Brandon Belt: San Francisco Giants 1st Baseman Is Starting to Come Alive

San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy has a reputation for not trusting young players and, for the most part, it's a justified reputation. However, in the case of Brandon Belt, the Giants manager has given the young first baseman plenty of opportunities in 2012. And it appears as if Belt is finally making the most of those opportunities.

Belt's a highly-touted prospect—the Giants' best non-pitching prospect since Buster Posey, as Belt was ranked No. 17 in all of baseball by ESPN's Keith Law prior to the 2011 season. But despite his pedigree, Belt hadn't hit much in the major leagues.

In 2011, Bochy and the Giants lived up to their reputation and kept sending Belt back and forth from Triple-A because he wasn't hitting to their liking. But this season, despite Belt's slow start, Bochy has been playing him pretty consistently, especially over the past month.

Through June 10, Belt had 141 plate appearances for the Giants. During that span, he hit .224/.340/.328 (AVG/OBP/SLG) with zero home runs. Belt was getting on base at an above-average rate, but he wasn't driving the ball with the consistency that he showed in the minor leagues or even in 2011, when he hit nine home runs in 209 plate appearances.

Well, that's all starting to change, and Bochy and the Giants are being rewarded for their patience. In his last 12 plate appearances, Belt has hit .400/.500/1.300 with three home runs.

Of course this is a small sample size. In fact, it's an extremely small sample size, so we can't assume that he'll keep hitting a home run a game for the rest of the season or keep hitting .400 because he definitely won't. However, it's probably safe to assume that Belt will keep hitting with more authority than he showed during his first 141 plate appearances, given his track record and what he did in 2011.

If Belt can just provide the Giants with some consistent pop, then you can live with his low batting average because he gets on base consistently.

With the Giants not getting much production from first base throughout the first couple months of the season, Belt's production is a welcome sight. It also shows that players develop at different rates, so you can't just expect everybody to step in and hit .300 and with power like Pablo Sandoval and Buster Posey did.

That could be a lesson well-learned for Bochy. Or him playing Belt could have just been an anomaly because the team didn't really have any better options. Either way, Belt's finally starting to drive the ball and that's really all that matters.