Livescore
The Mets will not have Carlos Correa in their lineup for 2023 and beyond.
That’s bad news for their 2023 season. Not devastating news, because here’s the thing: The Mets were already going to be really good back when we all thought Correa was going to be a Giant, and they’ll still be really good now that it looks like he’ll be with the Twins. Not as good, but good. The kind of good where a season with a win total right around triple digits isn’t just a pipe dream, but a realistic goal. Hell, if everyone stays healthy, it’s a baseline.
MORE: Why Carlos Correa signed with the Twins after Giants, Mets deals fell through
“I would agree with that, with that pitching staff, everything they’ve been able to accomplish,” Mark DeRosa, the 16-year MLB veteran who is Co-host of MLB Network’s “MLB Central,” told me on the phone Tuesday afternoon. “Certainly having him in that lineup, moving to third base, would have been just a huge, huge get. But you still look at that offense, with (Brandon) Nimmo coming back, (Jeff) McNeil and (Pete) Alonso and (Starling) Marte and (Francisco) Lindor, all the guys they’ve got, certainly they’re going to be good. That NL East is going to be a grind.”
The Mets were legitimate World Series contenders with him, and they’ll be World Series contenders without him. They have the pieces to win in October.
The silver lining news for the Mets? They won’t have Correa’s salary on the payroll, and removing a $315 million deal that averages out to $26.2 million per season over the next 12 years is major surgery. Like, operate-on-your-ankle significant. Even for Mets owner Steve Cohen, that’s a big enough chunk of change that it will impact how he spends on payroll.
And, rest assured, there will be plenty of ways for Cohen to spend that $315 million. As always with Cohen, think big. Like, think of that $315 million as a partial payment on a longer contract that could be on the horizon.
Here are the potential future Mets:
Shohei Ohtani
Last week, we talked about the riches that await Ohtani when the baseball unicorn reaches the free-agent market next offseason. The Angels will do everything in their power to keep him from hitting the market, but that isn’t going to happen. He’s going to become a free agent, and the list of teams interested in Ohtani probably will be longer than the list of teams that Ohtani is interested in.
“He’s going to be, probably, so specific as far as his criteria as far as size of the market, winning capability, sustained winning capability. After what he’s gone through in Anaheim, I’m sure he’s going to be very particular,” MLB Network Analyst Dan O’Dowd, a former Rockies GM, told me recently.
“Obviously, there’s only going to be a few organizations that have the capabilities financially to play at that level.”
The Mets, um, are one of those franchises. Ohtani is going to make Correa’s deals — all three of them — look like piggy-bank stuff. Cohen undoubtedly would have been in the conversation for Ohtani anyway, but now that he suddenly has an extra $315 million freed up? It would not be at all surprising to see the Cohen-led bidding push half a billion dollars.
Manny Machado
Machado already has one $300-million contract under his belt, but that deal came with an opt-out after the 2023 season. It’s an opt-out that Machado certainly is going to take advantage of, whether he uses it to renegotiate with the Padres or hit the market.
He’ll be entering his Age 31 season, and he’s playing as well as he has at any point in his career. Last year, he finished second in the NL MVP voting, with a 6.8 bWAR and 159 OPS+. He plays stellar defense at third base, and locking him up long-term would pair him with Lindor to give the Mets the best left side of the infield in baseball.
And, yes, he’ll be 31 in 2024, but Machado has been as durable as any player in the league. He’s played 1,156 of the possible 1,194 regular season games since the start of the 2015 season, a remarkable 96.8 percent. That’s second in the bigs, only two games behind Paul Goldschmidt. He might not get 12 years, but he’ll get a healthy AAV.
Juan Soto
This one’s a bit more of a long-shot — mostly because of the timelines — but not impossible. Soto, the left-handed slugger with a World Series trophy already on his resume, won’t be a free agent until after the 2024 season. If he gets there, and Cohen’s Mets don’t land either Ohtani or Machado, go ahead and start ordering your Soto/Mets jerseys for 2025.
But let’s say the Mets decide Soto is the priority sooner than that, and the Padres realize he’s going to test the free-agent market — which is what he’s always contended he will do, and why he turned down the lucrative extension from the Nationals. And let’s say the Padres decide to trade him after the 2023 season, bringing back a haul of young MLB talent and prospects. Making that move would go a long way toward restocking an organizational talent pool that’s taken a hit the past few years.
The Mets have a top 10 farm system, with lots of players likely to make an impact at the major league level during the 2023 season. They wouldn’t necessarily want to trade all of them, but again, if Soto is the priority? Yeah, they’d make the move. And then Cohen could negotiate with Soto and his agent — yes, it’s Scott Boras — and hammer out an extension that’s far, far north of $400 million.
Basically, Correa isn’t getting Cohen’s money, but Cohen will be spending it soon enough.
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