In Patrick Bailey, have Giants finally found their Buster Posey successor?

Major League Baseball

Updated Aug. 13, 2023 9:43 p.m. ET

Patrick Bailey wants all the data he can get. The manner in which the 24-year-old rookie catcher digests it and deciphers it belies his age and experience. He finds it essential to construct his plan of attack, whether kneeling behind a plate guiding a pitching staff or sitting in front of a chessboard planning a move.

Pitcher Sean Manaea got a feel for the Giants catcher’s meticulous study habits on the rookie’s first road trip, when Bailey used his time on the flight to sift through scouting reports and write his own personal notes for the upcoming opponent. But it was playing chess against him when Manaea gained real insight into Bailey’s ability to absorb new information.

Bailey knew how chess pieces moved, but he claims he never actually played the game before this year. When he picked the game up, he attacked it with the same studiousness that has made him one of baseball’s more promising young catchers.

He can’t just play casually; he has to find every advantage. He began watching chess videos on YouTube. Manaea once saw him visiting Chess.com. Bailey went from winning the occasional game to beating Manaea four matches in a row.

“I feel like there’s some game-calling stuff to it,” Bailey told FOX Sports, “trying to see multiple moves ahead and what they’re trying to do.”

It is that same diligence on a baseball field that has San Francisco players raving about Bailey, whose production since getting called up in May suggests the Giants may have found the long-term answer to the Buster Posey-sized vacancy behind the plate.

The players around him describe a quiet confidence unusual for someone his age.

“He has confidence that he’s the best,” Giants pitcher Alex Cobb said. “He’s confident in how smart he is. He’s confident in how good of abilities, physically, he has. So, when you know that you are that, it makes it a lot easier to just be comfortable and feel like you belong. Because he knows he belongs.”

“A lot of catchers are a little bit wide-eyed,” pitcher Ross Stripling added. “A little bit, like, ‘Holy hell, this is a lot of information you’re giving me.’ I’ve just never seen him be overwhelmed.”

Bailey’s self-evaluation, however, yields a different descriptor.

“I don’t really know if confidence is the word,” Bailey said. “I’d say probably just like a stoicism, tranquility, trying to slow things down. Obviously with the success, I think it turned into a little bit more confidence, especially at the plate.”

Patrick Bailey hits walk-off two-run HR to secure Giants’ win over Rangers

Though the North Carolina State product thumped 29 home runs in his college career, Bailey’s defense is what largely made him a first-round selection of the Giants in 2020 — two years after they selected catcher Joey Bart as their No. 2 overall pick. The decision looks prudent. Bart underwhelmed with his opportunity last season, but he got another chance this year as one of four competitors for an open catching job in spring training.

Bailey, whose highest level of play entering this year was at high-A, was not part of that group. That did not stop him from trying to throw his hat in the ring.

“Every time he caught a pen, a live BP, went into a game, he was trying to show he was the best catcher in camp,” said Giants bullpen/catching coach Craig Albernaz, who arrived in San Francisco the same year Bailey was drafted. “Pitchers saw that.”

Bailey always felt his defensive abilities would translate at the highest level, but the switch-hitting catcher struggled to hit at the lower levels of the minors and didn’t do much to assuage those concerns last year, slashing .225/.342/.420 with an abysmal .460 OPS in a small sample against left-handed pitching at Eugene.

While scuffling, his stoicism could be mistaken as lethargy or apathy.

“A lot of people saw it as, like, lazy and doesn’t play hard,” Bailey said. “That was never the case. It was just slowing things down and really seeing stuff as much as I could. I understand it’s just kind of a different way to go about it.”

The funny thing about a player’s level-headedness? Performance determines its interpretation.

When Bailey boldly and successfully back-picked Arizona‘s Geraldo Perdomo with two outs in the ninth inning on Aug. 1 to secure a 4-3 win at Chase Field, it was his slow heartbeat.

When Bailey turned a 4-2 deficit into a 5-4 lead with a 432-foot home run in the eighth inning on June 30 at Citi Field, and when he saved the Giants from a fifth straight loss Sunday with a walk-off home run, it was his cool, calm demeanor.

Quickly, the narrative changed.

“Just instant,” Stripling said. “The second we got him, we just kind of flipped a switch.”

In that four-man battle for the catching spot, none of them cemented the role.

Roberto Pérez underwent season-ending shoulder surgery in April. That month, Austin Wynns was designated for assignment. Blake Sabol has split time behind the plate and in left field. Bart, meanwhile, went on the injured list when the Giants called up Bailey on May 19. By the time Bart was healthy again, Bailey had seized the job.

Giants pitchers have a 3.87 ERA overall this year — and a 3.35 ERA when throwing to Bailey, the lowest for any catcher with 500 innings. He has played in just 66 games, yet he has been worth more wins than all but three National League catchers.

Bailey’s elite defense guided his ascension. He receives pitches with a distinctive smoothness, ranking in baseball’s 100th percentile in framing, and has converted 53% of non-swing pitches into called strikes in the shadow zone — that is, the edge of the strike zone — which is the best rate in baseball. Beyond looking at an iPad, there’s an easy way for Stripling to tell when Bailey has stolen a strike.

“The other dugout starts b–ching,” Stripling said. “You’re like, ‘I can’t wait to see that one.’ It’s like two balls off and down, and he sticks it.”

Bailey can also throw from any angle with one of the quickest exchanges in the game. He has caught 35% of attempted runners — 15% better than league average. Only J.T. Realmuto and Garrett Stubbs have demonstrated a faster pop time to second base.

That game-ending pickoff of Perdomo? It was the fastest successful pop time (1.39 seconds) on a throw to first base by any catcher in the Statcast era. On Sunday, he caught Texas‘ Ezequiel Duran stealing to send the game into extras with the fastest pop time (1.71) to second base recorded by an MLB catcher this season.

“Is he a really good big-league defensive catcher, or is he going to be pushing the envelope of being one of the top guys in the league?” Albernaz said. “He’s pushing that envelope now.”

There is no better measurement of his impact than the Giants’ turnaround upon his arrival.

They were 20-23, in third place and closer to last than second in the NL West, when Bailey was called up. They won eight of their next nine games with Bailey in the lineup and have been firmly entrenched in the playoff race since. Even after a recent slide, they still hold the second wild-card spot.

Given what he has already provided defensively, Albernaz knows Bailey’s offense will dictate his ceiling. But his bat is better than advertised. Though he’s hitting close to league average, Bailey has made his hits count with an OPS over 1.000 with runners in scoring position. He’s also performing twice as well as a right-handed hitter this year than he did in the minors last season, as evidenced most recently by Sunday’s walk-off homer against Rangers closer Will Smith.

To no one’s surprise, Bailey thinks the added information available at the major-league level might be boosting his offensive production, as well. He knows what pitch shapes to expect both from opposing pitchers and his own.

“A lot of times with a young catcher, you’ll come in between innings and be like, ‘What’d you see from [Shohei] Ohtani there,’ and a young catcher won’t have anything, he’ll be looking to you for answers,” Stripling said. “Versus Bailey, in pregame meetings he has his own notes, his own thoughts, his own attack plan, just stuff that you see from a three-, four-plus year vet.”

His primary goal after his debut was to build his pitchers’ trust. He viewed the operation as a three-step process. First, display his defense. Second, put in the time to study opposing hitter reports. Third, communicate. The last part was essential. He hasn’t shied away from offering his opinion in game, even to the aces of the staff.

“He’ll go right up to Cobb and be like, ‘Your second split to CJ Cron, that’s the one we want,'” Albernaz said.

Bailey’s confidence has made believers of everyone on the roster, including — and most importantly — the veteran starters leading the staff.

Stripling estimates he now lets Bailey call his pitch first about 95% of the time. Earlier this year, both Logan Webb and Cobb were calling their own games. Bailey’s preternatural feel for the game eventually made them reconsider. Cobb compared it to letting Bailey lead a dance.

“I was doing PitchCom myself most of the year, and then I was like, ‘You know what, you take it,'” Cobb said.

“He’s putting down fingers that you already had the grips to. Slowly, you’re like, ‘All right, I’ll let him see where he takes me.'”

Whatever happens the rest of the way for the Giants, they seem comfortable handing the reins to a novice whose skills are translating fast.

Both behind the plate and in front of a chessboard.

“We’re getting to the point,” Manaea said, “I’m going to have to start making some other moves or something.”

Rowan Kavner covers the Dodgers and MLB as a whole for FOX Sports. He previously was the Dodgers’ editor of digital and print publications. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.