Buster Posey Slams “Impossible” Homerun in Game Against Padres
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The San Diego Padres are a heck of a team. Their ascension through the ranks of the National League’s Western division has sparked an electrifying rivalry with the LA Dodgers, and it’s made things in the National League that much more exciting all around.
While the Padres trail behind the Giants and the Dodgers in the NL West, they’re still one of the best teams in the league. That’s what makes their games against their nearby rivals, the Giants, so downright exciting to watch. And the Giants have yet to disappoint this season, once again ripping into a winning streak that has fans celebrating.
Tuesday night, a truly impossible-looking homerun from Giants’ batter Buster Posey once again proved that the San Francisco team is here to look for a World Series win. Their bats are red-hot, and heroics like Posey’s are poised to propel the Giants to a pennant.
During Tuesday night’s game, Posey continued to do what he’s done all season: dominate the game from the batter’s box. The Padres are on an offensive streak, scoring at least six runs in their past nine wins. That’s an offense that has rocketed them to the top of the NL West and gives them the best win rate in the MBL this season.
Right when the second game of the series was getting started Tuesday night, Buster Posey put the Giants ahead of the Padres with a truly epic home-run swing. Seeing the pitch live, it looks like pitcher Jake Arrieta makes some kind of mistake and gets instantly punished for it. However, this isn’t the case: his pitch was great, and Posey pulled off the impossible to take the ball deep.
Buster Posey's HR was on a pitch 1.37 ft from the center of the plate
That is:
– The furthest inside pitch any Giants RHB has homered off in the pitch-tracking era (since 2008)
– Tied for furthest inside pitch ANY Giant has HRed off in span, w/a Pablo Sandoval LH HR on 9/19/12 pic.twitter.com/SV5Mjk3tKH— Sarah Langs (@SlangsOnSports) September 15, 2021
MLB reporter Sarah Langs breaks it down in this tweet, where she explains how absurd Posey’s feat here is. The ball was far inside the plate, well into the “take” zone for most batters. To take such a floating, inside fastball out of the park indicates a combination of a great eye, fast hands, and unprecedented strength.
The ball was a full 1.37 feet away from the center of the plate. That’s not the kind of pitch that any batting coach would tell a hitter to swing for.
Posey’s swing is tied with Pablo Sandoval for the further ball off the plate to ever be homered by a Giant. Sandoval is in good company to be in, as the Giants remember him as one of the most consistent offensive powerhouses in the team’s history.
The Giants’ win Tuesday night also solidified their place in the post-season this year. They were the first team this season to clinch their playoff position, owing to their absurd win/loss ratio. They will almost assuredly be joined by the Dodgers, who are sitting only two-and-a-half games behind the Giants. The Padres, meanwhile, are an eye-popping 20.5 games behind, showing just how wide the gulf between the NL West has grown.
Elsewhere, things are much more competitive. For instance, in the NL East, the Braves only lead the Phillies by 4.5 games, making their pennant race a closely-watched event by sports fans on the East Coast.