Sources - Aaron Judge declines $19M settlement offer from New York Yankees, seeks arbitration victory

Aaron Judge is betting big on himself, again — this time by going to an arbitration hearing with the New York Yankees that starts at noon Friday rather than agreeing to a settlement.

On the eve of this season, Judge turned down a $213.5 million contract offer from the Yankees, choosing instead to leave open the possibility that he could become a free agent this fall. Now, in the midst of the best season of his career and with the arbitration case looming, Judge has taken a similar approach with his 2022 salary. According to sources, the Yankees offered to settle at the midpoint — $19 million. But Judge declined, and is instead aiming for an arbitration victory that officials in both management and the union believe will alter the financial landscape players in the immediate future.

Arbitration cases are typically adjudicated during the offseason, with players and teams proposing salaries in January and taking those numbers into a hearing in February. But the sport's recent offseason calendar was obliterated by the owners' lockout of the players, and so the arbitration cases have spilled over into this season.

Given the unusual timing of this year's hearings, any evidence generated after the start of the 2022 season cannot be presented by either the Yankees or Judge's representatives; the three-person panel cannot consider any production from this year. That Judge is on pace to become the first player in more than two decades to reach 60 homers, has an OPS of over 1.000 this year and is the likely front-runner for the AL MVP is supposed to be irrelevant in the arguments, which are expected to last anywhere from four to five hours over Zoom, with Judge in cyber-attendance.

Before the COVID pandemic, hearings were held with