On Friday, a day after he hit a walkoff single, Aaron Judge and the New York Yankees were supposed to enter arbitration on Judge’s 2022 salary. It wound up not coming to that as Judge and the Yankees came to a settlement and avoided arbitration.
First reported by Jon Heyman at the New York Post, Judge will receive $19 million for the 2022 season. In addition, according to MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand, Judge will receive a $250k bonus if he wins AL MVP and a $250k bonus if he wins World Series MVP.
In arbitration, Judge had filed for $21 million and the Yankees filed for $17 million so the two sides met in the middle to kick the can down the road for a longer term deal. It’ll be interesting when both sides eventually have to discuss a long-term deal but as multiple people have said, this settlement is a good sign that they can come to terms and Judge remains a Yankee.
Social media was filled with reactions to the Aaron Judge settlement.
https://twitter.com/barrypiatoff/status/1540386841387466753?s=20&t=Xt7zaVeai_V-ASlDQRw-jQ
The Yankees trying to explain why Aaron Judge (the best player in baseball) is worth $19 million but not $21 million pic.twitter.com/ORhthnhHIJ
— Full Slate Podcast (@Full_Slate_Pod) June 24, 2022
Aaron judge agreeing to meet the @Yankees in the middle to avoid arbitration gives me hope that the 2 sides can get a long term deal done by the end of the season
— Kaitlyn is studying psychology
(@KaitlynnCounts) June 24, 2022
Alright so essentially Aaron Judge will earn 19.5 million dollars this year, awesome https://t.co/nEKI26s31F
— Addison (@YankeeWRLD) June 24, 2022