Major League Baseball

Bobby Bonilla's New York Mets contract sells for $180K at auction

Updated Aug. 7, 2022 3:14 p.m. ET

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Former Major League Baseball star Bobby Bonilla is well known for his unusual contract with the New York Mets, which famously will keep paying him into the 2030s.

Now that deal is paying off in other ways, too.

The contract signed by Bonilla sold for $180,000 at an auction on Goldin on Saturday night, FOX Business reported. 

The Mets released Bonilla in January 2000. He had hit .160 with four home runs and 18 RBIs the previous season, when a knee injury limited him to 119 at-bats. Bonilla had two seasons left on his contract at $5.9 million, and the Mets agreed to defer his salary at 8% interest and make 25 equal payments of $1,193,248.20 each July 1 from 2011-35, a total of $29,831,205.

"This is a truly historic item and is like no other contract ever offered," the description read, according to FOX Business. "This contract comes with a letter of provenance from Dennis Gilbert, stating that ‘I have been in possession of this contract since 1993 and guarantee this is Bobby Bonilla's original copy.’"

Bonilla hit .279 with 287 homers and 2,010 hits in his MLB career, which lasted from 1986-2001. He played with the Chicago White Sox, Pittsburgh Pirates, Mets, Baltimore Orioles, Florida Marlins, Los Angeles Dodgers, Atlanta Braves and St. Louis Cardinals. Bonilla finished second and third in NL MVP voting during his years with the Pirates.

The 59-year-old Bonilla will keep getting checks from the Mets until he's 72.

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