While the average MLB salary reached a record $4.5 million for 2024 amid increasing revenues for the league, the number has been skewed by mega contracts for a handful of generational players.
And it appears Yankees outfielder Juan Soto could be the next player to land a record contract in terms of AAV this offseason. A recent panel of 28 MLB executives polled by ESPN projected that the slugger might earn anywhere from $50 million for a single season to $655 million over 10 years in his next deal. The average of all projections was $482.5 million over 11.6 years and, with the highest and lowest outliers removed, it was $498.4 million over 12.4 years with a $40.4 million AAV.
The highest proportion of panelists, 14 total, indicated that Soto would land a deal in the $500 million to $599 million tier. Three said that the deal would reach at least $600 million.
New free-agent contract records for annual average value (AAV) measured in terms of the luxury tax (the metric used by the league) were set consecutively in the past two offseasons, with Aaron Judge receiving a nine-year, $360 million deal with a $40 million AAV from the New York Yankees in 2022 and Shohei Ohtani landing a 10-year, $700 million contract from the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2023 — the largest total contract value in sports history as well as the highest record in terms of annual average value (AAV) at $46 million.
The trimmed average projection from ESPN’s panel would see Soto fall short of Ohtani’s records for both total amount and luxury tax AAV, but it would see him eclipse Judge and set a new AAV record for a player who doesn’t pitch. It seems likely that Soto will earn something in the range of MLB’s largest-ever contracts, but the rising value of mega deals and increasing league revenue make it difficult to pinpoint a realistic comparison, particularly as Soto has emerged as a generational talent.
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