DENVER -- Has Buster Posey just been Pipped? The Giants All-Star catcher and 2012 National League MVP sat out a second consecutive game Wednesday, and though backup backstop Trevor Brown's two straight starts leave him 2,128 games shy of Lou Gehrig's old mark, his dramatic performance filling in for Posey behind the plate conjures memories of Wally Pipp, the man The Iron Horse displaced.
Posey will be back in the lineup. But with lingering discomfort from a foul tip he took off the instep of his right foot Sunday, the Giants aren't rushing him back onto the field.
"Buster, he's not quite ready," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said Wednesday. "He's day-to-day. I can't tell you for sure he'll play tomorrow. He may need tomorrow off too."
Bochy and Posey had both been confident he'd be back in action Wednesday, but after Brown's two-homer, four-RBI night coupled with a brilliant job behind the dish calling Jeff Samardzija's eight innings of two-run ball on Tuesday, the sense of urgency dimmed considerably.
"He did test it," Bochy said of Posey. "He came out and ran. We didn't have tests done. Which we don't plan on, unless it's not going to go away, then we'll reevaluate it."
Brown, a 24-year-old rookie who made his big league debut with the Giants last September, made his first start of the season Friday against the Dodgers, and his first hit of the season -- a two-run homer in the eighth -- broke up a no-hit bid by the Dodgers.
With all three of his hits going for two-run homers, his bat has been "icing on the cake" for Bochy, but his performance behind the plate may be making a bigger impact with the pitching staff.
"It's always nice to have a catcher get a start with one of your guys who he probably wasn't going to catch a lot and they have success," Bochy said. "So now [Samardzija] loves throwing to him, just like he does Buster, so that makes it a little bit easier when Buster needs a day and Brown goes back there. I can tell you this: they're all comfortable throwing to him."
Brown's performance in Tuesday's series opener gave a boost to both his own confidence and the confidence his teammates have in him while providing a welcome distraction from any potential panic about Posey.
"Right now we're confident that he's going to be fine, because of how much he's improving," Bochy said of Posey. "There's always a little concern that [the issue] is still there."
• Shots heard 'round the West: Brown is in good company with his team-leading three home runs in each of his first three hits of the season. Elias reports that Brown is the first Giant rookie to hit three home runs in his first three games of the season since Bobby Thomson went deep three times in the first three games of his 1947 rookie campaign.
Brown is also the first Giant since Kevin Mitchell to homer for his first three hits of the season. Mitchell accomplished the feat in 1991, the year Brown was born.
• Beat The Shift Night: The escalating frequency of defensive shifts caught Bruce Bochy's attention in Tuesday night's series opener with the Rockies.
"They are taking it to another level," he said of the defensive tactic. "As drastic as some of these shifts are, there are guys that you're going to see beat the shift. That was kind of the model last night. A couple of our guys beat their shift, and [Mark] Reynolds beat our shift. It was 'Beat the Shift' night for a while."