The Diamondbacks went into 2025 with an Opening Day payroll of slightly below $187MM, representing yet one more new excessive for a membership that had already bumped its payroll from roughly $116.1MM in 2023 to $163.3MM in 2024. Arizona’s try and attempt to capitalize on its shock NL pennant in 2023 hasn’t labored out, nevertheless, because the D’Backs fell wanting the playoffs in 2024 and are combating simply to attempt to salvage a profitable document this 12 months.
These struggles led to some promoting on the deadline, with such impending free brokers as Eugenio Suarez, Josh Naylor, Merrill Kelly, Randal Grichuk, Shelby Miller, and Jordan Montgomery all despatched elsewhere. The cash saved by getting these gamers off the books for the ultimate two months of 2025 will impression the 2026 payroll, as workforce president/CEO Derrick Corridor mentioned the D’Backs will “reinvest into the product for subsequent 12 months. We’re going to must as a result of we’re nonetheless going to have so many guys on the IL. We’re going to must do some work on the roster.”
When it comes to total spending, nevertheless, Corridor instructed the Arizona Republic’s Nick Piecoro and different reporters that subsequent 12 months’s payroll is anticipated to be diminished to some extent. “Do I feel we have to have the payroll quantity the place it was this 12 months? Most likely not. However I feel we will have simply nearly as good a workforce as we constructed by reinvesting the cash that we’ve got (saved) after which some,” Corridor mentioned.
Corridor’s assertion isn’t stunning since 2025 was seen as one thing of an all-in season for the Diamondbacks, with possession okaying the payroll enhance for the reason that total roster core was in place. With a number of notable gamers slated without spending a dime company this coming winter, a spending minimize was just about inevitable simply due to all of the excessive salaries coming off the workforce’s books. Within the aftermath of the commerce deadline, the Diamondbacks have slightly below $107MM in assured salaries set for 2026 (hat tip to RosterResource), although that quantity doesn’t consider arbitration raises.
It doesn’t assist issues that Corbin Burnes (Arizona’s highest-paid participant) will miss most or all the 2026 season recovering from Tommy John surgical procedure. Between Burnes’ absence and Zac Gallen slated without spending a dime company, the D’Backs may have holes to fill within the rotation, plus they’ll be seeking to repair a bullpen that has been a weak hyperlink for the higher a part of two years. The Diamondbacks’ offense has once more been sturdy in 2025, however the absence of Suarez and Naylor implies that subsequent 12 months’s lineup wants much more energy.
Corridor mentioned he expects the D’Backs to nonetheless be capable of make strikes in free company, and the CEO unsurprisingly didn’t give any specifics about how a lot GM Mike Hazen might or might not must spend this offseason. It’s attainable the workforce doesn’t but know the reply to this query, as Corridor famous that attendance over the rest of the season will impression subsequent 12 months’s payroll.
Hypothetically talking, even when the Diamondbacks have been to scale back payroll to 2024 ranges, that also leaves Hazen with fairly a little bit of spending capability to deal with the roster’s many wants. Buying and selling a participant like Lourdes Gurriel Jr. (who drew curiosity previous to the deadline) who is just below assured contract via 2026 is one other avenue the entrance workplace might pursue to unencumber extra money, if mandatory.
With a lot invested in long-term contracts, there isn’t any sense that the Diamondbacks are planning a bigger selloff or contemplating a rebuild the least bit. As disappointing because the final two seasons have been for the Snakes and their followers, there may be nonetheless sufficient core expertise in place that it wouldn’t be a shock to see the D’Backs return to competition by subsequent 12 months, although Hazen will once more have to be inventive.
