The Giants announced All-Star catcher Buster Posey received a cortisone shot following Sunday’s game and will rest during the All-Star break for right hip inflammation that has bothered him for much of this season.
Giants broadcaster Duane Kuiper joined Murph & Mac on Tuesday morning and discussed the team’s use of the All-Star break to rest Posey. Murph asked Kuiper whether the Giants would consider placing Posey on the DL.
“I don’t think with the All-Star break that they would look at that,” Kuiper responded. “The All-Star break is their DL. And I think we’re finding out that in the eyes of the manager, that (Posey’s) value is so high defensively in calling the games, that they’re willing to wait until the All-Star break as opposed to putting him on the DL. That’s how much they think of him behind the plate.”
Despite being named as an All-Star, Posey’s pain has been evident. While his .280 batting average ranks 57th in MLB, it’s a low number for the Giants’ anchor, who has never batted below .288 in a full season.
It is unclear what the Giants or Posey plan to do in the long-term, or whether the injury is treatable by surgery. But for the remainder of the season, Kuiper said Posey would be bothered by the injury.
“It’s going to bother him this year,” Kuiper said. “But if you can control it by getting a cortisone shot every so often, that’s probably what’s going to have to happen until the end of the season. I don’t know… if he could do something in the offseason with surgery if that would help. I don’t know. But if he can’t, it’s going to bother him until he stops playing.”
“Clearly, everybody can see, he’s not the same guy at the plate,” Kuiper continued. “You don’t see anything (wrong) defensively, but when it comes to driving, opening up your hips to get to whatever, inside fastball, whatever, you can see that it’s clearly bothering him.”
Part of the mystique of Posey’s injury is his reputation for playing through pain. Since Posey suffered a broken left ankle in 2011, he has played at least 140 games for the Giants in each of the last six seasons. Despite playing the most physically-demanding position in baseball, Kuiper said Posey has never complained about injuries.
“I’ll say this about Buster; you guys know that Mike (Krukow) and I know him very well,” Kuiper said. “We talk to him a lot. And not one time, since he’s arrived here in the big leagues, has he ever said to either one of us, ‘I got this little thing, it’s bothering me.’ Not one time. So he keeps all of this stuff really close to the vest and that’s just the way he is.”
Kuiper said Posey’s nature of playing through and not complaining about pain adds to the surprise of finding out he has a serious injury.
“It’s almost as if he doesn’t want to sound like he’s coming up with any type of excuses,” Kuiper added. “Not one time has he ever said anything… As far as major stuff, uh-uh, he doesn’t say a word. So when the hip thing comes up, we’re almost a little bit surprised. So finally, it takes having to sit out of the All-Star game that he’s going through some serious stuff physically.”
Listen to the full interview below. To hear Kuiper discuss Posey’s hip injury, start from the beginning.
