One of the big takeaways from the 2024-25 offseason has been the big money contracts handed out to starting pitching. Max Fried and Blake Snell have each earned $218 million and $182 million guarantees respectively, and Corbin Burnes will likely be next once he chooses a team.
Assuming there will be an equally strong free agent market for starting pitchers next offseason, there is an even bigger list of candidates who could cash in on the open market. These pitchers all project to land a contract of at least $100 million as free agents.
RHP Dylan Cease
Cease is on track to become the top free agent next winter if he continues his success. He will be watching closely to see what Burnes gets on the open market to set expectations for what he could get. A report from USA Today's MLB Insider Bob Nightengale suggests that offers for the former Brewers and Orioles pitcher are exceeding $250 million.
Since the start of the 2021 season, Cease had made 130 starts and pitched 716 innings with a 3.52 ERA. He's made at least 32 starts in all four seasons, showing that he's capable of answering the bell consistently. His 2022 and 2023 seasons both serve as outliers, with ERAs of 2.20 and 4.58 respectively. His 3.47 mark from 2024 is much more in line with what to expect moving forward.
After a tough 2023 season, he bounced back to post the lowest walk rate of his career (8.5%) while maintaining a strong strikeout rate in 2024. He was one of the best starting pitchers in baseball when it came to missing bats, as his 32.4% whiff rate and 29.4% strikeout rate ranked in the 92nd and 89th percentile, respectively, according to Baseball Savant. That type of bat-missing ability should give him the leg up on the market compared to some of the other pitchers on this list.
A strong and healthy 2025 would give him five consecutive seasons of at least 32 starts and 165 innings. That's the type of durability typically unheard of these days, as the amount of innings a starter provides continues to shrink. He's also finished in the top-four of the Cy Young voting twice in the last three seasons, finishing second in 2022 and fourth in 2024.
If he hits the open market after the 2025 season, just before his 30th birthday, Cease could command at least a seven-year deal with a total value in excess of $200 million.