CHICAGO – The most tantalizing and frustrating member of the Yankees bullpen is on his way out.
The Yankees are trading Camilo Doval to the Pirates for prospects Omar Alfonzo and Luis Cruz, The Post’s Jon Heyman’s and Joel Sherman confirmed Saturday, a year after he was part of their deadline haul to remake the bullpen.
Doval, who is under team control through 2027 and still owed about $2 million this season –$750,000 of which the Pirates are assuming – pitched to a 4.54 ERA across 44 games this season.
His inability to deliver in big spots had relegated him to mostly low-leverage situations of late, part of the reason why the Yankees are still looking to add an impact arm to their bullpen before Monday’s deadline.
But the hard-throwing Doval will no longer be part of the equation, which may be addition by subtraction, even as the Yankees had held out hope that they could fix him.
The righty showed his talent in flashes – with his 100 mph cutters – but not nearly often enough.
The Yankees were planning on calling up Yovanny Cruz from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to take Doval’s spot in the bullpen ahead of Saturday night’s game against the Cubs at Wrigley Field.
Alfonzo, the son of former big league catcher Eliezer Alfonzo, is a 22-year-old, lefty-hitting catcher and first baseman.
In 60 games at Double-A Altoona this season, he was batting .239 with a .757 OPS and nine home runs.
Alfonzo just lost his mother and sister in the Venezuelan earthquake earlier this month.
Cruz is an 18-year-old outfielder that was playing in the Dominican Summer League, batting .313 with a .856 OPS and seven steals in 17 games.
Alfonzo was the Pirates’ No. 17 prospect, per MLB.com, three spots behind Rafael Flores Jr., the catcher the Yankees sent to Pittsburgh as the headliner in the David Bednar trade last summer.
The Yankees also sent another catcher to the Pirates in that deal, Edgleen Perez, who is now their No. 8 prospect.
