What Will It Take for the Phillies to Re-sign Jeff Hoffman?

The Philadelphia Phillies struck gold when they signed Jeff Hoffman to a minor league contract in 2023.

Over the past two seasons, Hoffman pitched 118.2 innings for the Phillies, striking out 158 batters and giving up just 30 earned runs. He put up a 2.28 ERA and 2.54 FIP. Only one NL reliever threw more innings with a lower ERA or FIP: fellow free agent Tanner Scott.

A couple of poor outings in the postseason meant Hoffman’s 2024 season ended on a sour note. Still, there’s no denying he has become one of the most dominant high-leverage relievers in the game.

Many outlets, including us here at Just Baseball, view him as the second-best reliever of the 2023-24 MLB free agent class, behind only Scott.

For all those reasons, the Phillies would surely love to have him back. But for all the same reasons, it won’t be nearly as easy for them to scoop him up this time around.

How Much Will It Cost the Phillies to Re-sign Jeff Hoffman?

After losing Hoffman and Carlos Estévez to free agency, the Phillies’ bullpen is looking a little thin. They could use at least one more back-end option, preferably a right-hander, to work alongside Matt Strahm and Orion Kerkering as Rob Thomson’s closer committee.

Hoffman isn’t the only option, but he’s arguably the best. He’s also the arm the Phillies are most familiar with. Pitching coach Caleb Cotham could pick up where he left off with Hoffman instead of starting over with Clay Holmes, Blake Treinen, Kirby Yates, etc.

Therefore, it’s hard to imagine the Phillies won’t at least make an effort to re-sign Hoffman. They might back off if another team blows them out of the water with a contract the righty can’t refuse. Still, I see no reason why they wouldn’t reach out to his agent at CAA and make a competitive offer.

So, what might a competitive offer for Jeff Hoffman look like? The highest-paid reliever last winter was Josh Hader. The year before that it was Edwin Díaz. Neither of their record-breaking contracts are useful as comps.

However, some of the next highest-paid relievers from the recent past can offer insight into a potential Hoffman deal.

Robert Stephenson signed the second-largest deal for a reliever last winter, a three-year, $33 million pact with the Angels. He was a year younger than Hoffman is now, but he was coming off just one great season as opposed to Hoffman’s two.

Going back to the 2022-23 offseason, the most lucrative reliever contracts went to Díaz, Robert Suarez (five years, $46MM), Rafael Montero (three years, $34.5MM), and Taylor Rogers (three years, $33MM).

There’s a strong argument to be made that Hoffman is a more promising free agent than Stephenson, Suarez, Montero, or Rogers. I’m not sure he’ll be able to match Suarez’s $46 million guarantee (that seemed high even at the time), but I wouldn’t be surprised if he signed a three-year deal with a higher average annual value than any of those pitchers.

The staff at MLB Trade Rumors predicted a four-year, $44 million deal for Hoffman. Ben Clemens of FanGraphs predicted a slightly higher AAV on a shorter deal: two years and $26 million.

I mention those two predictions because my personal projection for Jeff Hoffman’s next contract is smack-dab in the middle: three years and $35 million ($11.67 million AAV).

Dating back to the 2020-21 offseason, the only relievers who have signed for a higher AAV are star closers Hader, Díaz, Craig Kimbrel, Kenley Jansen, and Liam Hendriks. The only relievers who have signed for a higher guarantee are Hader, Díaz, Suarez, Hendriks, and Raisel Iglesias.

Hoffman doesn’t quite have the track record to lock down star closer money, but he’s been just as good as any star closer over the past two years.

Will Teams Pursue Hoffman as a Starter?

Things could get more complicated if any potential suitors are confident enough to bid on Hoffman as a starter. Rumor has it that some teams have considered exactly that. If that’s true, I could imagine the bidding going over the $40 million mark.

Reynaldo López signed a three-year, $30 million deal with the Braves last November. A couple of months later, the Giants signed Jordan Hicks to a four-year, $44 million deal. Both had been relievers the year prior, but their new teams signed them to join the rotation.

Hoffman is older than López and significantly older than Hicks. But he’s also coming off a far more successful walk year than either.

If he can get more than one team to bid on him as a starter, something like Hicks’s four-year, $44 million deal doesn’t seem out of the question. Given his age, maybe three years and $40 million with a team option for 2028 is more likely.

Would the Phillies consider a deal like that?

I pondered that question yesterday when I wrote about five creative moves the Phillies could make this winter. Here’s what I had to say:

On the one hand, you could argue that if the Phillies saw Hoffman as a starter, they would have already tried him in that role. That’s a fair point.

On the other hand, this team wasn’t desperate for starters until the 2024 season was already well underway. By that time, Hoffman was a critical member of the bullpen. Perhaps the Phillies just didn’t want to mess with his success halfway through an All-Star campaign.

Ultimately, it comes down to whether or not Dombrowski, Thomson, Cotham, and the rest of the team’s top decision-makers think Hoffman has what it takes to make the leap – and if they trust him enough to essentially guarantee him the number five spot in the 2025 rotation.

My gut tells me the answer is no. If teams are bidding on Hoffman as a starter, I think Philadelphia will bow out.

That said, I certainly won’t be mad if the Phillies prove me wrong. It’s been delightful watching Hoffman transform into a back-end bullpen stud, and it would be all the more exciting to see him become an effective big league starter at this stage of his career.