Reds Hot Stove Online Edition: Q&A with J.R. House

With the Reds getting close to wrapping up Spring Training out here in Goodyear, Ariz., I had the chance to catch up with third base and catching coach J.R. House this week. You can find a few excerpts below from our conversation that touched on the development of Tyler Stephenson and what kind of impact catchers can have on a game from behind the plate.

Tommy Thrall: Tyler Stephenson, it seems like he's made a lot of progress from last year to this year. How much has he grown and developed and what have you seen from him?

J.R. House: When you go back and you draft a catcher out of high school, and what you would hope that would be five or six years down the road, in today's standards, this is what you hope for when you make that kind of investment as an organization, to see what Tyler's doing now.

Thrall: When you go from being the backup to "the guy," I have to imagine there are going to be some obstacles that you're going to face. Are there some obstacles already that you guys are kind of keeping an eye on that you anticipate facing this year?

House: Yeah, I think there's some challenges that we're really looking forward to coming together as a unit to overcome. Just the amount of responsibility, the workload that goes into being "the guy," "the catcher." The leadership responsibilities of it as well, all those things come into play when you're trying to catch over 100 games and lead the staff.

Thrall: As far as the positives of him, what really impresses you about where he is right now in his game?

House: It's really everything. When you're a young catcher coming into the league, being able to call a game, handle the staff, take on the pounding that comes with being a catcher -- foul tips and all that -- and then to be productive with the bat, it's just been really, really good to see him go through those things.

Thrall: Game calling it seems like doesn't get talked about as much as it used to. Pitch framing, you hear a lot about that. But is game calling still an important piece for catchers?

House: Yes. So when we go over the categories of catching, whether it's game calling and framing, blocking, throwing, hitting, all of that -- on the top of the list is game calling. We try to keep it in an objective way to where we do run value per pitch, catcher's ERA, wins and losses, all of those things to kind of see what happens when you put your fingers down. And Tyler's done a great job as far as handling those things and through metrics has been grading out really well also, so it's been good to see.

Thrall: Not just pitch calling and game planning, but I would think that part of game calling goes into reading the hitter, as far as pitch to pitch. Is the catcher able to read a hitter, or is that more on the pitcher to figure out what they may be looking for based on where they're set up in the box, their swing, or reacting to a certain pitch?

House: I think it's both. As far as having an awareness to look for those things, it's an instinctual thing that you can come up with as you're a kid learning to play catcher. But at the same time, as soon as you become a Red, it is a responsibility of yours and is something that we do teach from the very beginning when you get here.

Thrall: As far as pitch framing goes, going back to that as something that gets talked about a lot, what kind of an impact can pitch framing have game to game? Is that saving a run here or there? Is that getting an extra strikeout for a hitter?

House: From a physical standpoint, it's the most influence you have over a game just because it happens more than anything else. And the magnitude of turning a ball into a strike or keeping strikes strikes, depending on how you catch the baseball, is huge. So it's something that we do value and we keep track of, and Tyler has graded out above average which is faster than what we had projected last year, and we just look forward to him continuing to increase that.

Thrall: Do you ever see the blocking aspect sacrificed for maybe being a better pitch framer?

House: I have, 100% yes. But at the same time, we track the blocking just like we do the receiving. So we have metrics for that as well, so grading out as to what type of blocker you are, we make sure that information is relayed and we teach the technique of blocking very similar to how we do catching the ball or throwing.