Buster Posey talks calling up top SF Giants prospect Bryce Eldridge

SAN FRANCISCO – Bryce Eldridge, the Giants’ 20-year-old power-hitting top prospect, could reach the major league team before the end of the season. 

During an interview Thursday on KNBR (680 AM), Buster Posey, the Giants’ president of baseball operations, raved about Eldridge’s recent form at the plate. 

Since returning from a hamstring injury that kept him out for almost a month, the 6-foot-7 slugger is batting .281 and has slammed eight home runs and driven in 26 runs over his last 17 games with Triple-A Sacramento. 

In his four most recent starts, Eldridge has hit four homers. 

“What’s been really fun to watch with Bryce is the way that he’s hitting the homers,” Posey said. “He’s hitting a ton of homers to left-center, and that plays really anywhere. That plays at our ballpark, any ballpark.”

Could a callup be in the cards for a team that entered Thursday’s off day with a 58-57 record and was recently sellers at the trade deadline? 

That is yet to be determined. 

“He’s continuing to make strides, and we’re going to keep watching him and see where we are as we continue to move forward. Nothing’s etched in stone,” Posey said, adding, “I think there’s a chance, but there’s a chance he doesn’t as well.”

So what is keeping Eldridge in Sacramento and out of a Giants lineup that lost Jerar Encarnacion on Wednesday to what seems to be a severe hamstring injury?

“As we’ve said all along, there’s more to being a big-leaguer than just hitting, and Bryce knows that,” Posey said. “He’s continuing to make progress defensively, and it’s how you run the bases. It’s all of it, and he’s continuing to do that.”