I think all three catchers bring something to the table and have their own strengths and weaknesses. All the statistics used are from ESPN and are lifetime numbers only. Stats are current as of yesterday.
LaRue: $3.9m/yr with 7 yrs experience. Defensivley, he's got a FPCT of .990, 67PB and 230 SBA against him. PB as a percentage of games is 10.5%. His CS% is .395. He's commited 40 errors on 638 games. Errors as a percentage of games is 6.3%.
Valentine: $1.15m/yr with 7 yrs experience. Defensivley he's got a FPCT of .992, 19 PB and 134 SBA against him. PB as a percentage of games is 6%. His CS% is .330. He's commited 15 errors in 315 games. Errors as a percentage of games is 4.8%.
Ross: $500K/yr with 4 yrs experiene. Defensivley. he's got a FPCT of .989 , 12PB and 66SBA against him. PB as a percentage of games is 7%. His CS% is .371. He's commited 11 errors in 168 games. Errors as a percentage of games is 6.5%.
From a defensive standpoint, Valentine has the best FPCT, lowest PB as percentage of games played, and errors as a percentage of games played. However, he has the lowest CS% while LaRue is highest. With the exception of PB as a percentage of games (LaRue highest) all the numbers are pretty much in the same range.
Offensive numbers:
LaRue: .242BA, .325OBP, .419SLG and .744OPS. In 2103 AB he's hit 79HR and 509H. He struck out 612 times or 29% of AB's.
Ross: .225BA, .296OBP, .429SLG and 1.008OPS. In 471AB he's hit 23HR and 106H. He struck out 146times or 31% of AB's.
Valentine: .241BA, .302BP, .394SLG and .696OPS. In 1022AB he's hit 32 HR and 246H. He struck out 187 times or 18% of AB's.
Offensively, Ross has the higest OPS and SLG, however he's K'd 31% of his ABs. LaRue K's 29% of the time which isn't much better. Javi only K's 18% of the time. LaRue has hit the most HR and hits, but Javi isn't far behind him in hits.
LaRue's biggest black-mark is his price tag. He brings experence to the table, however, there are plenty of other vets on the team. Then again, he has power but does that offset his high PB rate? Ross is cheep but K's alot. He has a great OPS and has hit 9 fewer HR in 551 less AB's than Javi so he's got some power. His errors as a percent of games is as high as LaRue. Javi is realitivley low cost at $1.15m/yr has 7 years of experience (same as LaRue) so he can bring the "experience" to the table for what that is worth. What he lacks in power he makes up in hits and OPB. Defensivley he is strong, with the exception of his throwing arm.
I'll take a look at the combinations of LaRue/Valentine, LaRue/Ross and Valentine/Ross but this post is already too long.
Food for thought and hopefully serrrious debate.