The Jarrod Saltalamacchia Situation

So, the presumed solution to the catching problem is down in AAA.

Jarrod Saltalamacchia is hitting .359/.417/.578 for Oklahoma.  He is apparently healthy. 

So why isn't he up here, already?  Bob Hersom has an article about the situation, that leads off explaining the problem pretty well:

RedHawks catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia would be back in the major leagues if he didn't have a problem throwing the ball - not to an infielder, but back to his pitcher.

In Salty's last game, Tuesday night at AT&T Bricktown Ballpark, 12 of his throws back to the pitcher landed either short of the mound or in center field. He had five errant throws in the first inning alone.

The Rangers clearly aren't going to want to call him back up to the majors until they are convinced this problem is gone for good.  And the longer that Salty has problems throwing the ball back to the mound, the longer he will have to go without a problem throwing the ball back to the mound before the organization will be convinced that he's put the problem behind him.

The last thing the Rangers are going to want to be dealing with in a pennant race is a question of whether or not their starting catcher is going to have a recurrence of the yips.  And while the Rangers are probably willing to roll with Matt Treanor for the time being, the longer this goes on, the more likely it is that the team is going to have to start looking for other options for 2010 besides Saltalamacchia.