NEW YORK — Giancarlo Stanton has not played a game for the Miami Marlins since 2017. He may still finish this season as the highest-paid player on their books.
That is the strange reality facing Stanton’s old team, and it ties directly to the trade that sent him to the Yankees nearly a decade ago.
ESPN insider Jeff Passan laid out the scenario in a trade-deadline preview, and it ranks among the more bizarre payroll quirks in the sport.
How Stanton still lands on Miami’s payroll
The story starts in November 2014, when Stanton signed a 13-year, $325 million contract with the Marlins. It was the richest deal in American sports history at the time.
Three years later, in December 2017, Miami traded him. The Marlins sent Stanton and $30 million to the Yankees in exchange for Starlin Castro, Jorge Guzman, and Jose Devers, a salary dump for a small-market club shedding its biggest commitment. The Yankees, by contrast, were adding the reigning National League MVP.
As part of that deal, Miami agreed to keep paying down a slice of the contract. That obligation never went away. In 2026, Stanton still counts for roughly $10 million on the Marlins’ payroll, money owed to a player now starring in the Bronx.
Miami will cover another $10 million in 2027 and also the $10 million club option buyout in 2028.
The Passan report that put a number on it
Passan flagged just how unusual the situation has become for the Marlins. Only two players on Miami’s active roster currently earn at least as much as Stanton’s $10 million figure.
Those two are ace Sandy Alcantara and closer Pete Fairbanks. Beyond them, the next name on the payroll belongs to a player who has not worn the uniform in nearly nine years.
“Beyond Alcantara and closer Pete Fairbanks, the Marlins’ next-highest-paid player is Giancarlo Stanton, who last played for them in 2017,” Passan wrote. “There is a legitimate chance that after the deadline, Stanton tops the list.”
Why the trade deadline could seal it
The path to that outcome runs through Miami’s deadline plans. Both players ahead of Stanton are candidates to be moved before the August cutoff.
Alcantara, the 2022 National League Cy Young Award winner, has drawn interest despite an uneven season. Passan noted the right-hander still throws hard, with a fastball that sits around 98 mph, but his strikeout rate ranks near the bottom among qualified starters, 67th of 72.
Fairbanks has also surfaced in trade talk as contenders hunt for bullpen help. If Miami deals either or both, Stanton’s salary would jump to the top of the Marlins’ payroll, a player they are paying not to play for them.
Stanton’s stalled season in the Bronx
The timing of the report is striking because Stanton is not even on the field for the Yankees right now. He has been sidelined for weeks.
The 36-year-old last played on April 24 and landed on the injured list with a calf strain. He has been ramping up his running program and taking live batting practice, but the Yankees have not set a firm return date, and a recent setback pushed the timeline back further.
Before the injury, Stanton was in the middle of a down year by his standards. He was hitting .256 with a .302 on-base percentage, a .422 slugging mark, three home runs, and a 101 wRC+, numbers that placed him right around league average.
The Yankees are paying him $19 million in 2026 and owe another $15 million in 2027.
Goldschmidt has covered the void
Stanton’s absence could have crippled the Yankees lineup, especially with Aaron Judge also sidelined. Instead, Paul Goldschmidt has more than filled the gap for the Yankees.
Since Stanton went down, Goldschmidt has hit .315 with a .376 on-base percentage, a .567 slugging mark, and a 161 wRC+, along with eight home runs and 19 RBIs. The 38-year-old, signed for just $4 million in the winter, has looked like his Arizona MVP self.
His value has shown up beyond the box score. Goldschmidt rates as a plus-one Out Above Average defender at first base this season, a sharp improvement from his minus-three mark with the Yankees in 2025.
The most recent highlight came against the Blue Jays, when Goldschmidt took Louis Varland deep for a go-ahead ninth-inning homer. Varland entered that at-bat with a sub-1.00 ERA and a 49-to-10 strikeout-to-walk ratio, having allowed almost nothing all season.
A deal that still echoes for two teams
The payroll quirk underscores how far-reaching the original Yankees-Marlins trade was. Nearly a decade later, both franchises are still living with it.
Stanton has spent his pinstriped years chasing October while part of his salary kept flowing through the team that drafted and developed him. The Yankees took on a former MVP, and Miami took on years of paying him to play elsewhere.
Whenever Stanton is healthy, the Yankees still want his right-handed power back in the middle of the order. For now, though, the louder storyline sits 1,300 miles south. A player who has not suited up for the Marlins since 2017 may soon top their payroll, a fitting capstone to one of baseball’s most consequential trades for both the Marlins and the Yankees.
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