Saturday BP, 8/25/18

Maybe today will be Buster Posey’s last game of 2018 or maybe it will be tomorrow afternoon (community member Balmy Henry really went to town on Posey’s surgery with this comment in the Posey surgery article). Either way, StubHub has cheap tickets for both games (starting at $11 for today’s game if you want to make an extreme impulse buy; starting at $6 for tomorrow’s game if you want to make a more considered impulse buy) if you need to get one more Buster Posey fix before the year’s out.

The hip surgery announcement had that little caveat about a 6-8 month recovery period which in my mind really changes the offseason. I’ll have a post up tonight that gets into that some more, but in the meantime, let’s take a step back and consider Buster Posey’s somewhat odd career.

Not originally a catcher, but drafted as such. Signed the largest bonus at the time. Came up for a cup of coffee at the end of 2009 and wasn’t even allowed to take consecutive sips from that cup because of Bruce Bochy’s need to protect Bengie Molina. The Giants had to trade Bengie Molina just to get Posey more playing time, which led to him being named the Rookie of the Year. And he won the World Series in his first season. A reminder: at the trophy ceremony, he youthfully and (at the time) naively said “Let’s go win another one!” like it was no big deal. Then the broken ankle. The comeback player of the year / MVP season / Mat Latos pantsing on national television. Another World Series (it was that easy). The Guillermo Moscoso season (I am having a tough time figuring out the character of that season beyond that — the rain globe season, maybe?). One of the best teams ever in the first half of 2014 to almost missing the playoffs because of the second half. Then the miracle postseason run. His last truly great personal performance season in 2015 and then the random disappointment of that team not having any pitching. The up-and-down-ness of 2016 that set the course for 2017 and, of course, 2018.

That’s a decade of boom and bust from a team standpoint but for him has been a steady ascent. Because he’s a catcher and because he’s about to go on the shelf for 6-8 months due to hip surgery, it feels like we’ve come down the other side of the mountain. We’re in the shadow of his apex. Maybe that’s sad, but for now, I’m going to stand here shocked. Time flies. Maybe we should’ve all wised up to his and our immediate future when we saw those grey-haired temples to start the season. One minute, he was Buster Posey, the next minute, he was Chase Utley.

But let’s not sit here and lament the passage of time and use that as a bludgeon for the remainder of Posey’s career. Let’s instead just marvel at the passage of time.