The Giants will turn Oracle Park over to two fresh faces Monday night, with Marcelo Mayer returning from the injured list and Bo Davidson arriving from Triple-A Sacramento for his first Major League game against the Twins. Davidson, the organization’s No. 8 prospect and leading outfield prospect, was penciled into right field and the No. 3 spot in the order. Mayer followed as the designated hitter in his first Giants appearance.
The moves come amid a season that has steadily stripped down San Francisco’s Opening Day roster. Jung Hoo Lee went on the 10-day injured list with a groin contusion after fouling a ball into a sensitive area during the sixth inning of Sunday’s 3-1 loss to the Dodgers. Bryce Eldridge joined him on the seven-day concussion list after striking his head on a low archway at the team hotel in Los Angeles. With Lee sidelined, no player from the Giants’ Opening Day lineup remains active.
Mayer and Davidson become the 69th and 70th Giants to appear this season, pushing the club’s already-record player turnover further. Left-hander Philip Abner was designated for assignment to open a place on the 40-man roster for Davidson.
Mayer gets a late-season chance
Mayer, 23, came to San Francisco from Boston in the Erik Miller trade at the Aug. 3 deadline. The fourth overall selection in the 2021 MLB Draft once sat among the game’s most highly regarded infield prospects, but injuries interrupted his path with the Red Sox. Across 114 games during the 2025 and 2026 seasons, he hit .223 with a .278 on-base percentage, a .346 slugging mark and seven home runs.
The Giants see an opportunity for a reset, with the Chula Vista, California, native now back on the West Coast. His most recent Major League game came June 25, before a bone stress reaction in his left ulna put him out of action. He played four rehabilitation games at Sacramento last month, then had to pause again because of a bone bruise in his right foot.
Over the weekend at Dodger Stadium, Mayer completed his baserunning progression and showed the club enough to earn a look in the final week of the regular season. Though he has played shortstop, second base and third base in the majors, manager Tony Vitello expects to keep him mostly in the DH role for the moment.
Davidson’s route to this clubhouse has been a different kind of climb. The 24-year-old signed as an undrafted free agent out of Caldwell Community College in North Carolina in 2023, then hit his way through the system. Between Double-A Richmond and Sacramento this season, the left-handed hitter batted .290 with an .888 OPS and 29 homers in 125 games.
He looked close to a promotion after earning Pacific Coast League Player of the Month honors for a scorching August with the River Cats. A foul ball off his foot on Sept. 9 delayed the call, costing him a week, but he returned without much rust. In his final five games for Sacramento, Davidson went 7-for-18 with a home run.
“I’m taking it all in and staying composed,” Davidson said. “I’m just trying to be present. There’s really nothing else I can do. I’m enjoying it.”
Vitello had seen the raw tools long before Davidson’s Triple-A surge. The manager said the outfielder may have produced the most impressive batting-practice showing of anyone in spring camp. The foot injury, he said, briefly stalled an arrival that felt inevitable.
“We knew he would get here eventually,” Vitello said. “When he fouled that ball off his foot, it took some of the air out of it, because you knew he was going to be called up at some stage. It probably set him back a little.”
Eldridge’s season likely ends
Eldridge’s concussion protocol assignment likely closes the book on his promising rookie season. The 21-year-old first baseman hit .269 with an .825 OPS and 17 home runs in 107 games, providing plenty of the power expected from a 6-foot-7 young slugger.
But Vitello said Eldridge’s work at first base may have been the more revealing development. “The defensive improvement is probably the one thing that surprised us most,” the manager said. “As a fan, the simple thought is, ‘He got called up, let’s watch for home runs.’ He had more than his share, and some were huge, dramatic swings. But he handled a lot of the smaller details, too.”
For one night, though, the attention shifts to Davidson’s first big-league at-bat and Mayer’s chance to begin again. In a Giants season defined by churn, the latest reshaped lineup carries both a debut and a second start.
