{"id":485814,"date":"2025-12-20T02:00:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T02:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/485814\/"},"modified":"2025-12-20T02:00:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T02:00:15","slug":"right-hander-merrill-kelly-diamondbacks-finalize-a-40-million-2-year-deal-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/485814\/","title":{"rendered":"Right-hander Merrill Kelly, Diamondbacks finalize a $40 million, 2-year deal | National"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>PHOENIX (AP) \u2014 Merrill Kelly&#8217;s return to the desert is official after the Arizona Diamondbacks announced on Friday that a two-year, $40 million deal has been finalized.<\/p>\n<p>The sides reached a tentative agreement on Sunday, but the deal was pending a physical. The right-hander will receive a $2 million signing bonus, a $17 million salary in 2026 and $21 million in 2027.<\/p>\n<p>There is also a vesting option for 2028.<\/p>\n<p>He was good for both teams, finishing with a combined 12-9 record and 3.52 ERA.<\/p>\n<p>Kelly could open next spring as the D-backs No. 1 starter in a rotation that is expected to include Ryne Nelson, Brandon Pfaadt and Eduardo Rodriguez. Ace Corbin Burnes <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/arizona-diamondbacks-corbin-burnes-tommy-john-surgery-4326a98c334ad5f03f1c548864e6c2f5\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">is still recovering from Tommy John surgery<\/a> while 2023 All-Star Zac Gallen is a free agent and appears unlikely to re-sign.<\/p>\n<p>Kelly\u2019s return to the desert isn\u2019t a huge surprise considering he\u2019s a Scottsdale native and played at Arizona State.<\/p>\n<p>The fan favorite was a key piece of the team that went to the World Series in 2023. He had a 12-8 record and a 3.29 ERA that season, adding a masterful performance in Game 2 of the World Series against the Rangers, which is the only game the D-backs win in the Fall Classic.<\/p>\n<p>Kelly doesn\u2019t have overpowering stuff but thrives with a six-pitch mix that keeps hitters off balance. He has carved out a solid MLB career despite not making his debut until he was 30 in 2019.<\/p>\n<p>He played four seasons in South Korea from 2015 to 2018, going 48-32 with a 3.86 ERA.<\/p>\n<p>AP Baseball Writer Ronald Blum contributed to this story.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX (AP) \u2014 Merrill Kelly&#8217;s return to the desert is official after the Arizona Diamondbacks announced on Friday&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":485815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2404],"tags":[146,22,64328,4314,5,38,4,256,8080,185,3889],"class_list":{"0":"post-485814","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arizona-diamondbacks","8":"tag-arizona","9":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks","10":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks-merrill-kelly","11":"tag-arizonadiamondbacks","12":"tag-baseball","13":"tag-diamondbacks","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-mlb-baseball","16":"tag-mlb-world-series","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-sports-transactions"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115749429200148179","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=485814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/485815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=485814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=485814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=485814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}