Before actu­al­ly engag­ing in an arbi­tra­tion hear­ing, which was sched­uled to begin at noon on Fri­day, Aaron Judge and the Yan­kees set­tled on a con­tract agree­ment. Judge will make $19 mil­lion this sea­son, with an addi­tion­al $250,000 if he wins Amer­i­can League MVP, and anoth­er $250,000 bonus if he brings home the 2022 World Series MVP.

The $19 mil­lion set­tle­ment, which allowed the sides to avoid their arbi­tra­tion hear­ing, is a sig­nif­i­cant raise from the $8.5 mil­lion he earned in 2020 and the $10.1 mil­lion fig­ure he brought in last year. The $19 mil­lion is also a mid­point between the pro­pos­al from Judge’s camp ($21 mil­lion) and the one the team would have brought to the arbi­tra­tor ($17 mil­lion), accord­ing to mul­ti­ple sources. Had the hear­ing actu­al­ly occurred, the arbi­tra­tor would have had to decide between one of those num­bers, as the sys­tem does not allow for com­pro­mis­es like that.

This is the final sea­son of Judge’s arbi­tra­tion eli­gi­bil­i­ty. He is set to hit the free agent mar­ket for the first time after this sea­son, and the larg­er-than-life play­er will get one of the biggest pay­days in MLB his­to­ry. Pri­or to the sea­son, Judge turned down the Yan­kees’ sev­en-year, $213.5 mil­lion con­tract exten­sion. Had the Yan­kees got­ten their way and paid him $17 mil­lion this year, that total con­tract would have paid him rough­ly $33 mil­lion per year through his age-36 sea­son. Judge is rumored to be ask­ing for $36 mil­lion per year.

Instead, Judge turned that down and chose to bet on him­self, some­thing that looks like a bet­ter and bet­ter deci­sion with each game. Judge is on a tra­jec­to­ry to win the MVP, clock 60 home runs, and poten­tial­ly lead the Yan­kees to their first cham­pi­onship since 2009. If he accom­plish­es all that, he will essen­tial­ly get a blank check, as his val­ue will sky­rock­et tremen­dous­ly. Paired with Aaron Boone’s ten­den­cy to play him in cen­ter field this year rather than Judge’s usu­al, less impor­tant spot in right field, and No. 99 has become even more valu­able on the field.

Judge’s 2022 pro­duc­tion is well-timed as far as boost­ing his free agency val­ue, but it would not have been con­sid­ered in the arbi­tra­tion case. This also all would have been set­tled much ear­li­er if not for the MLB lock­out, which forced sev­er­al hear­ings to hap­pen dur­ing the sea­son. With Judge’s salary being deter­mined, no more play­ers from the 2021–22 arbi­tra­tion class need to set­tle their disputes.

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