The baseball timeline of catcher Carson Kelly
2012: St. Louis drafts Kelly
The St. Louis Cardinals selected Carson Kelly as a third baseman in the second round of the 2012 MLB draft. Fresh out of high school, Kelly headed straight to rookie ball to play for the Johnson City Cardinals. In his first season of rookie ball, Kelly hit 10 doubles, 9 HRs, 25 RBIs, and recorded a .662 OPS over the course of 56 games…
2013-2018: The minor league grind
From 2013-2018, Kelly mostly played in the Cardinals farm system. He saw brief time in the majors, playing 63 games for St. Louis over the span of 3 seasons (2016-2018). In those 63 games, Kelly hit 4 doubles, 0 HRs, 10 RBIs, and slashed .154/.227/.188 for an OPS of .415. Not good, not good at all…
Though Kelly struggled in the big leagues, he did find success in the minors. In 2016, Kelly hit 17 doubles, 6 HRs, 32 RBIs, and recorded an OPS of .738 across 96 minor league games. The following season Kelly was red hot as in 68 AAA games, he hit 13 doubles, 10 HRs, 41 RBIs, and recorded an OPS of .834. In Kelly’s last long stint in the minors (2018), he hit 14 doubles, 7 HRs, 41 RBIs, and got on base at a .378 rate. Kelly’s long minor league career was coming to an end; In a big and unexpected way…
2018: Mega trade
On December 5, 2018, the Cardinals traded Kelly, Luke Weaver, Andy Young, and a draft pick to the Arizona Diamondbacks in exchange for first baseman Paul Goldschmidt.
It is safe to say that this trade did not work out for Arizona. In Weaver’s time with the D-backs, he went 8-18 with a 4.45 ERA in 3 full seasons. In his last season with the D-backs Luke went 1-1 with a 7.71 ERA in 16.1 innings. He now pitches for the Cincinnati Reds. Andy Young played a total of 70 games for Arizona between 2020 and 2021 and performed pretty well, recording a .780 OPS, but was then released by the D-backs after the 2021 season, and is currently a free agent. The draft pick ended up being OF Dominic Fletcher who is currently in the minors, but looks like he could be an everyday outfielder for the Diamondbacks here soon. In 133 minor league games a season ago, Fletcher hit 35 doubles, 12 HRs, 72 RBIs, and recorded an OPS of .864…
That leaves us with Kelly and Goldschmidt. In Goldschmidt’s time with the Cardinals (528 games played), he has hit 115 doubles, 106 HRs, 332 RBIs, and he has slashed .291/.376/.516 for an OPS of .892. Is that good? I think that is good. To add salt to the wound, Goldschmidt won the NL MVP award in 2022. How has Kelly performed in his career with Arizona? Read on to find out…
2019-Present: The rest is history…
In 352 games with the D-backs, Kelly has hit 53 doubles, 43 HRs, 147 RBIs, and has recorded a .723 OPS. His best offensive season came in his first year in Arizona (2019). In 111 games in the 19’ season, Kelly hit 19 doubles, 18 HRs, 47 RBIs, and recorded an .826 OPS. Kelly has been a solid backstop for the D-backs no doubt. But when you look at the trade overall, it was a huge swing and miss for the Diamondbacks franchise. They traded away arguably the best player in franchise history…
One quick note about Kelly; He is an excellent catcher. Since 2019, he has had 10 catcher framing runs. Kelly has been above zero in that category every season, which is above league average. Kelly may not be the best of the best when it comes to his performance at the plate, but he gives his pitchers confidence that he will catch and call a good game…