Juan Soto transforms the Mets, who still need pitching, while the Yankees take a hit: Law

The best MLB free agent of this offseason, and one of the best of the last five offseasons, signed the biggest contract in pro sports history , as Juan Soto got 15 years and $765 million dollars from the New York Mets to travel about seven miles from the Bronx to Queens.

The move makes the Mets the best team in the National League East on paper, although they have to do more because the Philadelphia Phillies wont stand pat, while the New York Yankees now have to scramble to fill the void left by the loss of Sotos bat.

Advertisement Soto is an enormous upgrade for the Mets, as hed be for any team.

He was the third-best player in the American League last year and the second-best hitter, with a 180 wRC+ that only lagged behind his teammate, Aaron Judge .

Fifteen Mets had at least 100 PA in the majors last year and their best hitter was Francisco Lindor at a 137 wRC+, just ahead of Jose Iglesias, who is a free agent (and whose performance was a wild fluke).

Sotos best skill is his ridiculous plate discipline and the resulting ability to get on base, and while the Mets OBP in 2024 was above the NL median, they had the worst OBP of the six NL playoff teams.

(Its worth noting that the top six teams in the NL by OBP all made the playoffs.) To put it another way, if we return to the list of Mets with 100 PA in 2024, their No.

1 and No.

3 OBP guys are both free agents, so the Mets replaced them with the second-best OBP in all of baseball.

GO DEEPER Inside Juan Soto landing the biggest contract in pro sports history from Steve Cohens Mets Soto probably takes most of his at-bats from Starling Marte, who was barely an average hitter at 104 wRC+ and a dismal defender in a corner with a fielding run value of minus-7 runs.

The result is about a 7-win upgrade for the Mets if Soto more or less repeats his 2024, and I think thats a median projection given his age and skill set.

It wouldnt surprise me at all to see Soto have a year or two early in this deal where hes a 9-WAR player.

Even if he settles in around 6-7 WAR for the first half or so of the contract, he and Lindor give the Mets a pretty high floor as contenders in every season.

Of course, the size and length of the deal look absurd, and I doubt anyone expects Soto to still be a $50-million-a-year player in 2039, when hell be 40 if we havent burned up the planet by then.

All of these decade-plus deals are about spreading out the money for budget and luxury-tax reasons.

It might make more sense to think of this as a 10-year deal with deferrals, and then if Soto settles in as a solid DH who maybe doesnt hit for much average but still has some power and draws walks once hes in his late 30s, thats all a bonus.

As much as I talk about certain salaries being too high for the players expected value, Soto is about as valuable as it gets, and its pretty clear Mets owner Steve Cohen isnt going to let a mere $765 million stop him from spending elsewhere to build a champion.

Advertisement The Mets have also signed a few pitchers to shore up a rotation that had three starters who qualified for the ERA title and all three hit free agency, with one, Luis Severino , already signed elsewhere .

Kodai Senga should be back, and both Paul Blackburn and David Peterson are nice fifth starters, but the Mets needed to get some top-end starters to make the team both stronger in the regular season and, more importantly, a bigger threat in October.

Instead, theyve signed two projects, both right-handers who have serious issues getting lefties out.

Frankie Montas signed for two years and $34 million (the second year is a player option) coming off a year when he was worth 0.6 bWAR/1.4 fWAR for the Cincinnati Reds and Milwaukee Brewers .

Left-handed batters hit .276/.370/.497 off him in 2024, and theyve hit .265/.344/.456 off him in his career.

So while the Reds home park favoring left-handed power hitters didnt help matters, the issues are structural, not a fluke.

There might be some adjustments he can make to reduce the size of the platoon split, like perhaps ditching his cutter against them and throwing more splitters, but his issues throwing strikes to lefties arent going away.

Hes also got a long history of injuries, missing all of 2023, and his 150 2/3 innings last year marked his second-highest workload ever.

Clay Holmes is a project of another sort, as hes a career reliever whom the Mets signed to a three-year deal and intend to incorporate in the rotation.

He hasnt made a start since 2018 and was never very effective in that role in the minors, walking 11.8 percent of batters he faced as a starter in Triple A with less than a strikeout an inning and a 3.58 ERA.

Holmes kills righties, but against lefties, hes given up a .251/.359/.346 line in his career, with 2024 the first year where he cut his walk rate against them to an acceptable level.

Advertisement Hes essentially a sinker/slider guy.

Although you might argue he has both a slider and a sweeper, he does not have a pitch designed to get lefties out, as any breaking pitch he throws is going to move in toward left-handed hitters bats.

Platoon split issues dont get better when a pitcher moves to the rotation and has to face opposing hitters two or even, dare I say it, three times.

Maybe the Mets think they can give Holmes a splitter or changeup to deal with this issue, but theres a risk that doesnt work out, and I dont understand the three-year deal regardless of their plans.

All that is a long way of saying go sign a real above-average starter, guys.

Youre the Mets.

Sign Corbin Burnes.

In for a penny, in for all of the pounds.

It doesnt make sense to sign the best free-agent hitter weve seen in years, and then go cheap on the pitching side.

I wouldnt even consider bringing Pete Alonso back if that might be an obstacle to signing a high-end starter.

Signing Juan Soto to that deal tells everyone that its World Series or bust, as it should be for the Mets.

That means addressing the rotation, which has exactly zero guys in it you could count on for 160 league-average innings right now.

Their main competition in the NL East, Philadelphia, has the best rotation in the National League, and theyre going to make a big signing or trade at some point.

The Mets cant stand pat and wait for it when they still have a clear weakness on the depth chart.

The Yankees bet big on Soto, and got a pennant out of it, but theres no replacing what they lost with his departure.

There isnt a free agent out there good enough to hold his batting gloves, and while I could see steps forward for several Yankees hitters this year, including Anthony Volpe and Jazz Chisholm Jr.

, theyre not making up the gap with internal improvements.

They only return two regulars who managed at least a .300 OBP for them last year in Judge and Austin Wells .

Their best bet to try to prop up the offense which is now without the 299 times Soto reached base last year might be to try to trade for someone who isnt expected to be available.

GO DEEPER Where the Yankees stand: What should they do after their failed Juan Soto pursuit? Maybe the Athletics Brent Rooker (.365 OBP), although the As seem to be in spending mode for now.

Maybe the Cleveland Guardians Steven Kwan (.368 OBP), although his low salary, his collapse in the second half, and his lack of power probably make it hard to see anyone giving up what the Guardians might want.

The Chicago Cubs seem to want to move Seiya Suzuki , who had a .366 OBP and has been a 3+ WAR player the last two years, with a walk rate that would be second among returning Yankees.

Advertisement The big winners here are the Baltimore Orioles , who just saw their most immediate rival take a big hit from which they arent going to completely recover.

The Os should pounce and go get another starter, whether its bringing Burnes back or signing someone else from the group of above-average starters out there or even trading for someone like Jordan Montgomery , who has to be better in 2025 once he has a regular offseason and spring training.

This isnt the time for new owner David Rubenstein to be complacent, and signing Tyler ONeill and Gary Sanchez doesnt exactly move the needle here.

Every AL East team should be more aggressive in the wake of Sotos departure.

If I were an Orioles fan, Id worry the signings of a platoon outfielder and a backup catcher mean the team will be the least aggressive of the four.

(Top photo of Soto: Brad Penner / USA Today).

This article has been shared from the original article on theathleticuk, here is the link to the original article.