that he may well have had already written up years ago)

But Craig Calcaterra said he’d never “seen a team wax so effusive of a departing player as the White Sox just waxed about A.J. Pierzynski”, and Tim Baffoe of The Score made sure let people know he thought the Sox treatment of the situation was “weird”. Apparently, from outside the White Sox bubble, this outpouring came off as a bit much.

First and foremost, it more or less mirrors the response that Mark Buehrle’s departure received last year. There might not have been an immediate official statement, but there was an outpouring, and it was loving and tender.

“He’s not a Hall of Fame pitcher by any means, but he’s a real pro. He took the ball every single time and battled, was great in the clubhouse, caught first pitches, made appearances, was a great guy. He was perfect for our team.”

-Jerry Reinsdorf to ESPN on 12/9/11

“I just told the Marlins’ ownership, ‘You got one hell of a pitcher, but let me tell you, you got a better person,’” said Williams of his brief talk with Loria. “You have a humble person. You have a person that no matter how much money or success he’s had over the years, he is still the first person out to catch the first pitch from a fan.

“From there, I expounded as to his virtues, and not only his but his wife’s. They are good people. You don’t completely replace good people. He will always be a part of the White Sox family.”

-Kenny Williams

That’s pretty touchy-feely, but also for a better player that was longer-tenured. It’s not a true equivalency, but reflective of the fact that the Reinsdorf has been much more open about displaying his personal affection toward players and other members of the organization since the World Series title. Kenny Williams too.

The World Series title that also brought about the incident where the best player in franchise history left in a huff because he felt that not enough fanfare was given to end of his tenure. That ended in the GM calling said greatest player in franchise history an “idiot”, before airing out his exhaustion at the star treatment that the player had received, and even implying that he had money problems. Frank Thomas eventually returned to the franchise as a smile-laden ambassador, but it would take a little while.

Thomas was the last long-tenured player that didn’t come up under a Williams/Hahn regime that the franchise had to deal with the departure with, but with that memory still in place, it seems perfectly prudent to get out ahead of any feelings of abandonment departing veterans might have. Even if it’s a littler over the top.

Follow James Fegan on Twitter @JRFegan