Admin December 9, 2024
Juan Soto snubs Yankees, signs historic $765 million contract with the Mets
The wait is over! Juan Soto agreed to a massive 15-year $765 million contract with the Mets and our experts are here to break it down.
Sports Pulse
Juan Soto agreed to the biggest contract in sports history to kick off Major League Baseball’s Winter Meetings, but there should be plenty of hot stove action in the days to come at the annual event in Dallas.
Soto’s 15-year, $765 million deal with the New York Mets on Sunday night surpassed the $700 million contract that Shohei Ohtani signed last winter and may very well have shifted the balance of power behind the World Series champion Dodgers in the National League.
The trade market always takes shape at the Winter Meetings, with Chicago White Sox starter Garrett Crochet among the top players expected to be traded before the 2025 season begins.
Keep it here all day Monday for the latest news and rumors from around baseball:
With Juan Soto no longer available, Alex Bregman becomes the best hitter available on the free agent market.
“Alex is a good player, man. He’s a complete player. He’s a player that’s been on winning teams his whole career,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said at the Winter Meetings on Monday.
“Good defender. Offensively he’s really good. He’s a guy that a lot of people are talking about, and I do believe he can impact a big league team, a championship-caliber team. He’s that type of player.”
DALLAS — The Philadelphia Phillies, whose bullpen failed them again in the postseason, hope they have solved their Achilles heel by agreeing to a one-year, $7.75 million contract with free agent All-Star closer Jordan Romano on Monday at the Winter Meetings.
Romano was one of baseball’s premier closers from 2021-23 with the Toronto Blue Jays before missing the final four months of the season with an elbow injury. He needed arthroscopic surgery for an elbow impingement. The Blue Jays non-tendered him last month, making him a free agent.
Romano, 31, saved 95 games and struck out 230 batters with a 2.37 ERA from 2021-23, with the highest WAR among all relievers during that span.
– Bob Nightengale
DALLAS — The Detroit Tigers have added a starting pitcher.
The Tigers have signed right-hander Alex Cobb, an All-Star in 2023, to a one-year contract in MLB free agency, according to a source with knowledge of the agreement. The two sides agreed Monday, the first day of MLB’s Winter Meetings, but the deal is pending a physical exam.
Cobb, 37, posted a 2.76 ERA with three walks and 10 strikeouts across 16⅓ innings in three starts for the Cleveland Guardians in the 2024 season. He missed most of the season because of left hip surgery and a right shoulder injury.
– Evan Petzold, Detroit Free Press
Cubs announce Matthew Boyd deal
No need to sugarcoat it: This is devastating for the Yankees.
Soto and Aaron Judge made for one of the great middle-of-the-order duos in major league history, combining for 99 home runs (apropos), combining with Giancarlo Stanton to reestablish a punishing Bronx Bombers presence and drive the Yankees to their first World Series since 2009.
What now?
The answers are all suboptimal, to a degree. The Yankees can try to add power and address badly-needed upgrades by pursuing Alex Bregman, Pete Alonso or Christian Walker, with the first two options likely costing in excess of $200 million.
All three are right-handed hitters, however, which would badly imbalance the lineup around Judge. That’s where a trade for Cody Bellinger makes so much sense: They could likely import the lefty-hitting, athletically elite first baseman/outfielder from the Cubs for not much more than taking on the potential $52.5 million owed Bellinger this year and next (He has a player option for 2026).
Juan Soto and Blake Snell, the top two players in USA TODAY Sports’ 2024-25 free agent rankings, are now off the board but there’s elite talent remaining on the market expected to fetch big deals.
Here are the top 10 players still on the market:
- SP Corbin Burnes
- 3B Alex Bregman
- 1B Pete Alonso
- SP Max Fried
- OF Teoscar Hernández
- OF Anthony Santander
- INF Gleyber Torres
- SP Nathan Eovaldi
- SP Jack Flaherty
- RP Tanner Scott
Longtime New York Mets announcer Gary Cohen told SNY late Sunday that Juan Soto’s record-breaking 15-year, $765 million deal is “the biggest and most important transaction the Mets have ever made.”
“The only one that even is in the same ballpark is the trade for Mike Piazza in 1998.
“The Mets have never dipped this deeply into the free into the free agent market in terms of the caliber of player and youth. The thing that would come closest to that would be signing Carlos Beltran (seven years, $119 million after 2004 season).”
With the team coming off an NLCS appearance, Cohen said Soto “completely changes the conversation around the Mets” and the addition “automatically” makes New York the NL East favorites “regardless of what they do the rest of the offseason.”
DALLAS — This is the exact spot where it happened, turning the baseball world upside down, leaving executives fuming, and publicly threatening that it would forever ruin the sport.
The date: Dec. 11, 2000. The time: 1:30 a.m. The location: Room 633, Anatole Hotel, Dallas, Texas.
It was the moment the Texas Rangers agreed to a 10-year, $252 million contract with shortstop Alex Rodriguez.“How can I forget?” said former Rangers GM Doug Melvin. “How can anyone forget?”
Now, 24 years later, at this same hotel, history repeated itself. This time, it’s Juan Soto signing a record 15-year, $765 million contract with the New York Mets.
And once again, particularly from the small- and mid-sized markets, you could hear screaming into the Texas night, and cries that the sport is broken – worrying about a work stoppage in 2026.
Scott Boras, the man who negotiated A-Rod’s contract and now Soto’s, can only laugh and will tell you it’s a shrewd business deal that will only enhance the franchise’s value.
“I think the process was very misunderstood,” Boras told USA TODAY Sports of the Rodriguez pursuit. “When you look at the surplus value, even though the Rangers didn’t win, it was economically beneficial to the franchise. It was definitely team-friendly.”
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