The Pittsburgh Pirates have started Joey Bart behind the plate for a total of 14 games this year. They are a below .500 team when Bart starts behind the dish. However, the Pirates are a much better team when Henry Davis gets penciled into the starting lineup. It’s not a pure coincidence that the Pirates’ pitching staff also does significantly better when Davis is behind the plate. He’s shown to be a significantly better defender and game caller than Bart. However, Bart is becoming an active problem for the Pirates’ pitchers as a whole. It’s not just three or four Pirates who are pitching better with Davis than Bart; it’s the entire team, and the trend extends to former Pirates.
Pirates Pitchers Performing Worse with Joey Bart Behind the Plate
The biggest victim of Bart’s game calling and defense is Bubba Chandler. Chandler has performed exceptionally well when Davis gets to catch the hard-throwing youngster. Chandler holds opposing batters to just a .489 OPS, strikes them out at a respectable 23.7% rate, but most importantly, has only dished out a free pass 4.1% of the time. However, he becomes a much different pitcher when throwing to Bart (and not in a good way). His walk rate shoots up to 18.8%, while his K% dips to 21.1%. Batters nearly have a .900 OPS when Chandler throws to Bart at .893.
Joey Bart on the self-inflicting wounds piling up and the Diamondbacks riding the momentum to a 9-0 win over the Pirates here tonight. — From José Negron in Phoenix pic.twitter.com/61AAVdpRMd
— DK Pittsburgh Sports (@DKPghSports) May 6, 2026
It’s Far From Just a Chandler Problem…
Now granted, numbers like ERA, OPS, and K% and BB% by catcher on an individual level are flukey in many cases because of small sample sizes and other extenuating factors. It’s not the most accurate way of evaluating a catcher’s ability or a pitcher’s ability. However, it’s not just one Pirates pitcher suffering a massive disconnect in performance between Bart and Davis. If it were, this article wouldn’t get written. Many pitchers, both current and former, have very similar and significant splits.
Joey Bart shouldn’t be catching any more. Killing the confidence of our young pitching staff by putting him behind the plate is what’s going to derail this promising season. #LetsGoBucs#DFABart pic.twitter.com/dv5wYSAquc
— James Larson (@JamesLarson47) May 6, 2026
When Braxton Ashcraft pitches to Henry Davis, he has a 28.1% K%, 8.6% BB%, and holds opponents to a .598 OPS. Meanwhile, when Bart is behind the plate, his K% drops to 21.7%, and opponent OPS rises to .697, nearly 100 points greater than with Davis. The only positive is that his walk rate remains relatively the same at 8.4%. Carmen Mlodzinski has also consistently performed better with Davis (28% K%, 7.3% BB%, .657 opponent OPS) than with Bart (19.6% K%, 7.4% BB%, .722 opponent OPS). The Pirates’ current closer, Dennis Santana, also has significant splits by catcher. When Davis catches Santana, he strikes out 21.2% of batters, only walks them at an 8.1% rate, and has a .518 opponent OPS. While having Bart behind the plate leads to a better 25.5% K% and 4.7% BB%, he becomes much more hittable with a .590 OPS.
Former Pirates Also Had Issues with Bart
It’s not just current Pirates who have had problems with Bart. Former Pirates closer David Bednar rarely ever performed better with Bart than Davis. Opponents crushed Bednar with an 11.2% BB% and .766 OPS when Bart caught him. Meanwhile, Bednar pitched to a solid 8.4% BB% and .565 opponent OPS with Davis.
Bednar isn’t the only former Pirates pitcher with noticeable splits by catcher. Last year, standout rookie Mike Burrows owned a 20% K%, 9% BB%, and .816 opponent OPS with Bart, compared to a 27.3% K%, 6.4% BB%, and .561 opponent OPS with Davis. Another former Pirates starter, Bailey Falter, also saw a noticeable difference in splits between Bart (.707 opponent OPS, 1.88 K:BB ratio) and Davis (.687 OPS, 3.25 K:BB ratio).
The Pirates have just two pitchers who have done better with Bart than Davis. However, the difference between them is very slim. Mitch Keller is one. Keller has struck out 20.1% of batters faced, with a 7.7% walk rate and a .715 OPS with Bart. However, he still maintains a similar 20.6% K%, 6.4% BB%, and .723 OPS with Davis. Isaac Mattson is another Bucco hurler with better splits with Bart than Davis. Bart has coaxed a 25.4% K%, .540 opponent OPS, but a 15.1% BB% out of Mattson. Meanwhile, Davis has managed a 19% K%, 8.2% BB%, and .634 OPS from Mattson.
Skenes Goes with Davis as Personal Catcher
Of course, the best argument you could make for Henry Davis’ game calling and defense significantly helping the Pirates’ pitchers is that he is Paul Skenes’ personal catcher. While Skenes is talented enough to throw six shutout innings with a traffic cone behind the plate, Skenes would not stick with Davis so frequently if he didn’t fully trust his abilities to call games.
It’s Beyond Just a Normal Split
It’s normal for some pitchers to perform better with one catcher than the other. But when it’s nearly every pitcher who has gotten ample opportunities to work with both catchers, along with former players who got to work with both backstops in previous seasons, it becomes somewhat of a problem, at the very least. If Bart isn’t going to make up for his lack of defense or game-calling skills with his bat, then the Pirates must try to find an alternative and move on from Bart. Choosing Davis over Bart may not be a one-size-fits-all, magical overnight solution, but it surely can’t hurt the Pirates to try at this point.
Main Photo Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images
