Parks Harber, who the San Francisco Giants acquired for Camilo Doval, has been named the team’s player to watch in spring training.
After a slow start to the second half of the 2025 season, the San Francisco Giants traded closer Camilo Doval to the New York Yankees. As the Giants get ready for the 2026 season, one of the players acquired in that trade has been named as a player to watch in spring training.
Alden Gonzalez of ESPN named utility player Parks Harber, who was one of four prospects acquired for Doval by the Giants, as San Francisco’s player to watch.
“You won’t see this name pop up on many prospect lists, but some within the Giants really pushed to acquire Harber from the Yankees in last summer’s Camilo Doval trade, then watched him slash .333/.454/.644 in High-A for what remained of that season,” Gonzalez said.
Parks Harber Dominated at All Stops in 2025
All told, Harber logged 108 plate appearances and 87 at-bats for the Eugene Emeralds, San Francisco’s High-A team, in 2025. And while that might look like a small sample size, it didn’t come out of nowhere.
Harber hit well in two Minor League stops in the New York organization as well. He slashed .326/.395/.489 for the Hudson Valley Renegades, New York’s High-A team and .304/.422/.551 for the Tampa Tarpons, the Yankees’ Single-A team.
That, coupled with his performance with Eugene, gave Harber a .323/.420/.550 Minor League slash line in 2025. If we combine that with the .383/.513/.683 slash line Harber posted in the 2025 Arizona Fall League, that’s a .333/.437/.573 line throughout 2025. And while 351 at-bats over 86 games isn’t a huge sample size, it’s not small enough to be dismissed — particularly since it’s not new.
During the Fall League, MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo discussed Harber’s performance. He noted that, while Harber was not drafted in 2024 before signing with the Yankees, it wasn’t due to a lack of production in college.
“He spent three years at Georgia, smashing 18 homers with a .917 OPS in his junior season,” Mayo wrote of Harber. “After not being drafted in 2023, he transferred to North Carolina for his senior year, which led to even better numbers across the board: .343/.425/.648 with 20 home runs.”
Harber has a Good Swing for Oracle Park
One question that must be asked of any hitter entering the San Francisco organization is, “What will Oracle Park do to his offense?” It’s a notoriously tough place to hit home runs.
Fortunately, Harber is not strictly a home run hitter. He hit 13 home runs in 79 Minor League games in 2025 and three in 17 AFL games after the Minor League season. Those totals, while solid, don’t show a hitter who needs longballs to be effective.
Per Fangraphs, Harber had a 31.3% line drive rate on batted balls at his three Minor League stops in 2025. That opens up the door for something we haven’t seen a lot of since Oracle Park opened in 2000, a hitter who actually benefits from its spacious dimensions.
Line drive hitters work very well in stadiums with big outfields and spacious gaps, which Oracle Park has in spades. Line drives into those big gaps are where singles become doubles and doubles become triples.
That’s not to say that Harber will never hit a ball off the wall or into an outfielder’s glove that would have been a home run in 29 of 30 parks. But on balance, the dimensions of Oracle Park should work more to Harber’s advantage than his detriment. That’s not something we can say about a lot of hitters.
Harber has work to do before he gets to the Major League level. Spring training will be the first sign of how well he’s progressed. But if he does progress through the system, there’s every reason to believe he’ll be in San Francisco sooner rather than later.
Michael Dixon Michael Dixon has over 15 years of experience in journalism, both online and in print. While originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, he presently lives in the greater Indianapolis area. He’s also previously lived and worked in Arizona.
More about Michael Dixon
More Heavy on SF Giants
Loading more stories