Blue Jays to sign Cease to seven-year deal

The Toronto Blue Jays have agreed to a seven-year, $210-million contract with right-hander Dylan Cease.

November 27, 2025

By Kevin Glew

Canadian Baseball Network

The Toronto Blue Jays have agreed to a seven-year, $210-million contract with right-hander Dylan Cease.

First reported by Jon Heyman, of the New York Post, the deal represents the largest free agent contract ever handed out by the Blue Jays, eclipsing the six-year, $150-million contract that outfielder George Springer received in January 2021.

Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi added that the deal is pending a physical and will include deferred money.

Cease, 29, had been one of the most coveted free agent starting pitchers on the market.

He is the only major league pitcher to have made at least 30 starts and struck out 200 or more batters in the past five seasons. The durable right-hander has not finished lower than third in the league in K/9 in any of the last five campaigns, including topping the American League in 2021 (12.3 K/9) and the National League in 2025 (11.5 K/9).

The Milton, Ga., native is coming off a season with the San Diego Padres in which he went 8-12 with a 4.55 ERA and a 3.56 FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) in 32 starts. He fanned 215 batters in 168 innings. That represented his second season with the Padres after he was traded to them by the White Sox on March 13, 2024.

Originally selected by the Chicago Cubs in the sixth round of the MLB draft in 2014, Cease spent parts of three seasons in the Cubs’ organization before he was swapped to the cross-town White Sox as part of the package for left-hander Jose Quintana in July 2017.

Cease received his first big league promotion in 2019 and two years later, he enjoyed a breakout campaign when he went 13-7 with a 3.91 ERA with 226 strikeouts in 165 2/3 innings in an American League-leading 32 starts.

He followed that up with his best big league campaign in 2022, going 14-8 with a 2.20 ERA, while striking out 227 batters in 184 innings. He also topped American League pitchers with a 6.4 WAR and finished second in the AL Cy Young Award voting.

The veteran right-hander, who will turn 30 on December 28, possesses a high-90s fastball and a devastating slider.

Cease will join a Blue Jays’ rotation that includes Kevin Gausman, Jose Berrios, Shane Bieber and young phenom Trey Yesavage.

Cease’s deal is the second largest in Blue Jays’ history to the 14-year, $500-million contract that slugger Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (Montreal, Que.) signed with the club in April.