TODAY IS THE BIGGEST SPORTS DAY OF THE YEAR, PEOPLE. IT’S THE FIRST ROUND OF THE NFL DRAFT WHO’S GOING TO GET PICKED FIRST OVERALL WHO’S GOING TOP 10 WHO’S GOING TO FALL TO THE SECOND ROUND? THERE ARE SO MANY QUESTIONS TO ADDRESS SO MUCH DRAFT TO WATCH SO MUCH AMERICA TO PATRIOTICALLY SEIZE
(Looks around furtively, making sure that crowd is distracted)
Joey Bart’s been awful at the plate this year.
During a pregame segment last night, Mike Krukow was asked what’s more important for a catcher: hitting or pitcher whispering. He made some noise about how important offense is, but then, old pitcher that he is, he said that clearly the more important part of a catcher’s duty is handling the pitching staff. Krukow assured us that Joey Bart had the faith and confidence of the staff, and it was a far cry from his struggles behind the dish in 2020.
Sure, all that may well be true. Maybe the pitching staff’s early dominance owes way more to Joey Bart than we knew about. Maybe he’s pushing in exactly the way the team needs to unlock all the hidden effectiveness hidden within each individual pitcher. Maybe the clubhouse got together and named him “Our MVP” for all the work he’s doing.
He still can’t strike out half the damn time.
Oh, wait, someone’s coming.
LOOK I DON’T WANT THE NINERS TRADING DEEBO REALLY I DON’T BUT HE DOESN’T WANT TO STICK AROUND AND IF YOU CAN GET MULTIPLE FIRST ROUND PICKS THEN YOU HAVE TO AT LEAST CONSDER IT MAN IT’D BE A SHAME TO LET A GUY LIKE THAT GO THOUGH
For all the good things that Joey Bart did in the first week of the season, and the strong work he’s done being more patient at the plate, he has been an absolutely atrocious hitter for the last couple of weeks, and it’s not getting any better. Since April 12, Bart has hit .129/.229/.226, and he’s struck out in 57% of his plate appearances. We are rapidly approaching the point where that’s just who he is from an offensive standpoint, which would not be good.
There is one part of this that I’ve been sounding the alarm on for a while: I saw a lot of Joey Bart last year in Sacramento, and while he had more strikeouts there than you’d probably want to see, it wasn’t an egregious number. But he also wasn’t a superstar. He wasn’t even really a star. He wasn’t terrible, sure, but mostly he was just…fine.
And fine isn’t what you want.
YEAH YOU GOTTA LOOK AT YOUR NEEDS NOW BUT YOU ALSO HAVE TO DRAFT FOR POSITIONS THAT YOU DON’T WANT TO SPEND MONEY ON IN THE FUTURE YOU GOTTA CONSIDER THE SALARY CAP OR ELSE YOU’RE GONNA BE IN TROUBLE A FEW YEARS DOWN THE LINE
Because just fine in AAA means you’ll be worse than that in the majors. Every tiny flaw in Sacramento is a blaring alarm in San Francisco. If you consistently swing through elite AAA curveballs, then you’ll consistently swing through average major league curveballs, and there are a lot of those.
Now, none of that is to say that there was a better option than promoting Bart ALWAYS A GOOD IDEA TO TAKE A RUNNING BACK IN ONE OF THE LATE ROUNDS KYLE SHANAHAN CAN ALWAYS USE MORE HELP IN THE BACKFIELD — sorry, I thought I heard something and I panicked — but he is still much, much more of a work in progress than you want to see. Before Buster Posey retired, this is why I thought it would be a good idea to see what kind of trade market was out there for Bart, because his prospect sheen wasn’t that dim and maybe someone had an idea of how to help him in a way the Giants apparently couldn’t.
If that was ever a thought in Farhan’s mind, though, it went out the window in November. When your franchise catcher retires, you can’t exactly include his replacement in a trade deal without raising some eyebrows.
The Giants, then, seem stuck. They have Curt Casali, sure, but he’s hitting even worse than Bart. This year in Sacramento, they have Ricardo Genoves and Jhonny Pereda, neither of whom is super likely to crush the ball in the majors right now (Genoves has potential, but not potential he could realize tomorrow). They could swing a trade for a stopgap while Bart figures things out back in the minors, but what is he really going to figure out there? The thing that will help him most is playing in the majors, which he’s doing, so his best shot at becoming a productive player soon involves him being a very unproductive player even sooner.
There is one solution, though, I think. It’s a little unorthodox, but I’ve examined it from every angle, and what it comes down to is this:
YOU JUST GOTTA GO OUT AND GET GOOD PLAYERS IN THE DRAFT THAT’S WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT THESE GUYS HAVE BEEN WAITING THEIR WHOLE LIVES FOR THIS AND NOW THEIR DREAMS ARE ABOUT TO COME TRUE BUT THAT’S JUST THE START NOW IT’S TIME TO BE A SPONGE AND ABSORB AS MUCH INFORMATION AS POSSIBLE AND THEN IT’S TIME TO BE A PLAYMAKER BECAUSE THEY BROUGHT THEM IN TO MAKE PLAYS ON THE BALL BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT IN THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE IT’S ALL ABOUT FOOTBALL EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS ABOUT FOOTBALL ALL THE TIME
THIS IS AMERICA