William Contreras's Framing Has Gone South

[Matthew Trueblood]

Image courtesy of © Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images

William Contreras's work as a framer has been a constant topic of conversation, ever since the Brewers acquired him in the 2022-23 offseason. He'd been so bad at that vital skill as a member of the team from Georgia that some wondered whether even the vaunted Brewers developmental infrastructure could turn him into a solid backstop. Almost immediately, though, they did just that. There were questions about whether Contreras would be able to stay behind the plate, but now, he's established himself as one of the best catchers in the league.

This season, he got off to such a great start that one could almost believe he was finding a new level as a framer. Before the All-Star break, factoring in framing, throwing out runners and blocking errant pitches, Contreras was 3.9 runs better than average as a defender, according to Baseball Prospectus. Since the break, though (in considerably less total playing time), he's been 3.4 runs worse than average.

Specifically, after a hot start, Contreras went ice-cold as a framer last month. September's not off to a great start, either.

William Contreras, Framing Run Value by Month and Location, 2025

Month	Top of Zone	Bottom of Zone	3B Edge	1B Edge
April	-1	3	1	-1
May	0	-1	1	0
June	0	0	0	0
July	0	1	1	0
August	0	-1	1	-1
September	-1	0	0	-1

Contreras is having a harder time maintaining the edges of the strike zone and helping his pitchers out as the year wears on. It's not a pure fluke of statistics or umpire bias, either. When you watch him work, tangible differences jump out.

First, here's Contreras winning a call at the bottom edge of the zone back in the first half. He got a called strike on 44.3% of taken pitches in the shadow zones along the edges of the zone before the All-Star break.

This is not the cleanest catch you'll see, but it's typical of Contreras's effective first half. He sets up with his right knee up, creating a firm outside edge, and his stance is compact and blockish. That makes it easier for him to reach and move the ball, without appearing to be pulling it so much that the umpire assumes they're being manipulated. Here's another example of him coming up with a fringy call.

That's a more prototypical move. It's the same sturdy setup, and a nice, quiet reception of the ball. As is the modern state of the art, he pulls the ball to the center of the zone, but he does it subtly, and the fact that he wasn't punching at the ball when he first caught it made that move smooth.

Let's take a look at one more pitch Contreras framed well in the first half.

Chad Patrick slightly missed his spot, but Contreras was in good position to adjust to it. There's plenty of movement in the process of catching the ball, but it's all in rhythm, and the call ends up being easy for the umpire.

Now, let's look at what's happened in the second half. 

There's no one thing Contreras is doing worse lately. This illustrates a couple of the small ones, together. Brandon Woodruff missed his spot here, too, but Contreras is in a much lower, less balanced stance behind the plate, which makes him less able to adapt to that. Feeling himself lunge and believing, perhaps, that he ended up reaching lower than he really did, he also carries the ball too high. It's a big, broad movement, and not a smooth one. Here's another pitch in a similar spot, more directly comparable to the successes he had in the first half.

Catching Jacob Misiorowski is hard. He throws so hard that beating the ball to its spot—a key aspect of framing well, especially on fastballs—is difficult. Contreras didn't do nearly well enough on this one, though. He tried to catch the ball in his normal rhythm, but the ball got on him too quickly, and his resulting glove movement was all over the place. Alright, one more.

This ball didn't technically need to be a strike, anyway. It could have been one, though. Contreras is low enough to catch the ball on a smooth drive through it, stabilizing as he does so. Instead, though, he carries it too high again, and his whole body follows that glove movement.

Contreras looks, frankly, a bit tired. He's played a ton behind the plate this season, and it appears to be catching up to him. His mechanics are getting a bit more spastic. He's still thinking correctly on each pitch, but he's not physically executing his efforts to frame as well as he did earlier in the season. The Brewers should continue shopping for every opportunity to rest Contreras and to use him as the designated hitter, down the stretch, slotting Danny Jansen into his place as the backstop. Ideally, that would result in a fresher and more effective Contreras in terms of framing come October.

View full article

[Trax]

I noticed it to but didn't trust myself to make the call.   I think it was poor management to allow him to catch as much as he did with a broken finger, and even 100% healthy he needs days off to recharge whether he thinks so or not.  He has voice in the matter but the manager should keep it a managers decision. 

[Brian]

9 minutes ago, Trax said:

I noticed it to but didn't trust myself to make the call.   I think it was poor management to allow him to catch as much as he did with a broken finger, and even 100% healthy he needs days off to recharge whether he thinks so or not.  He has voice in the matter but the manager should keep it a managers decision. 

To bad Danny Jansen has the same avg as Eric Haase did. 

[keephopealive]

How does the framing stat work? Is the run value situation specific, e.g., framing strike 3 on the third out with guys on 2nd and 3rd worth more than framing strike 1 with the bases empty?  If it is, this could all just be small sample issues with monthly data. 

[Brian]

The only thing I noticed is that Contreras tries to frame pitches that are off the plate by as much as three inches.  Doing something so blatantly obvious to the umpire will set him up for failure on the closer pitches I believe.  So the key takeaway on my thinking is:  Overdoing the framing on really bad pitches leads to not getting calls on the very close pitches.