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SF Giants officially admit defeat a year after the Rafael Devers trade

Devers mistake is going to haunt San Francisco and Buster Posey for quite some time.
ByWynston Wilcox|
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The Rafael Devers mistake is going to haunt San Francisco and Buster Posey for quite some time.
The Rafael Devers mistake is going to haunt San Francisco and Buster Posey for quite some time. | Thearon W. Henderson/GettyImages

Key Points

Bullet point summary by AI

  • One year after trading for Rafael Devers, the San Francisco Giants admit the move failed to improve the team.
  • Devers' performance has dropped significantly, posting a .235 batting average and a 0.2 WAR in his first 71 games with the Giants.
  • The Giants now face a tough decision: trade Devers while he still has some value or keep him and continue struggling with his large contract.

The San Francisco Giants can’t avoid the fact that trading for Rafael Devers wasn’t the home-run move they thought it was. A year after the blockbuster that came out of nowhere, the Giants are literally worse off than before they made it. Usually a player not performing well a year after a trade isn’t a big spectacle. But when you’re talking about someone in Devers who's due more than $200 million over the next seven seasons, well, the margin for error is thin. 

Rather than building around Devers, could the Giants already look to move the third baseman-turned-designated hitter-turned-first baseman at the trade deadline? The latest rumors suggest San Francisco has accepted that they whiffed and is ready to move on from Devers while he has a sliver of trade value left. Buster Posey probably won’t be able to recoup anywhere near the prospects they lost in the original deal, but they could start to build toward having a more complete roster than what they have now. 

Giants' whiff on Rafael Devers puts Buster Posey in uncomfortable spot

Buster Posey, Rafael Devers
Buster Posey (left) poses with Rafael Devers after the blockbuster trade went through last June. | Bryan Kennedy/GettyImages

Buster Posey is a Giants legend who seamlessly transitioned from a player to front office man. That said, this phase of his post-playing career isn’t exactly going swimmingly. His first big move – though he wasn’t officially president of baseball operations yet – was orchestrating Matt Chapman's extension in 2024. That may have helped earn him the job, but it won’t help him keep it. And if the Devers debacle doesn’t get him canned, maybe hiring Tony Vitello will.

In his first full year in charge, he was responsible for two of the biggest gambles in recent memory, both of which appear to be backfiring. At the time, trading for Devers made sense for a couple of reasons: Namely, the Giants needed offense to keep pace with an NL West division that featured the Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres and the surging Arizona Diamondbacks. But San Francisco finished 2025 with an 81-81 record and no postseason. 

Since Devers arrived, the Giants have gone 69-93. That’s not exactly screaming Executive of the Year. What Posey does to rectify this situation he’s put the Giants in will ultimately save his job — or turn him from franchise legend to a front-office failure. 

Should San Francisco trade Rafael Devers a year after acquiring him?

Rafael Devers, San Francisco Giant
San Francisco Giants first baseman Rafael Devers (16) runs out a triple in the ninth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images | Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images

I see both sides. I understand why the Giants would be hesitant to trade Devers; sometimes players need time to adjust to their new surroundings. For Devers, who has a little more than seven years left on his contract, he could benefit from more than one year with a new team. His slash line isn’t great, posting a .235/.293/.413 with a .706 OPS in 71 games. But this is also a player who's just two-and-a-half years into a 10-year contract worth more than $310 million, and he has started to swing the bat better of late.

The Giants have every right to be fed up with Devers. Not just because of the statistical issues he’s facing, but because the team simply isn’t better with him on the field. Since 2021, Devers hasn’t finished a season with a bWAR below 3.5. He’s currently at 0.2, which would be lower than the 1.8 bWAR he had in his first 90 games in the Bay area. From that perspective, it makes perfect sense for the Giants to sever ties with Devers while they still can. There’s still some pop in his bat, and plenty of hungry teams looking to add offense at the deadline. What the Giants have to either accept or come to terms with is that they might not get a massive haul in return. 

Devers hasn’t been that bad overall in the last 12 months, and could warrant enough prospects in return to make it worth it, but no contender is going to put themselves in a position of dealing with all of his bloated contract. At best, a team like St. Louis Cardinals show interest, but they’re well on their way to believing in the youth of their squad.

It will be hard for the Giants to trade Devers simply because there aren't a lot of teams interested in navigating the same mess San Francisco is right now. That’s why they may be forced to keep Devers for at least another season. At least for now, the Giants realize the mistake they made; unfortunately there’s no easy fix.

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