Reese Kaplan -- Pondering the Two Unthinkable Mets Transactions

The next interesting case for the Mets 2023/2024 off season is what will happen to the starting rotation if indeed Yoshinobu Yamamoto decides he is not in favor of joining the rebuilding New York Mets.  All of the sudden the stories about his prospective deal keep sprinkling in words like "underdog" or "outside looking in" when describing the Mets' prospect of landing the Japanese gem.  How rapidly things descended from the Mets were the front runners to the Mets are the also rans.

Truth be told, if you were the player in question you'd want to consider things like the culture of the new organization plus the financial commitment they will make not just to payroll but also to conditioning and player development.  Of course, all ballplayers want to be associated with a winning team and in that regard the club's somewhat checkered and scattered post season appearances are few and far between.  Coming off a losing record with two multiple Cy Young award winning starting pitchers, Kodai Senga, Jose Quintana, the reigning NL batting champion, Francisco Lindor, Pete Alonso and Brandon Nimmo, finding the club closer to the basement than the top is not a good road map and history to sell to newcomers.

So let's assume for a moment that the media naysayers are indeed correct and that Yamamoto has Los Angeles, San Francisco, Toronto or the Bronx on his mind, what then will Steve Cohen and David Stearns actually do?

Well, there are still quite a few formidable arms in free agency, headed by Blake Snell, Jordan Montgomery and others.  Then there is the trade route, but that approach might have become more difficult when Ronny Mauricio went down for the 2024 season which means other Baby Mets are now less spare parts but necessary ones.  Your veteran players are appealing with regard to Nimmo and McNeil, but the one who would net the most in return plays first base.

So let's momentarily consider the future of Pete Alonso.  It is somewhat telling that according to reports the Mets have not seemingly made it any kind of priority to extend his contract to keep him in Queens for the foreseeable future.  With Scott Boras as an agent, he's likely being advised to sell himself to the open market at the conclusion of 2024 when there is no Shoehei Ohtani nor Juan Soto around to overshadow his offensive production.  

The options the Mets have are three fold.  They could extend the man right now which would likely involve a massive overpay now that Ohtani has reset the baseball superstar salary threshhold for the future.  Would you pay $35 to $40 million per year for Alonso for as many as six seasons?  That's a lot of green for someone who is indeed homegrown but who last season resembled too much of an all-or-nothing hitter.

Option number two would be to try to hedge your bets by keeping Alonso at first base until midyear when pennant chasing teams are looking to reinforce who they have in their lineup.  You would be looking for a passel of hotshot prospects in exchange for Alonso as a half year of a 40+ home run bat with 50+ RBIs could seal the October deal for a team on the edge of the best teams around.

Option number three would be to take a page out of the Padres' operating manual and trade the man during this off season before he becomes a free agent and try to net a bigger payout than you would get for a midyear deal while also saving yourself about $30 million in his salary.  While Steve Cohen has not been shy about spending his money, not all of it was done wisely and there are players helping other teams like Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander and others who are hitting the Mets budget this year.  Consequently the financial brain trust may find partially balancing those payments a bit an appealing approach.  

While the club has done some horrific deals in the past headed by the Nolan Ryan and Tom Seaver fiascos, you do have to clear your head a bit and think about those three Alonso approaches.  For the rest of us who are not paying the salary, extending the man is likely choice number one.  If the Mets are not likely to hit the post season, then option number two would likely be appealing as you only have to give up Alonso's contributions for the post All Star Break part of the 2024 season.

Let us take a healthy swig of something strong and momentarily consider option number three -- dealing Alonso now rather than later.  The short term loss of 40 HRs 100 RBIs is nothing to take lightly, but if there is truth to the 2024 seasn being a bit of a transition year then a huge trade could help reinforce that perspective.  It won't be too long before Luisangel Acuna, Drew Gilbert, Ryan Clifford and others in the pipeline.  Imagine adding two more top ten prospects at minimum from another club for Alonso as opposed to losing him as a free agent and getting at best a draft pick.  Consider saving $30 million.  There is some traction here as hard as it would be to lose out on the most powerful home run hitter the club has ever had.  

So the open ended hypothetical question is, what would be a fair deal to execute an off season trade of Pete Alonso prior to Spring Training?  Have at it.