Buster

I figured he didn't need any sort of fancy or catchy title. A blog on Buster Posey really needs no introduction at all.

In January, Posey visited the Yogi Berra museum and got to spend time with Berra himself. The legend and the already legendary catchers spent the day together and answering questions. Both players each won two World Series in their first three seasons. It led me to wonder about the other similarities between them and other great catchers of the game.

Which begs the question with Posey: are we watching potentially the greatest catcher of all time?

After being drafted 5th overall in the 2008 draft, Posey made his Major League debut in September of 2009. He started the 2010 season in Fresno but was brought up in May to provide some relief for Bengie Molina behind the plate. When Molina was traded to the Texas Rangers on July 1st for Chris Ray and Michael Main, Posey moved into the full-time catcher role. And he never looked back.

Every Giants fan, and now every baseball fan, is familiar with the greatness of Buster Posey for the last two and a half seasons. 2010 Rookie of the Year, 2012 All-Star (receiving more votes than any National League player in the history of the game), 2012 Silver Slugger Award, 2012 Hank Aaron Award, 2012 Comeback player of the year, 2012 MVP, and, most importantly to Giants fans, two World Series rings.

The only other catchers in baseball history who have won Rookie of the Year, MVP, and a World Series are Johnny Bench and Thurman Munson. Pretty good company.

He'll turn 26 at the end of this month, so he's got a long career ahead of him (knock on wood) that he'll hopefully spend in a San Francisco uniform. He's played 308 games in his career so far, not quite enough statistically for two full seasons. But he's already made quite an impression on the baseball world. How does he match up against some of the greats?

Yogi Berra, considered by many to be the greatest catcher in baseball history, was a three-time AL MVP. He was a 15-time All-Star, won 10 World Series with the Yankees, and hit 358 career homeruns. He also caught Don Larsen's perfect game.

Johnny Bench (personally, my favorite catcher) played for the Cincinnati Reds in the 70s. As stated before, Bench was named 1968 Rookie of the Year. He was also a two-time MVP, won ten Gold Gloves, a 14-time All-Star, and won a World Series in 1976.

Roy Campanella began his career in the Negro Leagues before coming to the Dodgers one year after Jackie Robinson did. Even though he only played ten seasons before being paralyzed in a car accident in 1958, he was one of the best catchers in the game. He played in eight consecutive All-Star games, won a World Series in 1955, and was a three-time MVP. He also set a single-season record for catchers with 41 homeruns and 142 RBIs in 1953.

And perhaps the All-Star catcher most similar to Posey is Mike Piazza. Piazza was an incredibly impressive catcher offensively, perhaps the best in the game (so far). He holds a .308 lifetime batting average with 427 career homeruns. He was Rookie of the Year in 1993, a 12-time All-Star, the 1996 NL MVP, and he won the Silver Slugger Award ten times.

Piazza played in 389 games in his first four seasons. Over that time, he hit 94 homeruns and had 304 RBIs. He hit .322 over that span. So far, Posey isn't quite on pace to reach those kinds of numbers, but he's not off to a bad start. 308 games in, Posey has a career 46 homeruns, 191 RBIs, and has a career average of .314. Both of them won Rookie of the Year, with similar averages (Posey with .305, Piazza with .318) and on-base percentages (Posey .357, Piazza .370).

While Buster has a long way to go to reach some of these great catchers, he's definitely on his way. And I'm looking forward to watching him all along the way.