It has been more than a year since Adley Rutschman was called up last May, and the Orioles have seen a massive turnaround at the major league level since then.
The Orioles have the second-best record in the American League at 45-28 entering play on June 23, a far cry from the five straight losing seasons endured before Rutschman’s promotion last season. Baltimore finished the 2022 season above .500 and is looking for more than that in 2023.
The success the 25-year-old-catcher has brought the Orioles has earned him comparisons to some of baseball’s greats. San Francisco Giants play-by-play announcer Jon Miller, who served as the Orioles’ radio voice from 1983 to 1996, sees similarities between Rutschman and former Giants catcher Buster Posey.
“Rutschman is probably way beyond Buster now [than] when Buster first came in,” Miller said on Glenn Clark Radio on June 2. “He was still learning the position. As it turned out, he was a pretty fast learner. He was great. The three times they won the World Series, he was in there every inning of every one of those games. And that was the key.”
Posey was drafted by San Francisco with the fifth overall pick in 2008 after three years at Florida State. Posey was still learning the catching position after switching to the position his sophomore year. Nonetheless, the Giants won the World Series in 2010 as Posey went on to earn NL Rookie of the Year honors. The Giants won two more titles in 2012 and 2014 with Posey behind the plate for the squad.
The 6-foot-1, 213-pound catcher was an All-Star seven times and won five Silver Slugger awards and a Gold Glove. His best season was in 2012, when he returned from a broken fibula suffered the year prior to bat .336/.408/.549 with 64 extra-base hits en route to a World Series championship and the National League MVP award.
Posey joined Pete Rose as the only players in MLB history to win league MVP, Rookie of the Year and three championships.
“Every pitcher on those [World Series] staffs said Buster’s the key,” Miller said. “The relief pitchers were the difference for those Giants teams versus all the teams they played in those postseasons. They never lost a game out of that bullpen. … They came from behind on occasion but never blew a lead.”
Miller said that Posey’s impact could be felt in the Giants’ struggles in 2022 following the catcher’s retirement. After winning 107 games in 2021, the Giants missed the playoffs altogether in 2022.
Miller compared the struggles that the Giants have had to that of the Cardinals following Yadier Molina’s retirement the past offseason. Molina, a 10-time All-Star and two-time World Series champion, was replaced by three-time All-Star Willson Contreras. Yet, the Cardinals have stumbled to fifth in the NL Central this season after winning 93 games last season.
“As good as he was as a hitter, [catching] was the No. 1 value for Buster Posey, and that’s where they miss him and it was the same thing for Yadier Molina,” Miller said. “Willson Contreras was such a huge disappointment. As good as a hitter he is, [he] is such a huge drop down from Yadier that that’s been a real problem for the Cardinals.”
Rutschman is batting .272/.382/.425 with 10 home runs and 32 RBIs on the year. He leads all catchers in All-Star voting in the American League.
“[It] looks like Rutschman is going to be a great player for a long time to come,” Miller said.
For more from Miller, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox