Katie Stratman-Imagn Images

Something significant happens to Chase Burns around this time every year. In 2024, the Reds made him the no. 2 overall pick in the draft. A little less than 12 months later, the former Wake Forest flamethrower made his big league debut. This summer, Burns was named to his first All-Star team, paving the way for a seven-year, $105 million contract extension.

Burns’ new contract kicks in next year and runs through the 2033 season; and in a rare occasion for a pre-arbitration extension like this, there are no opt-outs, options, or escalators. Thank God — you need a degree in discrete mathematics to know how long Julio Rodríguez is under team control, so a simple contract structure is a refreshing change.

Nevertheless, the Burns extension is difficult to judge because the economic structure of baseball is about to change. Assuming MLB locks out the players at the conclusion of this collective bargaining agreement in December, this contract won’t kick in until the next CBA is in force. And if the next CBA runs for the customary five years, Burns will still be under team control two CBAs down the line.

I would be surprised if the next CBA (or the one after, for that matter) included a hard salary cap or a significant change to the free agency timeline, but anything is possible. It’s a near-certainty that the minimum salary will go up by some amount, however. That’s relevant for Burns because he entered this season with 97 days of service time, and would not have been eligible for arbitration until 2029.

Presumably, this deal will get him a raise sooner, which is valuable. In exchange, Burns is signing away two years of free agency. As a college player, Burns got a late start in the pros, but he spent almost no time in the minors. Even after delaying his free agency by two years, he will still hit the open market after his age-30 season. If he performs up to anything like his potential, a second nine-figure contract will surely be in the cards then.

February’s Tarik Skubal arbitration decision rewrote the wage scale for arbitration-eligible players; in one hearing, Skubal raised the record award for a pitcher by more than half. Paul Skenes will probably raise that ceiling further when he reaches arbitration after this season.

I’m not saying Burns is in that class of pitcher — if you set the over/under at two Cy Youngs in the next five seasons for the young Reds hurler, I’d take the under — but he’s a terrific talent, definitely good enough to benefit from the downstream effects of Skubal v. Detroit Tigers. The extension takes that out of play, which probably means Burns is leaving money on the table. But with $105 million in guaranteed salary now coming down the pike, he can afford not to sweat every penny.

From the Reds’ perspective, $105 million doesn’t buy you as much pitcher as it used to, but this is not an organization with a history of dispensing nine-figure contracts willy-nilly. The last 100-mph ace they extended was Hunter Greene; his contract, which started in 2023, calls for just $53 million in guaranteed money.

Burns’ deal is the largest in baseball history for a pitcher who has yet to reach arbitration. (I dislike so-called contract records that slice the population so thin, but there is some utility in tracking such trivia.) More relevant to Cincinnati’s situation: In terms of total value, this is the third-largest contract in franchise history, trailing only Joey Votto’s 10-year, $225 million deal and Ken Griffey Jr.’s nine-year, $116.5 million deal.

For the Reds to bestow such riches on a 23-year-old with only 26 career big league starts should tell you that this kid has the goods.

Burns had an up-and-down rookie year. An inning into his MLB debut, I thought Burns might be the greatest pitcher who ever lived.

But he allowed seven runs and got just one out in his second start. He started to figure things out after about a month in the majors, but then lost the next four weeks to a flexor tendon strain. When he returned in mid-September, he pitched out of the bullpen, and his lone contribution to Cincinnati’s postseason was a mop-up appearance in Game 2 of the NL Wild Card Series. A perfect five-out mop-up appearance, but still.

Burns’ 4.57 ERA as a rookie looked ugly, but he had terrible batted ball luck and suffered with men on base. His underlying numbers — a 2.65 FIP and a 35.6% strikeout rate — indicated that more and better were to come.

And so it has come to pass. Burns isn’t striking out quite so many opponents — just 28.6%, which is still good for ninth among qualified starters — but his ERA is down to 2.54. He’s still walking more batters than you’d like, but adjusting for park effects, Burns has the fifth-best ERA- among qualified starters.

The how of his success is both simple and the same as it’s ever been. His four-seamer is one of the best in the league. Triple-digit velocity coming from a high arm angle is apparently nigh-unhittable at the top of the zone, and Burns has made a good living getting whiffs and popups there.

And in case hitters sit on the four-seamer, Burns can whip out one of the nastiest sliders you’ll see from a starting pitcher.

Burns is like 2023 Spencer Strider, but bigger, stronger, springier, and with the inverse facial hair. You can understand why the Reds like him so much.