After a long spell with the New York Yankees, Cody Bellinger is returning to the Bronx on a five-year, $162.5 million contract. The agreement, which makes Bellinger the team’s third-highest-paid player behind Aaron Judge and Gerrit Cole, includes a full no-trade clause and opt-out clauses after the second and third seasons.
The results themselves are not shocking.
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On a win-over-replacement basis, only Aaron Judge offers more value to the 2025 Yankees than Bellinger. He’s a great fit in the clubhouse and has no problem handling the New York pressure cooker. No other team needs a versatile, high-contact corner outfielder more than he does. By all accounts, Bellinger is enjoying his time in New York after arriving from Chicago in a salary-cut deal last winter. So, at the beginning of winter, a reunion seems inevitable.
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But the road to this conclusion was surprisingly bumpy. Bellinger and his agent, Scott Boras, were apparently seeking a long-term contract, but such a deal never materialized. As multiple reports indicated throughout the process, the Yankees were unwilling to go beyond five years. General manager Brian Cashman refused to budge, all but signaling that he was prepared to let Bellinger leave if he could find a more attractive deal elsewhere. This has led to something of a stalemate, with contract details being released to the public at an unusually regular pace.
As Bellinger and Boras looked for alternative offers — either as a legitimate landing spot or as a bargaining chip — potential big-budget suitors began to turn around. The first domino to fall was outfielder Kyle Tucker, the consensus top free agent on the market. Last week, Los Angeles effectively moved on from Bellinger when the 29-year-old agreed to a shock four-year, $240 million contract with the two-time defending champion Dodgers.
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It also prompted a change of direction by the New York Mets, who made a competitive offer for Tucker’s services. New York quickly signed infielder Bo Bichette to a three-year, $126 million contract. With the center field solidified, president of baseball operations David Stearns subsequently traded with the Chicago White Sox for mercurial center fielder Luis Robert Jr. The 28-year-old Cuban still has a cathedral-sized offensive ceiling, and he provides high offensive production thanks to his funky glove.
The exchange, reached late Tuesday night, appeared to deal the final blow to Bellinger and Boras’ hopes of pushing the Yankees’ offer higher. With the Mets out of the running, Bellinger and Boras had no choice but to return to the trade that Cashman had left on the table.
Financially speaking, it’s a somewhat disappointing catch. Coming off his most complete season since 2019, Bellinger is certainly looking for a contract that covers most of his 30s. But Boras’ hard-line approach brought no additional benefits. That said, two strong seasons could allow Bellinger to return to the open market in two years at age 32 and have a chance to cash in again.
It was a prudent, if predictable, move for the Yankees.
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Bellinger provides the corner outfielders with uniquely good defense — a must-have in the relatively vast left field of Yankee Stadium. The club’s backup plan will likely be Jasson Domínguez, a former superstar who has yet to establish himself as an impact player. Dominguez’s shortcomings were especially apparent on defense, where his Christopher Columbus-level receiving routes proved to be the stuff of legend for Iakty Sacks.
Despite being overshadowed by a premature exit in the ALDS against the Toronto Blue Jays, the 2025 Yankees finished the regular season tied with Toronto as the winningest team in the American League. So Cashman and his team seem more than happy to restart operations in 2026. Bellinger will rejoin a staff led by back-to-back MVP Aaron Judge and supplemented by second baseman Jazz Chisholm, first baseman Ben Rice and DH Giancarlo Stanton. New York threw 30 more deep balls last year than any other club and ranked first in most offensive categories.
While it’s not the six- or seven-year deal Bellinger might have dreamed of, the deal represents the culmination of the 2019 MVP’s years-long path back to stardom.
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After that historic campaign against the Dodgers, Bellinger hit rock bottom. Los Angeles declined to offer him a contract after the 2022 season. He connected with the Cubs and reinvented himself as a contact-oriented player with the Cubs. He signed a three-year deal with Chicago with an opt-out after a strong showing in 2023, which sent him to the Bronx, which was essentially a salary bust before last season.
He immediately bounced back and once again cemented himself as the victor. Bellinger was lackluster in a small sample size in October, but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s already solidified himself as a key member of a quality club. Now, he’s going to be getting paid like this for a long time.