He's young enough to learn if he's willing to work at it. If he doesn't work out,then they will have to find somebody else. He's got the arm strength. Ausmus will work with him as long as he's still with the tigers, which might not be long.
What if he was already working as hard as he could in 2015?
There is no shred of evidence to most of what you just posted. It is speculation, except the strong arm. He isn't young by baseball standards. We have no clue what his work ethic is and even if he already was working on this skills. Does that mean he didn't work the last 5 years? What if 2015 he worked as hard as possible and this was the result? Do you know that not to be the case? Again, speculation.
Ausmus working with him is a difference maker? Really? I would think he learned more from Alex working with him.
Having a strong arm is his only redeeming quality. And that he hits lefties (very small part). Otherwise, he has to work on all other aspects of his game in order to make it more than 5 years in the bigs.
His .297 OBP was worst on the team of the 13 players with at least 200 PAs. It is almost impossible for a player to change the walk rate after the age of 24. Working hard has nothing to do with it. Plate Discipline declines for most players from their minor league numbers. His walk rate in the minors was 19.0 PA/BB. Most players with that walk rate from the minors do not last in the majors. Not speculation, but historical fact. He walk rate of 26.6 PA/BB is inline of what you would expect moving from the minors to the majors. Again, this a skill you cannot change overnight, let alone in one year, if ever past 25.
214 MLB Players with 300 PAs against RHP in 2015 (107 would be median)
3. M. Cabrera .434
5. P. Fielder .416
13. C. Granderson .388
59. J. Peralta .359
75. I. Kinsler .341 OBP
82. Y. Cespedes .338 OBP
90. J.D. Martinez .335 OBP
106. Gose .330 OBP
116. C. Maybin .323 OBP
123. Iglesias .320 OBP
152. E. Suarez .308 OBP
168. A. Jackson .299 OBP
172. A. Garcia .297 OBP
177. T. Hunter .294 OBP
197. J. McCann .277 OBP
198. N. Castellanos .277 OBP
199. V. Martinez .276 OBP
214. O. Infante .234 OBP
Pitch framing and setting up for each pitch are skills and become habits. A catcher cannot think about it, it has to be instinctual. Again, at age 25, there is no evidence he can improve and if he is allowed to "work on them", let him do it in the minors where it is supposed to be done. Learning to this degree at the MLB level is not fair to the team or specifically, the pitchers. Statistics will show our pitches had more home runs hit when McCann caught them than when Ausmus caught them. It is caused by setting up too early or by bad pitch calling. If you are allowing McCann to learn at the MLB level in 2016, expect our pitching to suck again in 2016. McCann does not improve our pitching, he makes it worse. Fact.
Game calling. It is said he cannot call a good game and that Ausmus called the pitches for him in 2015. Not sure who did the calling in 2015, but in either case it sucked. And he isn't off the hook if Ausmus called the games. At some point, he will need to call games. Now you want him to work on that as well?
