Reports have come out that the Pittsburgh Pirates have inked a large Konnor Griffin contract at the start of 2026, before the top prospect has played a Major League Baseball (MLB) game. The deal is allegedly for nine years and $140 million. This continues a popular trend of teams trying to lock up their best young player early, to save money in arbitration and free agency. It’s not a new strategy, dating back to 2014 with mixed results at best, but it’s one that teams are open to in a world of $750 million deals.

In the normal course of events, a baseball player gets three years around the league minimum ($1 million), followed by three years of arbitration, and then they can hit the free agent market. The clock does not start until they become a major league player, so if a young player, drafted out of high school, spends 4 years in the minors before his debut, the clock starts in year 5 (their first in the bigs). Teams wield a significant amount of influence in this area, many times, keeping a player in AAA longer than necessary to retain an extra year of team control.

A player can get a raise in arbitration, but it’s truly a weird negotiation strategy. When a player is eligible for arbitration, the team brings a contract offer to a judge based on what they believe the player’s value is, and the player brings his number to the same judge. It is not a mediation that comes to a middle ground. The judge who oversees the case determines if the player gets paid what he wants or what the team is offering (no in between).

The most recent case of a player winning his arbitration case against his team was this past offseason, with Cy Young winner Tyler Skubal. The Detroit Tigers had proposed a salary of $19 million for the 2026 season, while Skubal and his agent were asking for $32 million. The judge sided with Skubal, who will make $32 million this season and become a free agent in 2027 (this was his final year of arbitration).

Konnor Griffin Contract Is Not Necessarily A Good Deal

The Pirates are banking on Griffin being a superstar, and the AAV of $15 million will be a bargain over the next nine seasons. If he is the next Mike Trout, then the house wins with this deal. Trout’s first season with the Anaheim Angels was 2011, but he only played 40 games, so it did not count as one of his pre-arbitration seasons. For the next three years, he made an average of $650k per year. He also hit .311 with 93 home runs and 291 RBI’s. He had an OPS of .963.

Rather than take their chances in arbitration, the Angels made Trout one of the highest-paid players in the league, with a six-year deal worth $250 million. Adding this to his three seasons at the league minimum, and Trout’s first nine seasons, he made $253 million. If Griffin is the same type of star, $140 million is an absolute steal. If he is Scott Kingery, on the other hand, it’s an enormous waste of money.

After three seasons of NCAA baseball with the Arizona Wildcats, Kingery was selected in the second round of the Major League draft (48th overall) by the Philadelphia Phillies. He rose through the minor leagues, making the 2017 All-Star Futures Game. In 2017, he hit .307 with 26 home runs between AA and AAA, and was earmarked for the big leagues in 2018. Before his debut in Philadelphia, the club gave him a six-year deal worth $24 million.

Since signing his deal, Kingery has 1,069 major league at-bats, hit .227, and has a career WAR of -0.2. Basically, when the league calculates wins above replacement, he is the replacement player that people are compared to. Jackson Chourio of the Milwaukee Brewers also signed before playing an MLB game, getting an eight-year deal worth $82 million. In each of his first two seasons, he hit roughly .270 with 21 home runs and 78 RBI’s, accumulating a WAR of 3.1.

There is no such thing as a guarantee when it comes to young talent. Anyone can blow up, but more people fall back to the minors and out of the league altogether. There’s no way to know for sure if $15 million a year for Griffin is a wise investment or a bust. The final vote won’t be cast until 2035. His contract is the true definition of high-risk and high-reward. It’s the kind of deal that makes or breaks MLB general managers.