PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. – Two months after Juan Soto signed the largest contract in pro sports history, a $765 million December lightning strike, the enormity of his paycheck still hasn’t sunk in.
“I’m still thinking about it and everything. It’s unbelievable,” Soto said Sunday upon reporting to New York Mets camp, where he’ll winter well past his 40th birthday.
“I’m really happy to know where I’m going to be for the next 15 years. Crazy. In a good way.”
A day later, Pete Alonso checked in, renewed acquaintances with Mets teammates and mused about his own winter free agent foray, which did not end until less than a week ago, when he signed a two-year, $54 million deal that he can terminate after one season.
“I definitely feel like I pushed the market forward for me… Pushing the market forward for 30-year-old first basemen,” says Alonso.
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“For me, that’s a win.”
A more modest winter, you might say.
Soto and Alonso were the alpha and omega of the Mets’ offseason, the focal points of a $1 billion outlay for eight players. It ended with the game’s premier free agent getting tied to the club through the next decade – and their previous franchise face confronting some harsh realities about his own market.
Together, they are tasked with helping the Mets win six more games than they did last year – when a surprise run to the National League Championship Series ended in defeat to the eventual champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
Those “OMG Mets” have given way to a Soto-infused borderline superteam – though the franchise stalwart nearly wasn’t a part of it. Alonso can opt out of his contract after one season, essentially a prove-it year after his production slipped in the two years before he became a free agent.
Yet the ever-chipper Alonso showed no bitterness Monday as his second Mets go-round commenced.
He dropped the word “stoked” four times in a 20-minute press conference. He appreciated the outreach from teammates Brandon Nimmo, Jesse Winker and Ryne Stanek, and the exhortations of workout buddy Sean Manaea saying, “Dude, you have to come back.”
And when his free agent market failed to develop, remembering the vibes of 2024 – when Alonso saved their season with a ninth-inning wild-card clinching home run – didn’t hurt.
“Making a run like that in ’24 you realize how much has to go in to getting there,” says Alonso. “That’s addicting. That playoff feeling, playing that high-leverage baseball – that’s what it’s all about.
“That is the most addicting feeling I’ve ever had on a baseball field. It’s motivation to get back and get better.”
Now, he is joining forces with Soto, and while their courtships were vastly different, the human element was crucial for both.
From exhausting to elated
If the Soto pursuit was a feverish process that ended in the Mets stealing him from the crosstown Yankees for just $15 million more, the Alonso slog was a staring match that owner Steve Cohen called “exhausting” during a January fan festival.
Yet both negotiations weren’t closed until Cohen and president of baseball operations David Stearns flew to Florida for meetings with both players, two months and hundreds of millions of dollars apart.
The Soto soiree only added stress for Cohen and Stearns in the endgame of high-stakes negotiations, the Mets pleasantly stunned when the 26-year-old slugger bound for the Hall of Fame said yes to them.
The Alonso summit allayed fears on the other side of the table.
Alonso is just 27 home runs from passing Darryl Strawberry atop the Mets’ all-time home run list. It is the only home he’s known in baseball, and after hitting 130 home runs in his first three full seasons, it appeared his free agency would be a geyser of cash.
So much so that he turned down a $158 million offer in 2023, a season and a half before free agency.
Little did Alonso that his last two seasons before freedom would be his worst: A .217 batting average in 2023, an adjusted OPS of 123 in each season, and an OPS that fell below .800 (.788) for the first time in his career.
Combine that with the Polar Bear’s likelihood he’d be more a defensive liability going forward, and it gave suitors pause.
Alonso swallowed hard and realized his plight was certainly part unpredictive market forces, but also of his own doing.
“I couldn’t have expected anything mega-long because I didn’t have my best year in ’23 or last year. The two years stacked up didn’t play to my potential,” he says. “You can’t expect to have a 10-year deal when I didn’t necessarily have my best two years in ’23 and ’24.
“Granted, definitely some positives. Definitely did a lot of cool things.”
Most notably his go-ahead home run off Devin Williams in the ninth inning of the decisive wild-card game at Milwaukee last October. The Mets stunned the Phillies and took the Dodgers to six games before the merry gang got broken up.
Yet Cohen was not to get swept up in the emotion of that big blast and magic run and hand over a blank check. At least not to anyone not named Soto.
They reeled in the generational slugger and then re-signed Manaea for $75 million, signed starters Clay Holmes and Frankie Montas and relievers A.J. Minter and Ryne Stanek, even re-upped Winker for the outfield.
Wither Pete?
Well, if the Soto pursuit was irrational exuberance, the Alonso negotiations were cold pragmatism. Cohen and Stearns wisely let the market come back to them.
“The qualifying offer definitely had an impact,” Alonso said of the draft-pick compensation that teams are loathe to give up for free agents that aren’t in the Soto stratosophere.
“That’s one thing I didn’t really expect. Guys that have had it, around age 30 – (Carlos) Correa, (Matt) Chapman, (Blake) Snell, (Alex) Bregman, a couple other guys had QO issues during free agency.”
The Mets would not have to sacrifice a draft pick to retain their own free agent, making a reunion sensible. Yet when Cohen let loose the “exhausting” remarks, a summit was necessary. Owner and GM decamped for Florida, giving Alonso the full free agent treatment as if he were a new recruit: A peek behind the organizational curtain, with grand plans for the future revealed.
The gesture went a long way toward Alonso thinking he might be a part of it.
“I respect that so much and I appreciate meeting people face to face, hearing their perspective and voicing mine,” says Alonso. “It was like a meeting of the minds. Just people talking ball.
“I’m happy (Cohen) decided to come down and we could talk in person. These people have believed in me from Day 1. And that means something.”
‘You gotta play’
Now, Alonso finds himself in arguably the best position in baseball: Hitting behind or around Soto. Just ask Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton how that worked out for them last year.
For Alonso, he hopes to pair that cushy spot in the lineup with swing adjustments that help him avoid the bad habits he fell into last year. Oddly enough, a banner season might make him more likely to become an ex-Met.
He won’t be subject to the qualifying offer next season, which, paired with a strong campaign, would give him a strong market, perhaps one that launches him into the nine-figure contractual galaxy.
Soto wouldn’t mind if the union went deeper than that.
“He’s one of the best pure power hitters in the league,” says Soto. “We’re trying to have some of that protection. It’s great to have him over here and it’s huge for the team.”
And fret not for Alonso’s bank account. He made $20.5 million in his final year of arbitration and his current deal has a frontloaded $30 million salary this year, driving his net career earnings north of $70 million.
Should he spray the ball into the Citi Field seats as both parties know he can, perhaps the Mets will see fit to make Alonso’s stay permanent.
“That would be fantastic,” says Alonso. “I’ve had a great first six seasons. People have been so receptive. This has been home. This is such a great organization
“I don’t regret it because every single step of the way in my career – high school, college, all of my six years here, you bet on yourself every year. You gotta play.”
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