Pirates Designate Camilo Doval For Assignment

The Pirates announced that right-hander Kirby Yates has been reinstated from the 15-day injured list. Fellow righty Camilo Doval has been designated for assignment as the corresponding move.

It’s a bit of a surprising decision for the Bucs at this late part of the season. They just acquired Doval at the trade deadline, giving up prospects Omar Alfonzo and Luis Cruz to get Doval from the Yankees. The Bucs have since slid from contention but Doval was under club control for 2027.

It would appear that the Pirates weren’t planning to tender him a contract for next year. Even if they were planning to non-tender him in November, it’s a bit strange to cut him from the roster now. There are several other pitchers in the bullpen who have options and could have been easily sent down for the final days of the season. They then could have tried to trade Doval before the non-tender deadline. The interest would have been minimal, given his up-and-down results. But even if they found no takers, they could have non-tendered him, which would have meant walking away at no cost for 2027.

It would seem the one benefit to cutting him now is the potential for mild cost savings in 2026. Doval is making $6.1MM this year. There’s a bit less than $200K to be paid out. Since the trade deadline has passed, he will have to be placed on waivers, if he isn’t on the wire already. A claiming team wouldn’t be able to use Doval in the playoffs, since the September 1 eligibility line has passed. But perhaps a team could pick him up if they think he’s worth tendering a contract for 2027, with a small added bonus of him potentially impacting one or two games late in this season.

If Doval goes unclaimed, the Pirates won’t save that money. Doval has five-plus years of service time, giving him the right to reject outright assignments while keeping all his salary commitments intact. If he were to clear waivers in the coming days, the Pirates will still owe him the few remaining thousands of dollars.

Doval has huge stuff, with a cutter and a sinker that each average in the upper-90s. He also has a high-80s slider and a mid-90s changeup. That lively arsenal has led to periods of dominance but also control issues. He had a really strong run with the Giants earlier in his career, becoming their closer for a while. From 2021 to 2023, he tossed 162 1/3 innings with a 2.77 earned run average. His 9.6% walk rate was on the high side but just barely, while he struck out 30.2% of batters faced and induced grounders on 53.4% of balls in play.

Since then, the control has declined, which has led to worse overall results and a few jersey swaps. Since the start of 2024, he has logged 183 innings with a 4.23 ERA. His 55.3% ground ball rate in that time is still a very strong figure but his strikeout rate has dropped to 26%, still above average but not by as much as his earlier numbers. His walk rate, meanwhile, has been 13% in that time. The Giants traded him to the Yankees last year, acquiring prospects Jesús Rodríguez, Trystan Vrieling, Parks Harber, and Carlos De La Rosa, and the Yanks then flipped him to Pittsburgh this year.

The control has been especially problematic of late. Doval had a 10.1% walk rate in 2026 at the time of the trade. Since then, he has walked 15.9% of batters faced. It’s entirely possible that the Pirates initially planned to keep Doval for 2027 but his recent results have pushed them to rethink that.

As mentioned, he is making $6.1MM this year. He would be due a raise in arbitration for 2027 but it seems the Pirates didn’t want to bring him back for a deal in the $7-10MM range. If one of the 29 other clubs considers him worth a deal like that, they could claim him right now. If not, he’ll end up a free agent and will be an interesting candidate for a bounceback flier.