Baggs Take on Posey for Whiteside:


Bruce Bochy’s odd decision to pinch run Eli Whiteside for Buster Posey seems to be the hot topic back home. It’s covered in the game story.

I paraphrased Bochy, but didn’t use his exact quote. Here it is: “Yeah. More speed. A ball in the gap, he’s going to score. He runs well. And that almost happened.”

Here’s another point against the decision that wasn’t mentioned in that space: The Giants only have a four-man bench because they’re temporarily going with a 13-man staff.

So for the negligible benefit (if any) of Whiteside’s speed over Posey’s, Bochy not only had to watch Whiteside look overmatched in two later situations where he could’ve won the game, but Bochy also used a quarter of his bench to make that move.

And let’s also not forget that Whiteside made a throwing error to second base. Earlier in the game, Posey threw two seeds to second base to catch runners.

When I don’t understand a manager’s move, I don’t necessarily assume he’s right. But I’ll wonder if I’m missing some vital piece of information. For example, when Posey sat last week, turns out, it was because they wanted to showcase Bengie Molina for a trade.

So what was happening here? Was Posey hurt? Nope, we checked. Bochy insisted Posey was fine.

So maybe there just isn’t that much to figure out here. Quite simply, many folks will feel that Bochy cost the Giants this game, and they’ll have a case.