Posey downplays home runs as part of SF Giants offensive strategy

Watching the SF Giants in 2024, it was clear that situational hitting was not the team's strong suit. That is why president of baseball operations Buster Posey is placing greater emphasis on the Giants scoring runs in different ways as a team.

In a recent interview with John Shea in the San Francisco Standard, Posey elaborated on the offensive approach he wants the Giants to employ: "Offensively, being able to score runs in multiple ways. It’s something Pat Burrell is preaching every day to the guys in camp. Being able to create runs sometimes without even getting hits. A leadoff double, getting the guy over to third base, it doesn’t always take a hit. Do we love homers? Of course. Everybody loves homers. But just making sure that our group understands that for us to be successful, we’re going to have to be dynamic in the way that we go about scoring runs."

This is something Posey first talked about when he began in his new capacity in the front office and manager Bob Melvin has echoed those sentiments. It is clear that Posey is deemphasizing home runs in the team's offensive approach which is probably a good thing.

Buster Posey says SF Giants must score runs in other ways than just home runs

If the Giants are going to be successful as a team in 2025, they are most likely going to have to win a lot of tight games that come down to doing the little things right. Solid pitching, sound defense, and good situational hitting is the blueprint which staff ace Logan Webb spoke about recently, saying the Giants cannot, and really should not, try to outslug other teams.

Posey saw this formula work firsthand to great effect last decade, producing three World Series titles. In fact, in 2012 the Giants had the fewest home runs of any team in the regular season and still went on to win the World Series. Now, it is dubious whether the Giants could repeat that, but it shows that home runs do not have to be a team's main source of offense.

The Giants still have plenty of potential power on the team. Matt Chapman, Willy Adames, and Heliot Ramos all hit over 20 homers last season so they should have some pop in the middle of the lineup. They also have a top prospect waiting in the wings in Bryce Eldridge who has a lot of pop in his bat. However, the team has to be just as good at moving a runner over or ensuring they get a runner home from third with less than two outs more often than not.

The Giants have a hitter in Jung Hoo Lee who excels at putting the ball in play and not striking out a ton. Perhaps other hitters on the team would do well to take a page out of his book especially when there are runners on base and just do everything they can to put the ball in play rather than swinging for the fences.

It is good that Posey has identified this as a key area of improvement, now the hard work of making it a reality must begin. We will see if the team can follow through on Posey's vision.