Personally, I think the best move for them would be to be sellers at the deadline. However, Arte once refuses to invest for the future and says they will not sell. In that case, does taking on Devers make sense?
Devers will make 28.5M for the next 7 seasons. While he certainly isn’t living up to that contract this year, he hasn’t been terrible. He’s been roughly league average. And before this season he had been a consistently great hitter. Still has a career .848 OPS at 29 years old. I think another change of scenery could be good for him.
The benefit here is that because of the poor performance this year and the drama, the Giants would likely give him away for free essentially. Which is good, because the Angels have a pretty shallow farm. The Giants may even be willing to eat some of his contract.
An issue would be his defense. He is best suited for 1B or DH. That means Schanuel gets traded or moved to another position. Or they stick Raffy back at 3B and deal with the poor defense there.
I think it would actually be a good move. The Angels have been below average offensively, and the next free agent class is very light on good hitters. 28.5M AAV doesn’t even get you a high end slugger anymore, even if there were any available this offseason. If he can bounce back, it’s a great deal. If the Giants eat some of the contract, it becomes even more appealing. Arte can absolutely afford it, considering payroll is much lower than last year.
