100 Greatest Catchers of All-Time

ALL-TIME TOP 100 LISTS

Baseball's All-Time Greatest Catchers Ranked From 1 to 100

RANK	NAME	FROM	TO	CAREER	LONG PEAK	SHORT PEAK	PRIME
1	Johnny Bench	1967	1983	75.2	47.2	23.9	32.7
2	Josh Gibson	1930	1946	72.8	56.8	30.5	44.2
3	Gary Carter	1974	1992	70.1	48.2	23.1	35.8
4	Carlton Fisk	1969	1993	68.4	37.7	20.3	23.2
5	Joe Mauer	2004	2018	55.3	39.0	19.5	28.9
6	Yogi Berra	1946	1965	59.5	36.8	17.4	27.5
7	Buster Posey	2009	2021	44.9	36.7	18.8	29.2
8	Ivan Rodriguez	1991	2011	68.7	39.6	19.3	30.3
9	Thurman Munson	1969	1979	46.0	37.0	19.3	27.0
10	Ted Simmons	1968	1988	50.3	34.8	16.2	22.9
11	Bill Dickey	1928	1946	57.3	35.9	18.1	26.3
12	Mike Piazza	1992	2007	59.6	42.2	21.9	30.9
13	Bill Freehan	1961	1976	44.7	33.7	18.3	22.5
14	Jorge Posada	1995	2011	42.7	32.9	16.8	23.2
15	Roy Campanella	1937	1957	35.6	34.3	18.9	26.9
16	Mickey Cochrane	1925	1937	49.1	36.2	17.6	27.0
17	Yadier Molina	2004	2022	42.2	28.7	16.5	22.4
18	Joe Torre	1960	1977	57.6	37.2	17.8	25.7
19	Gene Tenace	1969	1983	46.8	34.9	16.3	25.4
20	Jim Sundberg	1974	1989	40.5	28.6	14.3	21.3
21	Gabby Hartnett	1922	1941	56.9	31.0	15.1	20.6
22	Jason Kendall	1996	2010	41.7	30.4	14.6	20.0
23	Darrell Porter	1971	1987	40.9	29.0	15.7	18.3
24	J.T. Realmuto	2014	2022	29.7	28.4	15.5	20.3
25	Lance Parrish	1977	1995	39.5	28.4	14.3	19.5
26	Russell Martin	2006	2019	38.8	26.7	15.0	16.7
27	Biz Mackey	1920	1947	48.3	29.9	16.5	20.4
28	Salvador Perez	2011	2022	32.3	24.1	13.1	15.2
29	Brian McCann	2005	2019	31.9	24.5	13.4	17.6
30	Mickey Tettleton	1984	1997	29.4	24.7	14.9	20.7
31	Roger Bresnahan	1897	1915	42.1	30.5	16.0	22.9
32	Elston Howard	1955	1968	27.1	26.6	16.0	20.7
33	Wally Schang	1913	1931	47.9	25.2	12.3	17.5
34	Manny Sanguillen	1967	1980	27.6	26.4	13.7	18.9
35	Tony Pena	1980	1997	24.7	24.7	13.8	20.7
36	Javy Lopez	1992	2006	29.7	24.8	15.1	15.3
37	Ernie Lombardi	1931	1947	39.5	25.0	12.3	17.7
38	Louis Santop	1910	1926	40.3	25.8	14.1	16.0
39	Victor Martinez	2002	2018	31.9	28.3	15.0	17.1
40	Del Crandall	1949	1966	28.2	24.6	13.6	17.3
41	Tom Haller	1961	1972	29.3	24.0	12.2	17.6
42	Chris Hoiles	1989	1998	23.5	22.3	13.3	18.6
43	Tim McCarver	1959	1980	28.3	21.5	12.8	17.3
44	Terry Steinbach	1986	1999	28.0	21.5	10.9	15.6
45	Darren Daulton	1983	1997	23.0	22.2	15.8	18.3
46	Smoky Burgess	1949	1967	33.3	23.0	10.6	14.6
47	Ed Bailey	1953	1966	27.2	23.0	12.2	17.4
48	Mike Scioscia	1980	1992	26.1	21.7	12.1	15.7
49	Butch Wynegar	1976	1988	26.5	22.8	11.8	15.4
50	Willson Contreras	2016	2022	20.8	20.9	11.9	15.3
51	Walker Cooper	1940	1957	27.3	23.0	12.4	15.0
52	Sherm Lollar	1946	1963	30.1	21.9	10.8	15.7
53	Ray Schalk	1912	1929	33.0	22.0	10.5	18.0
54	Terry Kennedy	1978	1991	21.6	19.3	11.6	17.0
55	Jonathan Lucroy	2010	2021	17.7	19.2	13.7	17.6
56	Charles Johnson	1994	2005	22.6	20.4	12.6	16.1
57	Bob Boone	1972	1990	27.4	20.2	10.5	12.2
58	Mike Stanley	1986	2000	20.9	19.4	11.3	15.4
59	Mike Napoli	2006	2017	26.3	22.7	12.7	16.6
60	Jason Varitek	1997	2011	24.2	18.7	10.9	14.4
61	Johnny Bassler	1913	1927	21.3	19.7	10.9	18.8
62	Ramon Hernandez	1999	2013	22.1	18.8	10.6	14.9
63	Rick Dempsey	1969	1992	25.1	17.4	9.4	12.7
64	Rick Ferrell	1929	1947	29.8	19.7	9.1	16.6
65	John Stearns	1974	1984	19.7	19.5	12.5	14.7
66	John Romano	1958	1967	20.9	20.0	11.8	15.0
67	Matt Wieters	2009	2020	18.3	17.3	11.9	14.5
68	John Roseboro	1957	1970	22.5	19.4	10.3	13.6
69	A.J. Pierzynski	1998	2016	23.8	18.0	9.9	11.5
70	Johnny Kling	1900	1913	29.0	22.4	11.4	15.5
71	Steve O'Neill	1911	1928	26.1	20.6	12.1	16.8
72	Chief Meyers	1909	1917	25.2	21.3	11.9	18.1
73	Spud Davis	1928	1945	23.0	21.2	12.0	15.6
74	Carlos Ruiz	2006	2017	22.5	20.9	11.8	16.2
75	Kurt Suzuki	2007	2022	19.5	18.3	10.0	11.4
76	Joe Ferguson	1970	1983	21.0	19.7	13.2	9.9
77	Andy Seminick	1943	1957	21.5	18.7	10.8	15.0
78	Earl Battey	1955	1967	18.8	18.7	10.6	13.9
79	Ernie Whitt	1976	1991	18.3	18.3	8.9	13.1
80	Quincy Trouppe	1930	1952	21.1	17.0	12.0	16.0
81	Bob O'Farrell	1915	1935	21.3	17.1	12.4	16.2
82	Jody Davis	1981	1990	15.8	16.9	9.8	14.4
83	Muddy Ruel	1915	1934	20.5	16.4	9.8	16.8
84	Alex Avila	2009	2021	16.8	15.5	10.2	10.2
85	Miguel Montero	2006	2018	14.3	15.3	11.5	13.4
86	Hank Gowdy	1910	1930	23.7	13.7	7.1	14.1
87	Paul LoDuca	1998	2008	17.9	18.7	11.6	16.0
88	Steve Yeager	1972	1986	17.9	14.7	8.1	12.2
89	Benito Santiago	1986	2005	27.4	18.6	9.4	13.1
90	Clay Dalrymple	1960	1971	16.8	14.8	10.5	13.0
91	Don Slaught	1982	1997	19.3	14.7	7.2	11.1
92	Brad Ausmus	1993	2010	16.5	15.0	9.7	11.2
93	Bubbles Hargrave	1913	1930	16.4	17.9	12.3	13.9
94	Harry Danning	1933	1942	14.7	15.7	10.7	13.9
95	Hank Severeid	1911	1926	18.6	16.7	8.1	14.2
96	Stan Lopata	1948	1960	15.3	16.2	9.9	13.3
97	Yasmani Grandal	2012	2022	20.2	19.2	10.5	12.1
98	Mike Lieberthal	1994	2007	15.3	14.7	9.1	11.7
99	Ray Fosse	1967	1979	12.9	15.2	10.7	12.7
100	Chris Iannetta	2006	2019	15.0	15.3	8.7	9.1

EXPLANATION OF TABLE DATA

CAREER = Career Wins Above Replacement (WAR).

We use bWAR.

LONG PEAK = WAR in best seven seasons.

SHORT PEAK = WAR in best three seasons.

PRIME = WAR in best five consecutive seasons.

How Do We Rank The Players?

That's a Great Question. In short, it isn't Simple.

We have gone to great lengths to make our All-Time Baseball Player Rankings as thorough as possible. We believe our rankings are the most comprehensive, fair, and accurate.

Players are evaluated on five criteria as the foundation of our rankings:

Career Value
Long Peak
Short Peak
Career Prime Value
Contribution to Championship Teams

We use Wins Above Replacement (WAR) as a basis for these calculations. However, we also adjust for era, integration and level of competition, and missed playing time due to factors beyond the control of the player.

Generally, a player’s Career Value is worth about 50-60% of the ranking score we assign him. That leaves half or just under half from his long peak (seven best seasons), short peak (three best seasons), and prime (five best consecutive seasons). The contribution to championship teams (player performance in seasons where his team wins the pennant) is a small factor in most cases.

Because we adjust for timeline and era, our rankings have fewer players from before 1941 than many other baseball player lists.

We feel it’s important to acknowledge that baseball is harder to play today than it was 25 years ago, and 50 years ago, and so on. It doesn’t make sense, in our opinion, for most of the great baseball players to have played prior to World War II, when MLB was segregated.

100 Greatest Catchers of All-Time

ALL-TIME TOP 100 LISTS

CATCHER

FIRST BASE

SECOND BASE

SHORTSTOP

THIRD BASE

LEFT FIELD

CENTER FIELD

RIGHT FIELD

PITCHER