Brandon Belt underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in his heel

Brandon Belt recently underwent surgery to remove a bone spur from his right heel, the San Francisco Giants announced on Tuesday.

Belt had the surgery on Oct. 8 in Wisconsin, and has since returned to his offseason home in Texas to begin physical therapy.

Now, there are two different ways of looking at this.

1. Brandon Belt just had the fifth-best offensive season in all of baseball, and now you want to go around messing with his body? If it ain’t broke don’t fix it!
2. Brandon Belt just had the fifth-best offensive season in all of baseball, despite playing with a bone spur in his right heel? Imagine what he’ll do in 2021 with a fully healthy foot!

I recommend going for Option 2, if for no other reason than the surgery has already been done. You can’t exactly undo a bone spur removal (uhh ... well ... I guess you could, but I really don’t want to think about that).

Despite the aforementioned fifth-best offensive season in all of baseball (his wRC+ of 173 trailed only Juan Soto, Freddie Freeman, Marcell Ozuna, and DJ LeMahieu), Belt was likely slowed by the bone spurs all year. He missed much of Summer Camp due to a heel issue, and missed the first six games of the season while on the Injured List.

Belt and fellow veteran infielder Evan Longoria were activated from the IL at the same time, with Longoria suggesting that both were healthy enough to play, but not fully healthy.

The Giants didn’t release a timeline for Belt, but having surgery this early in the offseason means he should be good to go by Opening Day, barring any unseen setbacks. And maybe he just will improve on that .309/.425/.591 batting line...