With some free agents picking up huge monetary contracts within MLB in recent weeks, we look at some of the largest contracts issued over the course of MLB history.
Unsurprisingly, the most recent deals are some of the highest ever issued by MLB teams.
There have been 22 contracts totalling ten years or longer since Carlos Correa agreed a deal with the San Francisco Giants earlier this week.
Mike Trout signed a new contract with the Angels taking him up to the year 2030. The outfielder signed the new deal in March 2019 adding a further two years to his existing contract.
He was set to become a free agent after the 2020 season. The Angels felt he couldn’t just walk away from them without major commitment from the club.
It is thought that Trout’s $360million extension was the richest deal in North American professional sports history when he signed.
After trading for Mookie Betts from the Boston Red Sox in February 2020, the Dodgers made no mistake in tying him down to a huge deal.
In July of the same year, just prior to the shortened-season opener. Betts had already received a $27million one-year deal from the Dodgers when he signed to avoid arbitration.
Betts' extension was the most money given out by the Dodgers in a single contract, surpassing that of Clayton Kershaw in 2014.
Betts and the Dodgers were World Series champions in 2020 and they are +550 to repeat the trick in 2023.
Aaron Judge turned down a seven-year, $213.5million deal before the end of the season and then accepted this megadeal after hitting an AL record-tying 62 home runs and winning the MVP Award for 2022.
Carlos Correa’s deal is the second-highest free agent deal in MLB History behind the deal for Aaron Judge.
The Giants were all in on trying to get Judge and bring him home to the West Coast. Instead, the Yankees were forced to wait and play a patient game with him.
Correa, though, waited and withdrew from his three-year deal with the Minnesota Twins to obtain a monster deal.
The New York Mets acquired Francisco Lindor in January 2021 and just before the start of the season, Lindor extended the deal adding on 10 years and $341million to his existing $22.3m.
MLB: The biggest offseason transactions to date
Fernando Tatis Jr wasn’t set to become a free agent till after the 2024 season and wasn’t even eligible to arbitration at just 22 years of age, but San Diego clearly saw the potential and needed to lock Tatis Jr down for a considerable period of time.
His deal started in 2021 and reportedly contains a no-trade clause, another belief that Tatis Jr will be at Petco Park for a while, with the Padres +1000 to win the 2023 World Series.
Bryce Harper’s contract was the longest prior to Tatis Jr’s and it was the most money and years given to any free agent in North American professional sports history at the time of signing.
Harper has slugged .556 and clubbed 83 home runs across his first three years in Philadelphia and helped the Phillies after an injury-hit season in 2022 to reach their first World Series since 2009.
The Phillies are +1600 to go one step further and win the World Series in 2023.
After signing the then-richest contract in baseball in 2014, Giancarlo Stanton then played three more years with the Marlins, before they traded him to the New York Yankees.
Following seven seasons with the Los Angeles Dodgers that included the NL Rookie of the Year award, two NL Silver Slugger Awards, two All-Star selections, and NLCS MVP award and a World Series MVP Award, Corey Seager left Los Angeles to ink one of the largest free-agent contracts in baseball history with the Texas Rangers.
The deal came just one day after Texas invested in Marcus Siemien to a big seven-year deal.
Gerrit Cole will get $36million per season for his nine years in the Bronx following his free agency, though he’s still yet to help the Yankees achieve a World Series - last won by New York in 2009.
The Yankees are +800 to end that wait in 2023.
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