Re-Grading MLB's Biggest Free-Agent and Trades From 2022-23 Offseason
Three years have passed since the 2022-23 MLB offseason, which was kind of a bonanza.
That winter wasn't particularly rich with trades, but teams sunk $7 billion into various roster moves. It was a good time for top-flight free agents, with Aaron Judge's nine-year, $360 million contract topping the list of nine deals worth at least nine figures.
And now for the big question: Three years later, how do these moves look in retrospect?
We're going to get into that by grading the 20 biggest deals of the 2022-23 offseason. The book on some is already closed, while others are still very much active—for better or worse.
We'll start with five trades and five lesser signings before finishing with the 10 biggest contracts handed out that winter.
Grades for 5 Trades
1 of 12
Seattle Mariners Acquire Teoscar Hernández
The Deal: Mariners get OF Teoscar Hernández; Toronto Blue Jays get RHP Erik Swanson, LHP Adam Macko
Hernández was meant to bring some power to a Mariners team that had just snapped a 21-year playoff drought in 2022. Instead, he never figured out T-Mobile Park and wasn't much better than a league-average bat (108 OPS-plus).
Toronto got one strong season (66.2 IP, 2.97 ERA) from Swanson in 2023 before injury trouble pushed him to early retirement. Though he's still only 25, Macko is basically off the radar as a prospect after three straight rough years in the minors.
Grades: D for Mariners, D for Blue Jays
Atlanta Braves Acquire Sean Murphy
The Deal: Atlanta Braves get C Sean Murphy; Milwaukee Brewers get C William Contreras, RHP Joel Payamps, RHP Justin Yeager; Oakland Athletics get OF Esteury Ruiz, C Manny Piña, LHP Kyle Muller, RHP Freddy Tarnok, RHP Royber Salinas
The legacy of this trade is basically this: Atlanta didn't know what it had in Contreras, whereas the Brewers clearly saw something.
Murphy has posted 7.7 rWAR as a Brave, but has declined the last two years and is now set to share time with reigning NL Rookie of the Year Drake Baldwin. Contreras, meanwhile, has 12.4 rWAR in this same span, and is still in his prime at 28 years old.
For the A's, this trade is basically a disaster. Piña was the only non-prospect in the deal at the time, and none of the four players have yielded any returns in the majors.
Grades: A for Brewers, C for Braves, F for A's
Toronto Blue Jays Acquire Daulton Varsho
The Deal: Toronto Blue Jays get OF Daulton Varsho; Arizona Diamondbacks get OF Lourdes Gurriel Jr., C Gabriel Moreno
This was a case of the D-backs selling high on Varsho's unexpected breakout in 2022, and they were right that his bat was too volatile to be consistent going forward. Even so, he's given the Blue Jays 11.3 rWAR through his excellent defense and strong power/speed combination on the offensive side.
Gurriel was an All-Star in 2023 before reaching free agency and subsequently re-signing with Arizona. Yet the real get at the time was Moreno, and he's had trouble living up to a 4.3-rWAR breakout in 2023. He's good when he plays, but he just hasn't been able to stay healthy the last two years.
Grades: B for Blue Jays, B for Diamondbacks
Miami Marlins and Minnesota Twins Swap Pablo López, Luis Arraez
The Deal: Miami Marlins get INF Luis Arraez; Minnesota Twins get RHP Pablo López, INF José Salas, OF Byron Chourio
On the one hand, the Marlins got a staggering .343 average out of Arraez while he was around. On the other, he only lasted 180 games in Miami before he was traded to San Diego in a deal that has yet to have any payoff.
López, meanwhile, was quick to sign an extension and went on to be an All-Star and down-ballot Cy Young contender in 2023. Injuries and inconsistency have plagued him in two seasons since, but the Twins should still feel like they got the better end of the deal.
Grades: B for Marlins, A for Twins
Los Angeles Angels Acquire Hunter Renfroe
The Deal: Los Angeles Angels get OF Hunter Renfroe; Milwaukee Brewers get RHP Janson Junk, RHP Elvis Peguero, LHP Adam Seminaris
This was at a time when Renfroe was coming off hitting 60 home runs across the 2021 and 2022 seasons. He was thus meant to boost the Angels' offense, but the 2023 season instead saw his production fall into an irreversible downward trend.
Not that the Brewers did much better, mind you. Of the three players they got back for Renfroe, not one is still with the organization.
Grades: F for Angels, F for Brewers
Grades for 5 Signings
2 of 12
Philadelphia Phillies Sign Taijuan Walker
The Deal: 4 years, $72 million
This was one of the weirder contracts handed out three years ago, but the idea for the Phillies seemed clear enough. With the top of their rotation in good hands, all Walker had to do was provide average-ish bulk at the back end.
Instead, he's posted an 88 ERA-plus and 2.4 rWAR in three seasons. He was more of a swingman when healthy in 2024 and 2025, and he'll begin 2026 hoping to stick in a depleted Phillies rotation.
Grade: D
New York Mets Sign Kodai Senga
The Deal: 5 years, $75 million
Senga and his "ghost fork" were as advertised in 2023, as he was the Rookie of the Year runner-up after making 29 starts and posting a sub-3.00 ERA.
Since then, injuries robbed him of all of one start in 2024, and a strong start to 2025 gave way to more injury trouble and, eventually, a demotion to Triple-A. The Mets toyed with trading him this winter, and now seem set to only use him as a No. 6 starter.
Grade: C
Chicago White Sox Sign Andrew Benintendi
The Deal: 5 years, $75 million
This was the richest contract the White Sox had ever given out, and it frankly never made sense. Even if Benintendi was coming off a .304 average at the time, his profile was that of a mere singles hitter who played a non-premium position.
This is not to say he should have been expected to post only 0.6 rWAR in the first three years of the deal, but it does feel like karmic justice for an obviously bad signing.
Grade: F
New York Mets Sign Justin Verlander
The Deal: 2 years, $86.7 million
This was when Verlander was fresh off winning his third Cy Young Award in 2022, and the Mets' bet was that he would continue to age gracefully. Instead, this contract bought a 4.03 ERA and only 218 strikeouts in 252.2 innings.
The Mets were, of course, able to get out of the deal when they shipped Verlander back to Houston midway through 2023. It would look like a wise move even if they hadn't gotten back Drew Gilbert and Ryan Clifford, the latter of whom is one of their best prospects heading into 2026.
Grade: C
St. Louis Cardinals Sign Willson Contreras
The Deal: 5 years, $88.5 million
Speaking of deals that teams got out of, Contreras is now a member of the Boston Red Sox after St. Louis pretty much salary-dumped him in December.
Contreras was plenty solid offensively as a Cardinal, posting a 127 OPS-plus with 55 home runs in three years. It was nonetheless a weird vibe for him in St. Louis, mainly owing to how he was signed as a catcher even though the organization never seemed to have faith in his catching abilities.
Grade: C
Boston Red Sox Sign Masataka Yoshida
3 of 12
The Deal: 5 years, $90 million
Stats During Contract: 303 G, 1,206 PA, 29 HR, 13 SB, .282 AVG, .337 OBP, .425 SLG
More than any other signing that went down during the 2022-23 offseason, this is the one that caught everyone off-guard.
Masataka Yoshida wasn't on the radar as a big-money player at the time, and there wasn't exactly a big rally to Boston's defense after he put his name on a $90 million contract. As one exec told ESPN's Kiley McDaniel: "We thought he was worth less than half of what they paid."
Whatever the doubters saw back then, time has clearly proven them right.
Though Yoshida did get Rookie of the Year votes in 2023, he only posted 1.4 rWAR that year and has managed only another 1.6 rWAR in two seasons since. Injuries haven't helped, particularly not after Yoshida had shoulder surgery in 2024 and played in only 55 games in 2025.
The real problem, though, is that he has just one marketable skill. He's a good bat-to-ball guy, but without power, patience, speed or defense to back it up.
Grade: F
New York Mets Sign Edwin Díaz
4 of 12
The Deal: 5 years, $102 million
Stats During Contract: 116 G, 120.0 IP, 73 H (11 HR), 182 K, 41 BB, 2.48 ERA
Though the actual structure was more complicated, this signing nonetheless grabbed headlines for being the first ever nine-figure deal for a relief pitcher.
Dare we say it was well-deserved? Díaz had down years in 2019 and 2021, but his 2022 season was one for the books. He allowed only nine earned runs over 62.0 innings, and he struck out 118 of the 235 batters he faced.
Alas, the first two years of the deal couldn't have gone much worse. The flamethrowing closer missed the entire 2023 season after suffering a knee injury during the World Baseball Classic. He then struggled badly enough at the outset of 2024 to lose his job at one point.
Last year turned things around for Díaz in a major way, as he went back to a sub-2.00 ERA over 66.1 innings. Hence why he opted out, thus freeing himself to sign a deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers that guarantees nearly twice as much money as he had remaining on his Mets deal.
Did the Mets get their money's worth from 2023 to 2025? That's a reach. And given that Díaz will turn 32 on March 22, they probably got out at a good time.
Grade: C
New York Mets Sign Brandon Nimmo
5 of 12
The Deal: 8 years, $162 million
Stats During Contract: 458 G, 1,997 PA, 72 HR, 31 SB, .254 AVG, .338 OBP, .434 SLG
Similar to Edwin Díaz, Brandon Nimmo couldn't have picked a better time to have a career year. He went into free agency off a career-best 5.0 rWAR.
Of note was that the 2022 season saw Nimmo's offensive profile shift away from getting on base and more toward hitting for power. It didn't exactly shift back over the next three seasons, all three of which saw him top 20 home runs.
That's not a bad thing in the abstract, but this new version of Nimmo (115 OPS-plus) isn't quite the same hitter as the old Nimmo (130 OPS-plus). He's also lost defensive value, as he's gone from a solid center fielder to a below-average left fielder.
And so, also like Díaz, there's the question of whether the Mets got out of Nimmo's deal at the right time by trading him to the Texas Rangers for Marcus Semien.
Even with $5 million going to Texas, the Mets are saving over $30 million by swapping out Nimmo for Semien. Even if the latter is older by two years, he's also been 6-rWAR better than Nimmo since 2023.
Grade: C
New York Yankees Sign Carlos Rodón
6 of 12
The Deal: 6 years, $162 million
Stats During Contract: 79 G, 434.2 IP, 354 H (68 HR), 462 K, 158 BB, 4.00 ERA
On a pitch-to-pitch basis, Carlos Rodón was truly one of the best starters in baseball across the 2021 and 2022 seasons.
His expected ERA was 2.65, ranking second to only Corbin Burnes. And at 33.9 percent, his strikeout rate topped his new rotation mate, Gerrit Cole, for the best in baseball.
Even so, this deal was dripping with risk from the start. Rodón already had a lengthy injury history, which notably included both shoulder surgery and Tommy John surgery. He was also about to enter his age-30 season in 2023.
Three years later, the good news is that he was able to recover from his disastrous debut as a Yankee (64.1 IP, 6.85 ERA) with strong seasons in 2024 and 2025. But the bad news is twofold: he hasn't been the ace-caliber pitcher the Yankees paid for, and he's now recovering from another elbow surgery.
This one was only to remove a bone spur, but it's still going to cost Rodón the start of the season. It's also unlikely to help a fastball that lost 1.3 mph in average velocity from 2024 to 2025.
Grade: D
Chicago Cubs Sign Dansby Swanson
7 of 12
The Deal: 7 years, $177 million
Stats During Contract: 455 G, 1,876 PA, 62 HR, 48 SB, .243 AVG, .313 OBP, .408 SLG
Dansby Swanson is yet another guy who had a well-timed career year in 2022, which saw him go from a 2-ish WAR player to a career-best 5.5 rWAR.
Nobody mistook him for perfect, but he had an obvious appeal as a power-hitting, Gold Glove-winning shortstop. The Cubs needed both talents, as they had hit only 159 home runs and posted plus-3 Defensive Runs Saved in 2022.
Three years in, Swanson has been… honestly, pretty much exactly what the Cubs paid for.
He's only had one 5-rWAR season in three tries, but his total yield of 13.6 rWAR is plenty good for a guy earning roughly $25 million per season. The power and speed have been there on offense, and Swanson leads all shortstops in DRS for the last three years.
Would it be nice if he was also hitting for a high average and getting on base more frequently? Well, sure. But given how much he's already doing, this deal feels like it deserves more attention as a big win for the North Siders.
Grade: A
Texas Rangers Sign Jacob deGrom
8 of 12
The Deal: 5 years, $185 million
Stats During Contract: 39 G, 213.2 IP, 152 H (29 HR), 244 K, 42 BB, 2.86 ERA
It was this contract that set the tone for the whole 2022-23 offseason, though the list of people who thought it was a good idea seemed to include nobody outside the Rangers' front office.
After putting together an all-time run between 2018 and 2020, deGrom was limited to just 16 starts over the next two seasons. He was still outstanding when he did pitch, but the reality is that he entered free agency as a 34-year-old with a long list of past and recent arm trouble.
And as such, it wasn't really surprising when deGrom had to undergo a second Tommy John surgery after making just six starts for Texas.
That cost the righty almost the entire 2024 season, and his comeback in 2025 wasn't quite a return to form. There's nothing wrong with a 2.97 ERA over 172.2 innings, but deGrom just wasn't out there blowing hitters away like he did in his prime.
The likelihood of him turning back the clock at age-38 this year or age-39 in 2027 seems slim, to say the least. The best the Rangers can hope for is more of what he gave them in 2025, and even that feels like asking a lot.
Grade: D
Minnesota Twins Sign Carlos Correa
9 of 12
The Deal: 6 years, $200 million
Stats During Contract: 365 G, 1,531 PA, 45 HR, 0 SB, .266 AVG, .338 OBP, .428 SLG
Carlos Correa fell into the Twins' lap when they signed him during the 2021-22 offseason, and they further lucked out in getting a 5.3-rWAR year out of him in 2022.
That might have been the end of their partnership after he opted out, but the market gave him an even colder shoulder than it had the year before, when $300-plus million agreements with the San Francisco Giants and New York Mets fell through.
Such is how Correa ended up back in the Twin Cities, and the short version of what happened is this: he posted less rWAR in his final two-and-a-half seasons as a Twin than he had in the first alone.
Injuries were no help, and particularly not in 2024 as he struggled through plantar fasciitis. He also just didn't hit in 2023 or 2025, posting exactly a 94 OPS-plus as a Twin both years.
Correa is now back in Houston after the Twins basically gave him away at the 2025 trade deadline. And even if his trade value was obviously depressed, it is shocking how little the Twins got back from the Astros even after eating $33 million of the $96 million Correa was still owed at the time.
Grade: F
San Diego Padres Sign Xander Bogaerts
10 of 12
The Deal: 11 years, $280 million
Stats During Contract: 402 G, 1,680 PA, 41 HR, 52 SB, .272 AVG, .331 OBP, .407 SLG
Xander Bogaerts was plenty decorated by the time he reached free agency. In 10 years with the Red Sox, he was an All-Star four times and a World Series champion twice.
Even so, he came with question marks related to his power and defensive skills. Namely, how well the former would play outside of Fenway Park and whether the latter were good enough for shortstop.
Unexpectedly, it's on defense where Bogaerts has shined in San Diego. He's at plus-16 Outs Above Average as a Padre, and that counts above-average work at both shortstop and second base.
It's his bat that hasn't lived up to the hype, particularly as he's racked up a 96 OPS-plus over the last two seasons. He hasn't even slugged .400 in the process, which pretty well answers the Fenway Park question.
As Bogaerts has also been banged up a lot, this deal already isn't aging well for San Diego. He's 33 years old with eight years still to go.
Grade: D
Philadelphia Phillies Sign Trea Turner
11 of 12
The Deal: 11 years, $300 million
Stats During Contract: 417 G, 1,869 PA, 62 HR, 85 SB, .287 AVG, .337 OBP, .461 SLG
After back-to-back seasons of 5-plus rWAR in 2021 and 2022, Trea Turner failed to reach even 4 rWAR in his first two seasons as a Phillie.
Even now, there are warning signs that accompany the 32-year-old shortstop. His bat speed has really slowed down just since 2023, and contact quality metrics (i.e., exit velocity and hard-hit rate) have followed suit.
And yet, here Turner is coming off a 2025 season in which he won his second NL batting title and placed fifth in the MVP voting. The guy can clearly still hit, and that might not even be the most exciting part.
His sprint speed is still in the 100th percentile, which blows apart what we thought we knew about the aging curve for speedsters. And while he's not normally known for his defense, Turner racked up plus-17 Outs Above Average at short last year.
At his age, Turner will be hard-pressed to keep this up for even two or three more years, much less eight. But if they were worried in the first two years, the Phillies have to be happy about this deal after the third.
Grade: B
New York Yankees Sign Aaron Judge
12 of 12
The Deal: 9 years, $360 million
Stats During Contract: 416 G, 1,841 PA, 148 HR, 25 SB, .312 AVG, .445 OBP, .674 SLG
There's no point standing on ceremony with this one. It's an A+.
However, one can go so far as to call this surprising. The Yankees had to pay a premium for Aaron Judge after he had an all-time walk year in 2022, for which he won his first AL MVP after hitting an AL-record 62 home runs. And early on in his deal, things actually weren't going well.
No, really. That was a thing that happened. He had a toe injury that limited him to 106 games in 2023. Then in 2024, he was so cold at the start that people were legitimately panicking.
It was an ejection on May 4, 2024 that seemed to snap Judge out of it. Ever since then, he's batted .342/.472/.733 with 105 home runs in 275 games. His second and third MVPs came after 2024 and 2025.
This will be Judge's age-34 season, so it's fair game to have doubts about how much longer he can keep this up. But since it's already paid for two MVP-winning seasons, his nine-year deal would have to really go south for it to be a total bust.
Grade: A+
Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.
