The logical option that’d emerged for Cody Bellinger ended up being his free-agency destination in the end, but he could test the market again after next season, too.
The star outfielder and the Cubs agreed to a three-year, $80 million contract — with opt-out possibilities after the each of the first two years — that’ll pay him $30 million, $30 million and $20 million across the trio of seasons, The Post’s Jon Heyman confirmed.
Bellinger spent 2023 with the Cubs after signing a one-year, $17.5 million contract, and he produced his best season since his MVP-winning campaign in 2019.
Bellinger hit .307 with an .881 OPS and compiled 97 RBIs on a Cubs team that struggled — to the point where Bellinger was a name floated in trade rumors ahead of the deadline — before falling just short of the postseason.
He ended up winning Comeback Player of the Year and then was floated as a possible name for the Yankees to pursue early in free agency, but then Bellinger’s pursuit dragged, and dragged and kept dragging to the point where spring training had started and the 28-year-old — who’d spent his entire MLB career with the Dodgers, including the MVP- and World Series-winning seasons, before they non-tendered him following the 2022 campaign.
Bellinger’s deal didn’t land him nearly as much as he would’ve preferred, with Heyman reporting in December that Bellinger wanted more than $200 million.
His agent, Scott Boras, had also reportedly used — at least in the early stages of free agency — Phillies star Bryce Harper ($330 million) and Rangers star Corey Seager ($325 million) as comparisons for Bellinger’s pursuit, ESPN reported back in December.
“What have [Harper and Seager] done after they’ve signed when they’re 28?” Boras told reporters at the winter meetings, according to ESPN. “Harper got better. Seager has gotten better. It tells you that those kinds of players, who can do that at such a young age, actually get better beyond what they did at a younger age, once they’re healthy and returned to play.”
Even as the Cubs waited for Bellinger to make a decision, they added other pieces by snagging manager Craig Counsell, signing left-handed pitcher Shota Imanaga — nicknamed “The throwing Philosopher” — from Japan and adding reliever Hector Neris.
But with Bellinger, chairman Tom Ricketts told reporters earlier this week that the front office was “waiting for whenever he and [Boras] are going to engage,” according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
“And it could be at any time now, or it could be a few weeks,” Ricketts told reporters. “We’ll just see where it goes.”
Less than a week later, a reunion between Bellinger and the Cubs appears all but finalized, leaving Blake Snell, Jordan Montgomery and Matt Chapman as Boras’ major unsigned clients.
