Recent Giants’ first-round draft pick Joey Bart visited AT&T Park for the first time on Monday evening. The No. 2 overall pick was given his first Giants uniform in the dugout by general manager Bobby Evans, and had his first brief session with the Bay Area media.
Bart was also introduced to many members of the Giants organization for the first time, including Buster Posey, a player who he may replace down the line. Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper also met Bart for the first time on Tuesday, and described his first impression of the catcher on Murph & Mac.
“Well I met him in the hallway as I was going up to the broadcast booth,” Kuiper said. “He and his family and Bobby Evans were coming down towards the tunnel and out onto the field and Bobby stopped me and introduced me really fast. The first thing you notice right away is he’s a pretty good sized kid, but when I shook his hand I felt like I was shaking a dairy farmer’s hand. I felt like I was shaking Willie Mays’ or Frank Robinson’s hand, because he’s got a paw that just wouldn’t stop, and with those guys you’ve got to get in there or they’re going to hurt you, and he gave me a great handshake with big paws.
“That to an old son of a dairy farmer is a solid first impression, and from that point I’m sure it got better for him, because he got to meet younger people, like the (Buster) Poseys and the (Pablo) Sandovals, and he looked like he really enjoyed himself. I really thought he was great. He handled everything extremely well and hopefully they’ve got something. I think they do.”
Kuiper then gave a timetable as to how long it could take until we see Bart in a big league uniform.
“He’s a college kid,” Kuiper said. “So you figure the three years he had in college are in some ways, a little bit like three years in the minor leagues. So if you tack that onto two more years of professional baseball, I mean at some point you’ve got to get to Triple-A, or at some point Double-A, and once you get to that level and start to excel, then we can answer that question a lot better.
“How fast is he going to get through A-ball, rookie league? He’s going to get through that pretty fast, but then there’s those next two levels, especially Double-A. Double-A will separate guys really fast. So I think once we see how he handles Double-A, it could be two (years), it could be three. Probably if you are counting this year, more like three and I think at that point it’ll probably be time for Buster to start backing off behind the plate, and you might see both of them. I think I’ve said this before, it certainly didn’t hurt Aaron Rodgers to sit behind Brett Favre.”
Listen to the full interview below. To hear Kuiper on Bart, start from 8:00.
