Austin Barnes Signs Minor League Contract With San Francisco Giants

The San Francisco Giants signed Austin Barnes to a Minor League contract and assigned him to their Arizona Complex League affiliate.

Barnes’ MLB profile page notes the signing was completed on Friday, and he was assigned to the Giants’ rookie league affiliate on Sunday. He presumably will spend some time there in order to ramp back up to baseball activities after being a free agent for more than one month.

The Dodgers made a somewhat surprising decision in the middle of May to designate Barnes for assignment. It was the corresponding roster move to the team calling up Dalton Rushing for his MLB debut, and the organization’s top prospect has since taken on the backup catcher role to Will Smith.

Barnes cleared waivers and was subsequently released by the Dodgers on May 21.

The Dodgers had kept Barnes under contract for 2025 by exercising a $3.5 team option last November. At the time of his DFA, Barnes was the longest-tenured Dodgers position player.

That then became Chris Taylor, who himself was released by the organization less than a week later.

“This has been a very emotional week for all of us,” Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said at the time.

“Barnesy and C.T. have been in the middle of some huge moments for this organization. Both guys have left an indelible mark on our culture and where we’re at at this point. So the decisions were incredibly difficult.

“The conversations were tough, but with where we are, division race, composition of roster, everything, we felt like this was in the Dodgers’ best interest, in terms of how to win as many games and put us in position to best win a World Series this year.

“Doesn’t mean that it was easy, but ultimately felt like it was the right thing to do.”

Over parts of 11 seasons with the Dodgers, Barnes hit .223/.322/.338 with 63 doubles, 35 home runs and 162 RBI.

Will Austin Barnes play against Dodgers?

The Dodgers have 10 games remaining against the Giants this season, with two of the three head-to-head series taking place at Oracle Park.

Their first matchup is July 11-12 in San Francisco to lead into the All-Star break, and the Dodgers return to Oracle Park from Sept. 12-14. The season series between the longtime rivals concludes with a four-game series at Dodger Stadium from Sept. 18-21.

It’s plausible Barnes could factor into some of those games, but it would require the Giants first selecting his contract from a Minor League affiliate. Doing so would mean the Giants need to have room on their 40-man roster for Barnes as well.