San Francisco Giants star Rafael Devers is drawing brutal criticism after his nightmare start to the 2026 season. In fact, by Statcast metrics, Devers has simply been one of the worst players in baseball, ranking below the 50th percentile in most key performance categories.
Through the first month of the season, the 29-year-old is posting a .207 batting average with two home runs, 11 RBIs, and an OPS hovering around .537, the lowest mark among qualified hitters in MLB, according to SFGate columnist Dave Tobener. The Devers criticism quickly turned personal, with one comparison likely to sting both Giants and Red Sox fans.
Devers Draws Painful Pablo Sandoval Comparison
Dieter Kurtenbach of The Mercury News dubbed Devers “the Reverse Panda,” a direct shot at Pablo Sandoval, the beloved but ultimately extremely disappointing ex-Giant who signed a massive deal with the Boston Red Sox in 2014 and immediately collapsed. Devers arrived at Oracle Park carrying a 10-year, $313.5 million contract and the weight of an entire franchise’s playoff ambitions. He has delivered on almost none of it.
Sandoval’s infamous $95 million Boston disaster once stood as the gold standard of cautionary contract tales. But Devers may now be even worse. Kurtenbach notes that the Giants remain on the hook for roughly $226 million through 2033, with deferred money extending Devers’ payroll presence to 2043. The Sandoval boondoggle now looks modest by comparison.
Devers has shown little outward concern.
“Why should I be frustrated?” he told reporters, after avoiding the media for three weeks, during the Giants’ Philadelphia series, according to The Mercury News. “It’s my job. It’s the only one I know how to do.”
The numbers, however, tell an unambiguously frustrating story. AP baseball writer Josh Dubow noted on X that Devers has posted the fourth-highest strikeout rate in Giants franchise history among non-pitchers with 500 or more plate appearances â 29.8 percent. Statcast percentile data places him in the bottom nine percent of MLB in strikeout rate and the bottom six percent in expected weighted on-base average.
Giants Face Questions About Devers’ Decline
The mechanics underneath the numbers have alarmed analysts. Tobener pointed to Devers’ falling bat speed, now well below average, as a possible structural problem rather than a correctable slump, with his ability to handle four-seam velocity eroding noticeably.
Writing for FanSided, Wynston Wilcox argued the ugly start amounts to full vindication for Boston’s front office, which sent Devers to San Francisco last summer in a deal that drew widespread criticism at the time. Jackson Roberts of Sports Illustrated offered a cooler read, noting that with San Francisco at 6-12 and Boston only marginally better, neither side of the trade has a convincing claim to victory in the infamous trade quite yet.
What is not in dispute is the Giants’ dilemma. Devers cannot easily be traded without the team absorbing an enormous financial hit, and he occupies the same position on the field as top prospect Bryce Eldridge, currently tearing through Triple-A Sacramento. For a franchise that spent years searching for a legitimate middle-of-the-order presence, the Devers situation has become the heaviest dead weight of a troubled 2026 season.
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