Last month, MLBTR contributor Ethan Hullihen estimated the upcoming Super Two cutoff to be 2 years and 130 days, or 2.130. That projection has now been updated to 2.134, when factoring in transactions made through September 14.

The Super Two cutoff is a moving target. Players automatically qualify for arbitration when they have accrued at least three years of service time and don’t already have a guaranteed contract. For players who finish with a service count between two and three years, the top 22% of those players in terms of service time also qualify, as long as they spent at least 86 days of the most recent season on the active roster or injured list.

That means the cutoff is different from year to year, depending on the math involved for players who end up in that two-to-three-year window and how much service time is needed to be over the 22% line. Service time projections can be altered when player are optioned, recalled, selected, designated for assignment, etc. This year’s projection has shifted by three days over the past month and could shift again based on subsequent moves. Here are cutoffs from past seasons:

2025: 2.140
2024: 2.132
2023: 2.118
2022: 2.128
2021: 2.116
2020: 2.125
2019: 2.115
2018: 2.134
2017: 2.123
2016: 2.131
2015: 2.130
2014: 2.133
2013: 2.122
2012: 2.140
2011: 2.146
2010: 2.122
2009: 2.139

The final number can impact a player’s earning power, as some will be just over the line and some just below. If a player gets Super Two status, it gets him to arbitration a year earlier and puts him in line for four passes instead of three, potentially leading to millions of extra dollars.

As an example, Matthew Liberatore was just a few days over last year’s cutoff. He is making $2.26MM this year. If he had missed the cutoff, his salary would be near the $780K league minimum. For this year’s line, Hullihen projects Quinn Priester to just make it at 2.134 years. Jordan Beck and Tyron Guerrero (2.133 years), Johan Rojas (2.131), and Rico Garcia (2.130) would just miss.

It’s possible that the next collective bargaining agreement impacts the future of arbitration while the expected winter lockout could directly impact this class. The current CBA expires December 1 and the entire industry expects the league to lock out the players. In a normal offseason, teams have until late November to decide whether or not to tender contracts to arbitration-eligible players. For players without deals in place, January is the deadline for exchanging arbitration figures, then hearings take place in February. In the 2021-22 offseason, a new CBA wasn’t reached until March 10. Once that lockout ended, March 22 was quickly set as that year’s filing deadline. Hearings took place during the season.

When the salary arbitration system began in the 1973-1975 CBA, it was for all players with at least two years of service time. It was pushed to three years in the 1985-1989 CBA. In the 1990-1993 CBA, Super Two designation was given to 17% of players in the 2-3 window. The 2012-2016 CBA pushed that 17% threshold to 22%. In the last round of CBA talks, the MLBPA tried to get back to all two-year players qualifying for arbitration but eventually backed off that stance as the negotiations played out. The 22% threshold carried into the current CBA. In May of this year, the MLBPA’s initial proposal for the next CBA featured a jump to 44%.

Hullihen also projected the next qualifying offer to be $23.1MM back in June. That projection held steady to August and still remains at $23.1MM now.