Don’t hold your breath for one of those increasingly rare spring mega-signings involving Pete Alonso. He is almost surely headed to free agency after the 2024 season.
That doesn’t mean he’s a goner. He just likely prefers to keep his options open.
Mets baseball president David Stearns basically admitted there’ll be no quick Alonso deal in Stearns’ spring opening presser, citing 1) Alonso’s star stature, 2) his new agent and 3) the timing.
“Look, when you have a really talented player who’s really good and who’s entering the final year of club control who happens to be represented by Scott Boras, these things generally end up in free agency,” Stearns said. “We understand that.”
There’s another reason, too, which is closely related to reason No. 1, and that is Alonso’s probable mindset. He’s not viewed by long-time acquaintances of the Mets’ slugger as a “hometown discount” kind of guy.
Though there’s no reason to doubt Alonso’s professed love for the Mets/New York, old friends believe Alonso’s preference has long been to ascertain his true value on the market, and be paid his market worth — which is obviously his right.
Of course, that doesn’t mean he’ll be leaving.
Brandon Nimmo also employs Boras, who’s famous for maximizing free-agent value, and he stayed a Met after becoming a free agent. Even bigger stars than Nimmo sometimes stay, notably Aaron Judge with the Yankees, and although Judge got a record deal he may be different from most huge stars in that he left money on the table by taking the Yankees’ $360 million bid without having the Giants or Padres counter.
Alonso, due in camp by Feb. 19, didn’t specifically tell the Mets he’ll be a free agent, but he didn’t have to. They’ve made a couple past attempts to lock him up long term, which gave them an early clue where this was headed.
The Mets are believed to have used as guideposts recent deals for star first basemen such as Freddie Freeman’s heavily deferred $162 million, six-year deal and Paul Goldschmidt’s $130 million, five-year deal, but Boras prefers much older deals, including two he negotiated — Mark Teixeira’s $180 million deal and Prince Fielder’s $214 million deal — as comps.
While the Fielder contract (and those for Albert Pujols, Joey Votto and Miguel Cabrera) are viewed as overpays, Boras will also note salaries generally have risen in the decade-plus since those deals were done. Alonso’s unique skill set (more home runs than anyone since entering MLB) combined with an unusual ability to stay on the field (an average of five games missed per year) means the effort to hit a grand slam in free agency seems inevitable.