DALLAS — At baseball’s annual winter meetings in Dallas, the only manager coy with his compliments about superstar Juan Soto was the one in charge of his new team, if the reports are to be believed.
Asked about his offseason, New York Mets manager Carlos Mendoza smiled. “It’s going well. It’s going really well,” he said to the crowd of reporters. “There’s a lot to like when you’re looking at a player who’s worth that much money.”
For the past 24 hours, reports of a blockbuster $765 million deal to bring Soto, one of the sport’s finest young hitters, to the Mets for 15 years have dominated the baseball world.
By Monday night, the Mets had still not publicly confirmed the move. But the eye-popping contract is worth even more than last year’s then-record-setting $700 million deal between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the two-way Japanese star Shohei Ohtani. And landing with the Mets meant Soto had rejected his current team, the New York Yankees, to head from the Bronx to Queens.
“He’s a tremendous player,” said Dave Martinez, who managed Soto during his 4.5 seasons with the Washington Nationals. “He’s going to help the Mets, as we all know. I’m proud of him.”
A star from his first MLB start
From the beginning of his major league career, the Dominican-born Soto has been a star. In his first start as a 19-year-old with the Nationals, he hit a home run in his first appearance at the plate. He quickly became a fan favorite with his easy smile and “Soto shuffle,” his trademark shimmy at the plate. He won a World Series title with the team in 2019, the first in the franchise’s history.
In 2022, he was traded to the San Diego Padres, who then dealt him to the New York Yankees ahead of the 2024 season.
On a one-year deal in New York, Soto had the best year of his still-young career, with 41 regular season home runs and another four in the playoffs during the Yankees’ unsuccessful run to the World Series. He received the third-most votes in the American League MVP race. Since his debut in 2018, he’s won a total of five Silver Slugger awards and four All-Star game appearances.
It is rare for a player of his caliber to come on the open market at such a young age — at 26, he may not have yet reached the peak of his skill.
Soto stood out from other young prospects from the start, Martinez said. “The ball comes off his bat different. The way he approaches the hitting was way different than a lot of kids I’ve seen,” he said.
“I don’t know what he’s going to do when he’s 40, but I know what he’s gonna do come opening day,” Martinez added. “The Mets got a really good player and a great person, so I’m really happy for him.”
To Padres manager Mike Shildt, who worked with Soto during both his seasons in San Diego, Soto’s enormous contract was a sign of baseball’s health and stature in the wider world of entertainment.
Shildt compared the annual value of Soto’s contract — $51 million per year — to that of TV personality Judge Judy, who reportedly earned $47 million per year in the 2010s.
“Forty seven million dollars a year, and I don’t think she throws a really good curveball or could hit a good slider. And she was making way more than anybody — before Juan — has made in our industry,” Shildt said. “So, good for him. I’m happy for him.”
Transcript:
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Seven hundred sixty-five million dollars – that’s how much the baseball superstar Juan Soto is set to make over the next decade and a half with the New York Mets, according to reports. It is believed to be the biggest contract in the history of pro sports. NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan joins me now from Dallas, where she’s at baseball’s winter meetings. Hey, Becky.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Hey there.
SUMMERS: I mean, Becky, $765 million, that is not a bad contract for somebody who’s just 26-years-old.
SULLIVAN: I know. Yeah, I think we may have gone into the wrong line of work.
SUMMERS: (Laughter).
SULLIVAN: And Juan Soto, by the way, turned 26 on the day of Game 1 of the World Series, so it’s quite the young 26. And it’s just really rare that a player of his caliber, who is also so young, he’s potentially not at his – the peak of his skills yet, is coming onto the open market. He just wrapped up this one-year deal with the New York Yankees and had maybe the best year of his career. He hit 41 home runs in the regular season. He added four more in the post season, finished in third place in the American League MVP voting. And so he was just clearly the biggest prize of this offseason, and there were a lot of teams bidding for his contract. And the Mets won. And if he plays out this full contract of this full 15 years, that would take him through age 41, so he could be a Met for life.
SUMMERS: Tell me a little bit more about Soto as a person and as a player. I mean, he’s pretty well-known to people who love baseball, but perhaps not a huge household name outside of that.
SULLIVAN: Yeah. He was born in the Dominican Republic to a dad who was a huge baseball fan and brought him, you know, to his softball league and to batting practice. There’s stories of him practicing by hitting bottle caps in his living room. But he was really good from quite a young age. So by the time he was, like, 12 or so, he was already starting to draw attention from scouts – came to the U.S. when he was 16 and eventually made his debut with the Washington Nationals when he was 19-years-old. At the time, he was the youngest player in the major leagues. And in his very first start, he hit a home run at his very first at bat. So set the bar high from the beginning.
And he has since become a terrific player – incredible at the plate. He hits big, of course, when he does hit, but he’s also amazing at reading pitches and taking walks. And so every time he’s at bat, it’s like this miniature drama between him and the pitcher. And he’s known for his Soto Shuffle, which is this sort of, like, saucy little routine that he does when he’s up to bat where he kind of like, shimmies and slides his feet back and forth after taking a pitch, and he, like, is staring down the pitcher. But it’s all in good fun for him. He’s a good-natured guy, usually laughing and smiling a lot while he plays, and it’s just a lot of fun to watch.
SUMMERS: Becky, tell us, what does this massive contract mean for baseball?
SULLIVAN: I think it means that we are in baseball’s big-money era. This follows the $700 million contract that broke all these records last year, signed by Shohei Ohtani, who’s the Japanese superstar who signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers. And overall, there is just seeming to be this widening gap between the haves and the have-nots in baseball. There’s no hard salary cap in major leagues, and so if teams are willing to spend this much money, there’s basically nothing to stop them from paying these huge deals. There’s also no salary floor, so there’s nothing to stop cheap teams from rolling out poor rosters year after year.
And despite this, there had been parody in baseball recently in the last 10 years. Three different franchises have won their first-ever World Series. But Soto’s contract is worth more annually than the bottom eight teams have committed to their entire rosters for next season. That’s according to Spotrac, which is a service that tracks contracts. So, you know, with that kind of gap, there’s no surprise that three of the top spending teams in baseball made up 3 of the 4 final contenders for the World Series in the playoff this past year. That’s a huge gap that may only continue to grow.
SUMMERS: NPR’s Becky Sullivan. Thanks so much.
SULLIVAN: You are welcome.
