MLB: A’s can’t solve Astros in third straight loss to open the season; Giants’ Posey shows he’s back to form.
With his first swing of the 2021 season, Giants catcher Buster Posey formally announced his highly anticipated return to the diamond.
Posey’s solo home run in the second inning at T-Mobile Park on opening night left the bat at 106.5 miles per hour, making the 2-0 fastball he pulled over the left field fence the hardest hit ball of Thursday’s game.
With his first swing on Friday against the Mariners, Posey made an even more important point. He’s healthy and potentially capable of turning back the clock in the batter’s box. The Giants catcher drove the first pitch he saw from Mariners left-hander Yusei Kikuchi over the center field wall, putting his team on the board in an eventual 6-3 victory.
Gabe Kapler cited Posey’s power to straightaway center field as one of the most encouraging signs from the club’s first win of 2021, but the Giants’ manager and his catcher were already buoyed by a key development that had taken place earlier in the day.
Posey, who had caught 10 innings and 171 pitches on Thursday night, told Kapler he didn’t need a day off. A sore hip that had bothered the veteran backstop during spring training wasn’t going to keep Posey out of
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Friday’s lineup.
“I would consider that a good sign,” Posey said. “I was really pleased with the way I felt overall after catching 10 innings (Thursday) and then tonight as well. Credit to the training staff and the regimen that I have right now to keep things loose.”
Kapler said immediately following Thursday’s game that he hoped Posey would be able to play on Friday, but said candidly that backup Curt Casali might be pressed into action. The Giants want to avoid taxing Posey, especially early in the season, but also recognize what a valuable asset he is behind the plate.
When Posey reported he was eager to play again, Kapler penciled him into the seventh slot in the lineup for the second straight game.
“I think you know I consider health and the feedback from the players as importantly as I do anything else, so Buster’s feedback was really what pushed me over the edge here,” Kapler said pregame.
Posey spent most of the 2018 season battling a hip injury that ultimately required season-ending surgery and forced him to spend an entire offseason rehabbing. He never quite looked comfortable in 2019 as his .257 batting average and .688 OPS were easily the worst numbers of his major league career.
Posey and the Giants felt that with a full winter of training and building strength under his belt, the franchise cornerstone was poised for a bounce back season in 2020. A possible resurgence never materialized, however, as Posey chose to sit out the season after he and his wife Kristen adopted newborn twin girls weeks before a postponed Opening Day.
Entering 2021, Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi said having a healthy Posey returning to the team’s lineup was the biggest offseason “acquisition” the organization could make. Front office executives, Kapler’s coaching staff and Posey’s teammates have all made note of what an outsized impact he makes when handling the pitching staff, but the Giants have been less certain what they could expect from Posey on offense this season.
Through two games, he’s delivered two loud home runs and provided a strong indication his hips are as healthy as they’ve been since 2017, when he hit .320 and won a Silver Slugger Award.
“Two years ago, he wouldn’t have been able to do that,” first baseman Brandon Belt said after Posey’s Opening Night homer. “It looks like his hips are a lot healthier now, he’s able to turn on those pitches and you’re probably going to see a lot more of that from Buster this year.” Posey agrees. “I definitely think, particularly the way I turned on that pitch, I don’t think I’d done that in awhile,” Posey said of his Thursday home run. “Even the one (Friday), I felt like I really stayed through it well so it was nice to see.”
There are no guarantees Posey’s power surge will continue deep into a 162game season. After he homered 10 times during the first half of the 2017 season, Posey only hit a pair of home runs after the AllStar break.
He’s well aware of the different ways catching stresses his body, so Posey has adjusted his training regimen in an effort to stay fresh.
“The priority has to be stretching and mobility over everything else,” Posey said. “That’s how I’ve restructured my priorities as far as my hip goes. I was able to build up a lot of strength in the offseason, but going forward now with how much torque on a daily basis is going through it, I would put stretching and staying loose ahead of weightlifting.”
After starting on Friday, Giants right-hander Johnny Cueto explained that he believes his own performance will improve this season by having Posey back behind the plate. Cueto was one of several pitchers who spoke this spring about his comfort level with having a veteran catcher, and it was obvious throughout the 2020 season how much the 14thyear starter missed working with Posey.
The boost Posey provides on defense is no surprise. The Giants would likely be thrilled to have him back even if his offensive numbers matched the subpar output Posey produced in 2019.
With two solid swings, Posey has only increased the anticipation surrounding what he might be able to accomplish at the plate if he’s able to stay healthy. The sample size in the batter’s box is small and the season is long, but the Giants feel the excitement is justified.