The question is, what are the Mets willing to offer the Giants for Camilo Doval?
The San Francisco Giants have continued floundering just as the calendar approached the MLB trade deadline. While rookie president of baseball operations Buster Posey clearly intends to buy, hoping to reinforce the roster for a postseason run, plenty of teams would be interested in them becoming sellers. Giants beat writer Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic shared one specific example with Kerry Crowley and Markus Boucher in a conversation on KNBR earlier this week.
“Just hearing things around the league and especially my Mets counterpart Will Sammon is really clued in,” Baggarly said. “He’s a really hard worker. One of our most plugged in beat writers I think in terms of what teams are thinking around the league. He talks to a lot of executives, a lot of agents. I can tell you the Mets would have loved to have left San Francisco with Camilo Doval. There are a lot of teams around the league that need top-flight relief help.”
It’s no surprise that Doval would be highly coveted around the league, especially by a Mets team that is still trying to sort out its setup situation in front of closer Edwin Díaz. The 2023 All-Star still has some of the best stuff in professional baseball and has rebounded from his 2024 implosion that led him to lose the Giants closer job to Ryan Walker at the time.
In 45 appearances this season, Doval has amassed 15 saves with a 3.22 ERA (3.40 FIP) with 45 strikeouts and 24 walks in 44.2 innings pitched. Those numbers are not far off from his career 3.32 ERA (3.21 FIP) across five big-league seasons.
Trading Doval would not necessarily mean the Giants were selling. It would undeniably weaken the team’s bullpen, but could make it easier for them to acquire a proven big-league hitter or starting pitcher. Granted, those types of deals are easier said than done. The fact is, buyers rarely trade big-league talent because it’s hard to justify weakening any position if the goal is postseason contention. Nevertheless, Doval is extremely appealing given his track record and two remaining seasons of team control via arbitration after this year.