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According to Jon Heyman and Buster Olney, the Giants are doing background work on two of the biggest free agents available.
"The Giants have been considering outfield star Yoenis Cespedes, but they are a bit concerned that his regular-[season] finish might cause his price tag to rise by $50 million, or more. They have also liked Justin Upton before. But in all cases, there's some suspicion they'd prefer to keep outfield pay to the range of $90 million, which is what they paid their own star Hunter Pence".
San Francisco entered the left-field market after they declined their club option on Nori Aoki. While Cespedes would undoubtedly be an upgrade over Aoki (both offensively and defensively), there's likely some apprehension about giving him a contract in the neighborhood of $150 million.
While he had a fantastic 2nd half with the Mets, he struggled mightily over the final three weeks of the season, and has never played his home games in a stadium that suppresses home runs quite like AT&T Park does.
On the pitching side of things, Olney reported earlier today that the Giants are doing their homework on David Price.
The Giants are among the teams going through background preparation on David Price.
— Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) November 13, 2015
Like Cespedes, Price is expected to sign a highly lucrative deal, potentially for more than $200 million. While that's quite a bit of money to commit to a 30-year old starter, San Francisco was prepared to give Jon Lester a seven-year contract worth $168 million last year.
For now, it's unclear how aggressive the Giants will be for either of these players, but their interest in Price and Cespedes signals that they're at least willing to consider handing out lucrative contracts this offseason.