10 Crippling Contracts Making MLB Teams Cringe in 2024

Nobody ever wants to hear about MLB contracts that are paying off, and there's a reason for that: It's just not an interesting topic.

Not when compared to contracts that are blowing up in teams' faces, anyway.

We're going to run through 10 contracts that feel like especially bad news in 2024, but with a twist. Well, technically several twists by way ground rules meant to keep things interesting:

• Must Be Active: This rules out players who are no longer on the team in question, including Stephen Strasburg and José Abreu. 
• Must Have Played in 2024: At least enough to show what they can do, which notably rules out Jacob deGrom.
• Must Be an Original Signing: No deals absorbed via trades, a la Nolan Arenado, Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer.
• No Expiring Deals: This year is the end of the line for Patrick Corbin and Paul Goldschmidt, and potentially for Blake Snell if he makes use of his opt-out.
• Minimum $100 Million Guarantee: You're off the hook, Andrew Benintendi and Masataka Yoshida.

Otherwise, this was about looking for large gaps between a players' share of his team's luxury-tax payroll, as determined by Spotrac, and their production on the field in terms of wins above replacement, as determined by Baseball Reference.

Let's count 'em down in ascending order of the player's luxury-tax share.

Contract Status: Year 2 of 5-year, $102 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 5.8

WAR Contribution: Minus-0.3 of 15.0

One can't help but feel a little bad for both Edwin Díaz and the Mets for how things have shaken out since they re-upped in November 2022.

Theirs was always a risky agreement, but it also seemed reasonable enough at the time. Díaz was coming off arguably one of the five best seasons ever by a relief pitcher, which was also just his age-28 season. So, why not the first ever nine-figure deal for a reliever?

But then, of course, came the fluke knee injury last March that took out of the World Baseball Classic and ultimately sidelined him for the entire 2023 season. And whatever you can call this year, you can't call it a comeback.

Even the 30-year-old's 4.70 ERA doesn't tell the whole story. He's lost about 2 mph off the average fastball he had in 2022, and has otherwise been sidetracked by a demotion from the closer's role and, more recently, a sticky-stuff suspension.

One bright side is that Díaz doesn't actually account for a big chunk of the Mets' massive payroll. Alas, it's also the only one.

Contract Status: Year 3 of 5-year, $100 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 8.4

WAR Contribution: Minus-0.3 of 29.6

There has been, still is and may continue to be one valid thing to say in Nick Castellanos' defense: At least he's not holding the Phillies back.

It's not even hard to remember the times he elevated the Phillies. His defense played a huge role in getting them to the World Series in 2022. And for a time, he was the hottest hitter around in last year's playoffs.

But when it comes down to it, the 32-year-old's time in Philadelphia has been marked by average hitting (100 OPS+) and close to replacement-level overall production (1.3 rWAR).

Though he's been better in recent weeks, Castellanos is mired in the worst full-season year of his career. His OPS is just .662 and he's unsurprisingly in the running for the year's worst defensive outfielder by way of minus-six Outs Above Average.

The Phillies are stuck with Castellanos for now, but we'll see if they resign themselves to that fate again in 2025. It's conceivable that the trade whispers that sprung up last winter will get louder this winter.

Contract Status: Year 2 of 5-year, $100 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 8.4

WAR Contribution: Minus-0.4 of 18.5

When faced with the prospect of losing Joe Musgrove to free agency after 2022, the Padres chose not to mess around.

It was on August 1 of that year that they extended Musgrove. And the vibes? They were cheery. It's not often that a star player chooses to stay put on the eve of free agency, much less with the team he grew up rooting for.

"I really got the feel that they wanted me here," Musgrove said at the time, "and I think everyone knew that I wanted to be here."

Yet the signs of trouble that were apparent even then—Musgrove signed amid an 11-start stretch marked by a 5.25 ERA—haven't exactly dissipated. The 31-year-old spent significant time on the injured list in 2023, and he's now back there again with a bone spur in his elbow.

Musgrove had been struggling before going on the IL, posting a 5.66 ERA and a rate of nearly two home runs per nine innings. So whenever he's back, he'll have a lot of pieces to pick up.

Contract Status: Year 3 of 6-year, $140 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 9.9

WAR Contribution: Minus-1.5 of 15.0

It could just be me, but free-agent signings aren't as baffling as they used to be. It's as if teams have spent the last few decades increasingly obsessing over risk aversion.

But then there's the Tigers signing Javier Báez in November 2021, which never made sense.

Even fresh off a relatively respectable 85-win season, they were a rebuilding team that badly needed stability. Not Báez, in other words, as the allure of his peak performances of 2018 and 2019 also came with a propensity for whiffs that was never worse than in 2021.

Even setting aside his injury issues, it's hardly any surprise that the 31-year-old has been an offensive disaster in three seasons with Detroit. And it's only getting worse, as a .671 OPS in 2022 has been followed by a .593 OPS in 2023 and a .456 OPS this year.

Whatever the Tigers have planned for Báez, a continued partnership through the end of his contract in 2027 shouldn't be in the cards. The last thing anyone should do with a failure of this magnitude is refuse to admit it.

Contract Status: Year 4 of 6-year, $150 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 10.6

WAR Contribution: 0.2 of 11.2

Here's a pairing that, unlike Báez and the Tigers, couldn't have made more sense when it came together.

George Springer and the Blue Jays joined forces in January 2021. At the time, he was fresh off a deep playoff run for the fourth time in as many years with the Houston Astros, and they were trending up after going from 95 losses in 2019 to the playoffs in 2020.

Yet it's fair to look back now and say the good intentions simply haven't panned out.

Though Springer did buoy Toronto's offense with an .848 OPS across 2021 and 2022, he also missed 113 games with injuries. Last year proceeded to signal the end of his prime, as he played in 154 games but only posted a career-low .732 OPS.

Cut to now, and Springer's OPS is all the way down at .581 as he careens toward turning 35 on September 19. With the Blue Jays trending toward their first last-place finish in the AL East since 2013, what should have been a perfect partnership looks beyond saving.

Contract Status: Year 3 of 6-year, $140 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 10.7

WAR Contribution: 0.2 of 22.9

Whether it was ever a good idea for the Red Sox to sign Trevor Story is debatable, but we should all agree that the deal is cursed.

As he didn't sign until March 23, he basically had to skip spring training for the 2022 season. Then the injury bug came for him, resulting in hand and foot injuries ruining the end of his '22 campaign and in surgery in January 2023 to repair a preexisting elbow condition.

And so it goes. Story at least seemed prime for a defensive revival through his first seven games of this season, but then he dislocated his shoulder in his eighth outing. Due to surgery, there will not be a ninth.

As of now, all the 31-year-old has to show for three seasons with Boston is a .681 OPS and 3.5 rWAR in 145 games. And when you squint and try to see the Red Sox's future, it's hard to discern his place in it.

After all, David Hamilton looks like a keeper in the middle of the infield, and the day when top prospect Marcelo Mayer is ready to take over at short is only getting closer.

Contract Status: Year 2 of 11-year, $280 million deal

Team Luxury Tax Percentage: 10.7

WAR Contribution: Minus-0.1 of 18.5

This one will come as a shock to anyone who has somehow traveled forward in time from April 2023.

That was Xander Bogaerts' first month as a Padre, and it could not have gone any better. He homered three times just in his first six games and ultimately exited the month with three more long balls and a .914 OPS.

Yet so much has happened with Bogaerts since then, and very little of it is good.

Even before he fractured a bone in his left shoulder on May 20, the 31-year-old's stardom was already deflating. A bothersome wrist injury had sent his strong start to 2023 off course, and then the Padres moved him down the defensive spectrum by shifting him from shortstop to second base.

Between the .581 OPS with which he began this year and the .762 OPS with which he finished last season, Bogaerts has basically been a league-average hitter (101 wRC+) over his last 173 games. It's a bad omen for the nine years he has left on his deal.

Contract Status: Year 3 of 7-year, $182 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 11.0

WAR Contribution: Minus-0.6 of 6.3

Though the two signings came several months apart, the Rockies' deal with Kris Bryant had the same "Why, though?" energy as the Tigers' deal with Báez.

The move happened barely a year after the Nolan Arenado trade, and following a season in which the Rockies looked headed nowhere in particular as they lost 87 games. And for his part, Bryant's own trajectory wasn't in good shape either.

Following his peak as the NL MVP and a World Series champion in 2016, he gradually descended from a great player to a good player to a merely OK player. He did hit 25 homers in 2021, but with a modest 3.3 rWAR.

Plus, the Rockies' plan was to play him in the outfield. No small burden for any 6'5", 230-pounder, much less a 30-year-old tasked with roaming a huge outfield 5,200 feet above sea level.

This is not to say anyone could have anticipated an injury-addled Bryant posting in just 146 games with 17 home runs and minus-1.2 rWAR in his first three years in Denver, but it's not a result anyone should feel blindsided by either. This was never going to work out.

Contract Status: Year 2 of 11-year, $350 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 13.4

WAR Contribution: 0.4 of 18.5

After touching on Musgrove and Bogaerts, also including Machado in this discussion feels akin to unfairly dunking on the Padres.

Nonetheless, the 31-year-old has been having a rough go of it for a while now. Factoring in his wonky 2023, his last two seasons have abided by a rather different standard than the eight seasons that came before. Observe his 162-game averages:

• 2015-2022: .856 OPS, 35 HR
• 2023-2024: .756 OPS, 29 HR

The concerns also go deeper than the surface-level stats. Machado is striking out in a career-high 21.2 percent of his plate appearances, and his right elbow doesn't seem fully recovered from surgery. He's maxed out at 87.3 mph with his throws, 6.5 mph below his max from 2021.

The Padres might have avoided all this if they hadn't extended Machado in February 2023. A noble gesture, perhaps, but they did it when he had all the leverage. He had just placed second in the NL MVP voting in 2022, and he was looking ahead to an opt-out clause in his contract.

It's beginning to feel like the Miguel Cabrera story all over again. Loyalty to star players is a virtue in a vacuum, but it's no excuse to jump the gun.

Contract Status: Year 5 of 7-year, $245 million deal

Team Luxury-Tax Percentage: 18.2

WAR Contribution: 0.4 of 10.6

For what it's worth, Anthony Rendon's deal with the Angels wasn't the most blatant case of a team buying high on an obviously unsustainable performance during the 2019-20 offseason.

Stephen Strasburg signed the exact same contract with the Washington Nationals, and look how that panned out. Rendon has, if anything, come closer to living up to his own seven-year, $245 million deal. He at least had a good Angels debut via a .915 OPS during the shortened 2020 season.

Yet there's just no way to sugarcoat what's befallen Rendon and the Angels since then.

He's played in just 167 of 564 possible games since 2021. Barring a hugely successful return from a partial tear in his hamstring, this year will likely make it a fourth season in a row with less than 1.0 rWAR and single-digit home runs.

Though the 34-year-old is under contract for two more years after 2024, the Angels' best move will be to simply eat what they still owe him and let him go this winter.

Lest anyone fret, both the team and Rendon himself would be better for it.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.