MLB · P · Kansas City Royals
Cole Ragans
B/T L/L · 6' 4" · 190 lb · born Crawfordville, FL, USA · age 28 · draft 2016 rd 1 · played P 9 · MLB debut 2022-08-04
Injured 60-Day · Left elbow impingement. (roster status, as of )
151 batters faced scored this season His season card →
Scout’s note
Cole Ragans is a 28-year-old left-hander from Crawfordville, Florida, taken in the first round of the 2016 draft by Texas before reaching Kansas City. He has 506 strikeouts in 91 career games — a frontline arm when healthy, pure and simple, the kind of strikeout volume that does not require qualification.
Note written · FVR scout (GLM-5.2)
What he’s paid
Under contractA market fact, not an engine read: what a club decided about him, on the season before this one. Figures from Cot’s, as of .
- 2026 salary
- $4.58M
- Tax hit
- $4.42M
- Service time
- 3 yr 29 d
- Guaranteed
- $13M
The deal 3 years $13.3M (2025–2027) — $4.4M a year on average, worked out by us rather than stated on the sheet, and not the same thing as the tax hit above
On the sheet: 3 y/$13.25M (25-27) · agent Wasserman · 2 / 3 options left
After this season, as the sheet has it
| Season | 2027 | 2028 | 2029 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash | $7.6M | Arb 3 | Free agent |
| Tax hit | $4.4M | — | — |
Cash and the tax hit are two different rulebooks and are never subtracted from one another — see the payroll board for his club, Kansas City Royals.
A second set of books
The same contract, read by MLB Spreadsheets (Ethan Hullihen), as of . We keep two sources on this because one source cannot check itself.
- Tax AAV
- $4.4M
- Guaranteed
- $13.3M
- Term
- 3 yrs
- His class
- Extension
What the sheet prices each season at
| Season | 2026 | 2027 | 2028 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salary | $4.5M | $7.5M | Arb 3 |
A base salary under his own reading, and never subtracted from the cash figure above: a signing bonus lands in one and not the other, so the two disagree on most men without either being wrong. And the sheet does not mark which future seasons are GUARANTEED — a club option and a projected arbitration award are both just a number here, so read past the end of the deal as his forecast rather than as money owed.
Two sources, read a month apart, put this guarantee at the same dollar. That is the check, and it passed.
The tax AAV above is his number under the CBA’s own rulebook, not the average we work out from Cot’s total. On a contract with deferred money the two come apart on purpose — and neither is subtracted from the other.
Collect Cole Ragans
If the signal is right, the cardboard usually finds out later. Current listings:
Cole Ragans cards on eBay →Paid link — as an eBay Partner, FVR earns from qualifying purchases.
Not financial advice. We take positions only after publication — never before. Misses stay on the record.
Umpire favor
-1.1 net runs over 8 graded games — the zone cost the umpire more than it gave, on balance.
The line
Bio & season lines: MLB StatsAPI · refreshed nightly · abbreviations →