The Giants announced they’ve designated corner bat Matt Beaty for assignment. The move opens a spot on the 40-man roster for reliever Luke Jackson, who is back from the 60-day injured list. San Francisco had already optioned infielder David Villar to create space on the active roster.
Beaty has spent the bulk of his time in the organization with Triple-A Sacramento. Acquired from the Royals on Opening Day, he has appeared with San Francisco just four times. He singled while striking out twice in five at-bats. Beaty has hit well for the River Cats, compiling a .272/.406/.447 batting line over 129 trips to the plate. He’s walking at a quality 10.9% clip and has kept his strikeouts to a lower than average 18.6% rate.
Unfortunately for Beaty, that wasn’t enough to get him a longer look at Oracle Park. He’s appeared in just 24 MLB games dating back to the start of the 2022 season. The left-handed hitter showed some upside in prior looks with the Dodgers, including a .270/.363/.402 slash over 234 plate appearances during the ’21 campaign. He’s a career .249/.319/.405 hitter at the major league level and owns a .286/.388/.415 line through parts of five Triple-A campaigns.
Beaty clearly has offensive ability, but he’s struggled to carve out a consistent defensive role. He’s played all four corner positions at the major league level, the bulk of that time coming at first base and in left field. Those are the only two positions at which he’s started a game this year in Triple-A.
The Giants will have a week to explore trades or try to run Beaty through waivers. He has between three and four years of service time and is in his final option year, which could draw some attention from other clubs. Were he to go unclaimed on waivers, he’d have the right to test minor league free agency by virtue of both his MLB service time and a previous career outright.
