The deep-pocketed Dodgers did it again.
This week’s four-year, $240 million commitment to star outfielder Kyle Tucker marked merely the latest mega-money contract concocted by the Dodgers under their never-satisfied Guggenheim ownership group.
Los Angeles won a free-agent bidding war over the Mets and Toronto Blue Jays to land the lefty-swinging Tucker, who agreed to a shorter-term deal with a higher annual salary rather than the long-term contract many projected him to sign as this offseason’s top free agent.
Debates continue to rage over whether the free-spending Dodgers are bad for baseball, whether a salary cap is imminent, and whether MLB is destined for a lockout after the current collective bargaining agreement expires next winter.
But what we do know now is that the Dodgers continue to make unprecedented moves in pursuit of a third consecutive World Series championship, so let’s break it all down by the numbers:
60: The over-simplified breakdown of Tucker’s contract is that he will average $60 million per season, which pales in comparison only to the unadjusted $70 million average value of new teammate Shohei Ohtani’s heavily deferred 10-year, $700 million deal.
57: Because $30 million of Tucker’s contract is deferred, the net present-day value of his annual salary is $57.1 million, according to ESPN. That sets a new MLB record, blowing past the $51 million per year the Mets pay Juan Soto.
413.6: Spotrac currently pegs the Dodgers’ 2026 competitive tax payroll at $413.6 million. That’s nearly $100 million more than the second-place Mets ($317.0 million) and more than four times that of the last-ranked Miami Marlins ($100.1 million).
575.6: The Dodgers’ payroll is projected to yield a tax bill of nearly $162 million, according to Spotrac, which would put Los Angeles’ total 2026 payroll expenditure at a whopping $575.6 million.
2.1: That’s how many billions — yes, with a “b” — the Dodgers now have in overall guaranteed contract money on their books, including deferrals, according to Spotrac.
8: Once his signing becomes official, Tucker will be the eighth player on the Dodgers with a contract exceeding $100 million in total value. The others are Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Freddie Freeman, Will Smith and Tyler Glasnow.
7: In terms of luxury-tax salary, the Dodgers are set to have seven of this season’s top-26 highest-earning players, including Tucker ($57.1 million) at No. 1 and Ohtani ($46.1 million) at No. 3. All seven are set to count for at least $27 million.
36: Based on FanGraphs’ value model, Tucker’s production with the Chicago Cubs last season was worth $36.0 million. By that same metric, Tucker’s most valuable season came in 2021, when his production was worth $39.4 million.
5: Still, last season marked the fifth year in a row that the steady Tucker hit at least 22 home runs, posted an .OPS higher than .800 and finished with more than four wins above replacement (WAR).
24: The total value of $240 million ties Tucker with Albert Pujols (2011) and Robinson Cano (2013) for the 24th-biggest MLB contract ever. Of course, Pujols and Cano’s contracts were both for 10 years, making their average annual salaries less than half of Tucker’s.
