The Dodgers have locked up catcher Will Smith to a long-term extension.
Smith will remain in Dodger Blue for the next 10 years, the team announced Wednesday.
The Post’s Jon Heyman reports. The contract is said to be worth $140 million.
His contract is the longest for a catcher in MLB. Reported by researcher Sarah Langs.And the contract value is the third-largest in history for a catcher, surpassed only by Joe Mauer’s eight-year, $184 million deal and Buster Posey’s nine-year, $167 million deal.
The Dodgers backstop, who turns 29 on Thursday, was scheduled to become a free agent after the 2025 season.
The debate, which has continued on and off over the past few years, heated up after the Dodgers returned from their first trip to South Korea. According to MLB.com.
The length of the extension will give the Dodgers lavish tax benefits, and the deal will be worth about $14 million annually against Los Angeles’ competitive balanced tax salary. ESPN reported.
And that’s especially important now that the Dodgers have four players on contracts for at least 10 years, with Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Mookie Betts on 12-year deals and Shohei Ohtani on 10-year deals.
It might be easy to overlook Smith on an already stacked Dodgers roster lined with star names like Ohtani, Betts, Yamamoto, Freddie Freeman and Clayton Kershaw, but the catcher is one of the best in the big leagues. He has grown into a catcher.
Smith is a career hitter with a career batting average of .263/.358/.484, 91 home runs, and 308 RBIs, and appeared in the MLB All-Star Game for the first time last season.
In 2023, he had a batting average of .261 and an OPS of .797, with 19 home runs and 76 RBIs.
