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"I'm glad we're in a place where it will be finalized or it won't," Ken Kendrick, the lead general partner of the Diamondbacks, told MLB.com on Monday.

The Yankees and Diamondbacks agreed in principle and signed off on the three-for-one swap for Johnson by the end of business on Thursday. Concurrently, Arizona negotiated the tentative deal for Green. But the Commissioner's office was closed last weekend for the New Year's Day holiday, delaying the filing of the papers for three days.

In the deal, the Diamondbacks would get pitchers Javier Vazquez and Brad Halsey, along with catcher Dioner Navarro and $8.5 million to $9 million in cash, in exchange for Johnson, the five-time Cy Young winner who has been coveted by the Yankees since prior to last July's non-waiver trade deadline.

The Diamondbacks will then flip Navarro or one of two other young catchers, Koyie Hill or Chris Snyder, and a minor league pitcher to the Dodgers for Green and $8 million.

Selig had to approve both transactions because they include a sizeable amount of cash. But a precedent was certainly set early last year, when the Yankees obtained Alex Rodriguez from Texas. The Rangers agreed to pay $67 million of the remainder of his original 10-year, $252 million deal, the most lucrative contract in baseball history.

The payment made by the Yankees to Arizona would help defray some of the $34.5 million owed to Vazquez for the remaining three years of his contract. The right-hander signed a four-year, $45 million contract with the Yankees after a trade brought him to New York from Montreal prior to last season.

The $8 million from the Dodgers would pay half of Green's 2005 salary. Johnson is scheduled to earn $6 million in deferred dollars out his $16 million this season.

If Green and Johnson waive their respective no-trade clauses, all the players involved in the deals will have to pass physicals before the trade can be made official.

The Yankees are believed to be prepared to extend Johnson's contract for two seasons at around $16 million a year, giving the left-hander a shot at reaching the 300-win plateau in his stellar career. Johnson has a record of 246-128 losses over 17 years for Montreal, Seattle, Houston and Arizona. Likewise, the Diamondbacks are also expected to offer Green an undefined extension.

Johnson, who is first all-time among Major League left-handers with 4,161 career strikeouts, underwent surgery on his right knee during the 2002 season to remove the remaining cartilage. Johnson has a substance injected into the knee to help absorb the impact of his 6-foot, 10-inch frame landing on his right leg when he pitches.

Green is a career .282 hitter with 281 homers in 11 season from Toronto and the Dodgers.

The Yankees thought they had acquired Johnson two weeks ago as part of a three-team megadeal with the Diamondbacks and Dodgers. But Los Angeles pulled out of the trade, sending New York and Arizona back to the drawing board. In that deal, the Diamondbacks would have received Green and pitcher Brad Penny and Los Angeles would have landed Navarro.

Yankees president Randy Levine and Jeff Moorad, Arizona's CEO-elect, spoke numerous times last week and worked out the trade before the end of the year, which was stipulated arbitrarily by Johnson and the Diamondbacks as a deadline. Alternately, the Diamondbacks then reinstituted talks with the Dodgers to acquire Green.

This offseason, the Diamondbacks have spent nearly $82.5 million, adding free agents Troy Glaus, Russ Ortiz, Royce Clayton and Craig Counsell. The $24 million saved on the Johnson deal -- the Big Unit's salary, plus the nearly $9 million of Vazquez's salary paid by the Yankees -- would allow the Diamondbacks to further play the market.

Meanwhile, the Yankees have already added free agent pitchers Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright and free agent first baseman Tino Martinez, spending about $63 million in the process. Johnson would join Pavano and Wright in a New York rotation that also includes holdovers Mike Mussina and Kevin Brown.

Barry M. Bloom is a national reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.