9 Contract Options To Keep An Eye On In September

The final push of the 2025 season is upon is, which means postseason chases for fans lucky enough to root for contending clubs and offseason dreams for those whose clubs are already out of the running. It also means that players with vesting clauses in their contract and/or performance incentives are beginning to unlock bonuses related to plate appearances, innings pitched, games finished, etc.

In particular, there are a handful of club options that are worth keeping an eye on either for incentive purposes or for season-long rehabbers who’ll have a limited September window to audition for next year’s club. MLBTR’s Anthony Franco already highlighted the three vesting options of note last month, but we’ll still take a look at how those players are tracking and also shine a light on six more club/mutual options that’ll have some present financial ramifications as well as potential 2026 roster implications.

Here are nine options to keep in the back of your mind as the season’s final weeks play out…

Pete Fairbanks, RHP, Rays

Fairbanks’ three-year, $12MM extension with Tampa Bay contained a $7MM club option for the 2026 season, but he’s boosted that option’s value considerably. Fairbanks already triggered $1.5MM in escalators based on his total appearances in the first three seasons of the deal, and he’s maxed out a set of escalators based on his number of games finished in 2025, tacking another $2MM onto the option price. His option at this moment is valued at $10.5MM, but if he appears in even two more games this year, he’ll boost his 2023-25 appearance count to 150, adding another $1MM to its value. If he appears in seven of Tampa Bay’s final 22 games, he’ll bump his 2025 appearance total to 60 and add yet another $1MM escalator onto the deal.

A $12.5MM salary for a reliever is steep for the Rays, but Fairbanks has pitched a career-high 52 1/3 innings and logged a 3.10 ERA, 25.2% strikeout rate and 7% walk rate en route to 24 saves. Even if the Rays were hesitant to commit $11.5MM or $12.5MM to a frequently injured reliever who’ll turn 32 in December, a team with lesser budgetary concerns would be willing to do. The option will very likely be picked up either way, but the steeper the cost, the likelier an offseason trade becomes.

Andrés Muñoz, RHP, Mariners

Muñoz’s four-year, $7.5MM contract has become one of the game’s great bargains. At the time of the agreement, he’d made just one appearance for the M’s and had only 23 2/3 major league innings under his belt due to Tommy John surgery. The four-year term bought out his final pre-arbitration year and all three arbitration seasons, while also giving Seattle options on his first three free agent years. It’s easy to say now that Muñoz would’ve earned more through arbitration, but it’s hard to blame a 22-year-old who’d scarcely pitched in the majors for locking in that life-changing payday, and there was some modest risk for the Mariners in the deal as well.

The first of those three option years has a $6MM base value, but Muñoz has already boosted that by $500K. He unlocked $250K option escalators when he reached 20 and 30 games finished on the season. He’s finished 39 games now, and he’ll hit additional $250K escalators when he finishes his 40th and 45th games of the season. The first of those is a lock, and the second is certainly within reach.

Muñoz’s contract also has an $8MM club option for 2027 and a $10MM club option for 2028. He can boost both those figures by $1MM with the same set of escalators based on his games finished in the next two seasons, and beginning next year, he can also earn an additional $2MM per season based on games finished.

John Means, LHP, Guardians

Coming off his second career Tommy John surgery, Means signed a one-year, $1MM deal with the Guardians. Cleveland knew full well he’d miss most of the season recovering from last summer’s UCL operation. Means has a $6MM club option, with no buyout. He can’t boost that sum any further, but he’s on the cusp of returning to the majors and making what’ll amount to a two- or three-start audition.

Means, 32, has made four minor league rehab starts and has pitched well. He’s tossed 13 1/3 innings and yielded four earned runs (2.70 ERA) on eight hits and five walks with 13 punchouts. He’d been slated to make his final rehab start today before being scratched with an illness, but a return to the majors could happen as soon as next weekend.

When healthy, Means has been a high-quality starter. He’s posted a 3.68 ERA in 401 big league innings, all coming with the Orioles. He’s a former Opening Day starter and All-Star for Baltimore who has twice topped 140 innings in a season. A pair of UCL surgeries has limited him to just 52 1/3 innings since Opening Day 2022, however.

The Athletic’s Zack Meisel suggests that as long as Means is healthy, the option will be picked up. The Guards have committed a full year to rehabilitating the talented lefty. And, as explored at MLBTR last night, Cleveland has an uncharacteristic need for some pitching upgrades. A $6MM gamble on Means isn’t exactly a pricey roll of the dice, but the Guardians are one of the sport’s lowest-payroll clubs. If Means returns next week and gets rocked in his only two or three big league starts this year, it doesn’t feel like a given that they’ll dedicate that $6MM sum to him. If he looks even close to his old form, it seems like a reasonable risk to take. His handful of starts will be worth watching with a careful eye for Cleveland fans.

Jose Urquidy, RHP, Tigers

Urquidy is in a very similar situation to that of Means. He’s rehabbing from a second career Tommy John surgery and signed a one-year, $1MM deal with a $4MM club option for the 2026 season. Like Means, he’s on a minor league rehab assignment right now and could be activated in the near future. The former Astros righty tossed three scoreless innings for Triple-A Toledo three days ago and has now pitched 14 2/3 minor league innings with a 4.30 ERA and a 12-to-3 K/BB ratio.

Urquidy and Means have nearly identical career innings totals, though Urquidy’s 405 frames have come in a more condensed five seasons. From 2019-22, the right-hander posted a 3.74 ERA with a 20.3% strikeout rate and 5.2% walk rate in 342 innings for Houston. He was hit hard in a 2023 season that was shortened by shoulder troubles (5.29 ERA in 63 frames) and didn’t pitch in 2024 due to the elbow/forearm discomfort that eventually prompted his Tommy John surgery in early June last year.

If Urquidy comes back anywhere close to that 2019-22 form, a $4MM option should be a no-brainer, but a rocky performance could give the Tigers reason to pause. Urquidy’s return will also be worth monitoring since he could pitch his way into postseason roster consideration for Detroit.

Tyler Kinley, RHP, Braves

Atlanta looked past Kinley’s dismal 5.66 ERA with the Rockies and acquired him in July, clearly believing that the hard-throwing righty was only a few tweaks away from success. It’s been a masterstroke. Kinley has pitched 13 2/3 innings and allowed just one run since being traded to Atlanta in exchange for 26-year-old Double-A righty Austin Smith. The Braves have Kinley throwing even more sliders and working with a slightly lower release point, and the results have been stellar — albeit in a small sample.

The Braves were out of the postseason chase by the time the deadline rolled around, so the mere fact that they traded for a potential free agent with a 2026 club option signaled that they were open to exercising that option in spite of his struggles. Kinley’s success in Atlanta makes it quite likely he’ll return, but there’s a good chance it won’t be at the $5MM base price of his value. His contract contains option escalators based on games finished, the first of which kicks in at 20. Kinley has currently finished 18 games this year, including three with Atlanta. If he finishes two more, he’ll boost next year’s option to $5.5MM — and he’ll also unlock a $500K bonus for the current season.

It’s not a major change, but those incentives would bump him from a $2.08MM luxury tax hit to $2.875MM. Assuming the options on Kinley, Pierce Johnson, Chris Sale, Ozzie Albies and Ha-Seong Kim are all exercised, Atlanta will have $207.5MM committed to next year’s books when the offseason begins (before accounting for arbitration raises).

Harrison Bader, OF, Phillies

Bader has proven to be a terrific pickup for the Phils, hitting .307/.374/.477 in his first 99 plate appearances since being traded over from Minnesota. He’s up to 406 plate appearances on the season, which is just enough for his incentive structure to kick in. The $1.5MM buyout on Bader’s $10MM mutual option jumped to $1.7MM when he reached 400 plate appearances, and it’ll climb to $1.9MM at 425 plate appearances and $2.1MM if he reaches 450. It’s a minor bump, but for a Phillies club that’s a third-time luxury payor in the top tier of penalization, they’ll pay a 110% tax on the prorated portion of that extra $600K.

Given the strength of Bader’s play, they’ll happily pay that, of course, and the increased buyout does nothing to change the fact that Bader will return to free agency this winter. It’s been over a decade since the last time both sides of a mutual option were exercised in MLB (Brewers, Aramis Ramirez in 2014). Bader’s plus defense and strong season at the plate should position him for a multi-year deal in the offseason.

Jorge Polanco, INF, Mariners

Polanco is nine plate appearances shy of converting his 2026 mutual option into a $6MM player option. He’s also already tacked $2MM onto his 2025 salary via plate appearance incentives, and when he hits the 450 mark needed to trigger that player option, he’ll unlock another $500K. That’ll bump the veteran switch-hitter up to a $9.5MM salary in 2025. He’d get another $500K if he can make it to 500 plate appearances, but it’s not a guarantee he’ll get 59 plate appearances in between now and season’s end.

Though he’s slumped considerably in the middle months of the season, Polanco has heated up again in the past three weeks. He’s slashing .254/.319/.471 with 23 homers and 17 doubles in only 441 plate appearances — miles better than the down year he had with the M’s in 2024 before undergoing offseason knee surgery. He’s played well enough that he’s probably going to decline a $6MM player option anyhow, but it’ll be a nice safety net in the event of an injury (so long as it’s not a lower-half injury, as his contract contains language that’d prevent the player option from kicking in if he’s dealing with an injury related to that offseason knee procedure).

Matt Strahm, LHP, Phillies

Strahm is on the cusp of having his contract’s 2026 option vest. While that originally came at a $4.5MM base value, he’s already boosted the option value to $6.5MM via $1MM escalators at 40 and 50 innings pitched. Once he reaches 60, the option value increases to its maximum $7.5MM. The contract also stipulates that if Strahm pitches 60 innings and passes a physical at the end of the season, it’ll automatically vest.

Strahm has been excellent in 2025, logging 56 1/3 frames of 2.88 ERA ball with a 27.9% strikeout rate and 7.7% walk rate. He’s saved six games and tallied 17 holds. The Phillies would’ve picked up the option anyhow, but this removes any doubt.

Lucas Giolito, RHP, Red Sox

Giolito’s two-year, $38.5MM contract with Boston couldn’t have started much worse. The typically durable righty went down with a UCL injury in spring training last year, ultimately requiring surgery that wiped out his entire 2024 season. His 2025 return didn’t appear to be going well early on, either. Through his first seven starts, the 31-year-old was shelled for a 6.42 ERA in just 33 2/3 innings.

Since June 10, however, Giolito has returned to form. He’s started 15 games, totaled 91 2/3 innings and logged a pristine 2.26 earned run average. His 21.1% strikeout rate and 8.6% walk rate in that time are both about half a percentage point worse than league average among starting pitchers, but it’s been a strong run overall, pushing his season ERA down to a tidy 3.38.

That turnaround would make Giolito’s $14MM club option likely to be picked up — but it’s not likely to remain a club option. The right-hander’s contract stipulates that with 140 innings pitched this year, that option converts into a $19MM mutual option with a $1.5MM buyout. With 125 1/3 innings under his belt, Giolito only needs another 14 2/3 frames in the final three weeks to convert that option to mutual status. If and when he reaches that point, Giolito is a lock to decline his half of the mutual option, collect that buyout and return to free agency in search of a multi-year deal. The Sox could — and likely would — counter with a qualifying offer, but the hefty contracts for mid-rotation arms like Eduardo Rodriguez (four years, $80MM), Sean Manaea (three years, $75MM), Taijuan Walker (four years, $72MM), Jameson Taillon (four years, $68MM) and Luis Severino (three years, $67MM) in recent offseasons all suggest that Giolito can reasonably seek a pricey three- or four-year deal ahead of what’ll be his age-31 season.